Posted on April 19, 2026
The Lens-Artists challenge this week is ‘history through the lens’.
If I were being pedantic (pedantic? moi? surely not) I could argue that every photograph ever taken is an example of history through the lens, because it captures a moment in time that has already passed into history, even before you get a chance to look at it.
Of course, this isn’t really helpful for the purposes of the challenge. What we’re after is something indisputably old, and preferably crumbling.
But enough about my selfies. Like most photographers, I suspect, I have plenty of images of old buildings in various states of decay and disrepair. However, I wanted to find something a bit different.
This is part of a tableau in a museum set in an old chateau (I forget exactly where, unfortunately). The table is set with furniture and crockery of the interwar years, but what made it stand out for me was the blown-up to life-size old photograph that had been somehow printed onto a cloth sheet to form a backdrop to the scene.
Two particular features worthy of note: the massive wooden clogs worn by the gentleman on the right. And I hope that the other man in the picture is not really who he looks like.

Lens-Artists Challenge: History through the lens
Category: Autrefois, Black & White Tagged: Black & White, History, Lens-Artists, Museum, sepia, tableau
Posted on September 14, 2017
Oradour-sur-Glane is a place not very far from here that I’ve visited many times, and I’ve featured images from it in several other posts on this blog.
You can find out more about it here, but suffice it to say that it’s a permanent – and very powerful – memorial to a war crime perpetrated in June 1944.
Given this background, it’s not surprising to hear that there are very few doors left to show, but there are enough to provide hopefully an interesting and enlightening contribution to Thursday Doors.
This was the butcher’s shop:

And this the boulangerie (bakers). The sign on the left says “Here were found two charred corpses”

The village had been there for a long time, as you can see from this ironwork above a doorway on the main street:

This door is in the church:

This barn lies behind the church. Given its reasonable condition, I suspect it is used as a depot for site maintenance:

Finally. this is the heavy bronze door that leads to a crypt in the cemetery which houses a museum dedicated to the victims:

Thursday Doors 14 September 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Doors, History, Oradour-sur-Glane, Thursday Doors
Posted on February 17, 2015
This is the first post in a new category of ‘Autrefois’, in which I’ve tried to reproduce, as closely as possible, the modern look of views shown on old picture postcards of the Haute Vienne departément.
Bussiere-Poitevine: the tram station
Between the two wars, there was an extensive tram network in the Limousin region. Today very little remains, apart from some of the old stations (gares), with their distinctive checkered brickwork around doors and windows and corners.
The gare at Bussiere-Poitevine is one of the better-preserved and now does service as a municipal building.
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Bussiere-Poitevine: Maison Leger Montel
I’ve no idea what kind of shop Maison Leger Montel was, although when the picture for the postcard was taken they had a sale (‘Soldes’) on.
Today, it’s a hairdressers.
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Category: Autrefois Tagged: Autrefois, Bussiere-Poitevine, Haute Vienne, History, Limousin, postcards, sepia, trams