Storyville Portrait, c. 1912
Gold toned printing out paper, printed by Lee Friedlander
10 × 8 inches
Initialed by Lee Friedlander
October 19, 2026
E.J. Bellocq’s photography is deeply steeped in the history and lore of New Orleans. This playfully alluring image is one of his best known portraits of the women who worked in Storyville, the city’s onetime legal red-light district—legendary pictures that were unknown during his lifetime.
Years after Bellocq’s death, his original glass plate negatives were discovered by art and antique dealer Larry Borenstein in a room behind Preservation Hall—a former photography studio that Borenstein had converted into an art gallery and then a jazz club. Borenstein introduced the plates to Lee Friedlander, who he was acquainted with as a prolific photographer of the New Orleans jazz scene. Fascinated by the images, Friedlander purchased the negatives in 1966 and made prints like this one using turn-of-the-century techniques. Friedlander's prints served as the foundation for a landmark 1970 exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, which introduced this mysterious and bewitching body of work to the world.
