The Artists' Muse

No river in the world has been more painted, photographed, written about, or sung than the Seine. The Impressionists were obsessed with capturing its changing lights—Monet painted it over and over, trying to pin down its ephemeral moods. Renoir set his joyful boating parties on its waters. Later, photographers like Brassaï and Doisneau found poetry in the misty mornings and lamplit evenings along the quais.

Writers from Baudelaire to Hemingway have found inspiration walking its banks. Musicians have composed symphonies to its rhythms. "The Seine is not just a river," noted the poet Jacques Prévert, "it's a state of mind."

This artistic legacy continues today. Kadiatou Sylla, a young photographer from Mali, documents life along the Seine's less touristy stretches: "People think the Seine is just Notre-Dame and the Eiffel Tower, but the river extends far beyond central Paris. In the suburbs, you find different communities, different relationships with the water. Fishermen from Southeast Asia, kids from the housing projects learning to kayak, elderly couples who've walked the same stretch every evening for fifty years. This is the Seine too."