Looking for a picture of a windy day

March 13, 2007 8:46 PM

I'm looking for a link to a famous(ish) picture featuring an impossibly windy day.

I've seen it two or three times over the years in gift/poster shops. Hopefully my memory isn't playing tricks. The clues I have:

* It's a painting or drawing, not a real photograph.
* It's set in a city.
* People are maybe waiting around for a bus or something.
* Might be set in the 1950s or earlier if you look at the fashions.
* At least one person is holding on to a railing or similar and is practically being blown horizontal.

posted by uncanny hengeman to media & arts (18 comments total)

It's not Gusty Day On the Isis is it?
posted by Rubber Soul at 8:58 PM on March 13, 2007

No. But thanks, Rubber Soul.
posted by uncanny hengeman at 9:06 PM on March 13, 2007

Is it Jean Beraud's 'A Windy Day on the Pont des Arts'?
posted by Effigy2000 at 9:33 PM on March 13, 2007

Or this, by the same artist (apparently)?
posted by Effigy2000 at 9:37 PM on March 13, 2007

A little bit more modern. Say in the style of The Boulevard of Broken Dreams.

Pretty sure in was set in an American city.
posted by uncanny hengeman at 10:00 PM on March 13, 2007

Jour de Vent, Place de la Concorde (Windy Day, Place de la Concorde) ?
Same artist as Effigy2000's post, I believe.
posted by hindmost at 10:03 PM on March 13, 2007

I am hindmost's failure to preview.
posted by hindmost at 10:07 PM on March 13, 2007

Maybe Buster Keaton in 'Steamboat Bill Jr.?
posted by Etaoin Shrdlu at 10:36 PM on March 13, 2007

While I can't remember the artist or title, are you sure you're not thinking of a photograph? I remember seeing a photography museum in the Austin MoA and there was a photographer who would stage photographs-- the one that sound similar was one something of a construction paper background, fake set type thing with several people in front on a sidewalk all pretending like they were being blown away. One guy was hanging from a wire, horizontally, holding onto a lampost.
posted by stresstwig at 11:19 PM on March 13, 2007

Thanks, stresstwig.

Very possible. Maybe it was so freaky my memory morphed it into a drawing and not a photo.
posted by uncanny hengeman at 11:25 PM on March 13, 2007

A related image, very famous in contemporary art circles, is Jeff Wall's phtowork entitled A Sudden Gust of Wind (1993).
posted by londongeezer at 11:51 PM on March 13, 2007

londongeezer, I was just about to say that.

A Sudden Gust of Wind

It's a riff on a C19th print by Hokusai:

Ejiri in Suruga Province
posted by unSane at 3:47 AM on March 14, 2007

Great fun perusing your answers. Very interesting.

stresstwig's answer sounds extremely close to the mark, if you could have a re-read of his description.

Sorry for giving you a bum steer and saying it wasn't a photograph.
posted by uncanny hengeman at 4:45 AM on March 14, 2007

Hmm, I don't know if this is it, but this is the photo I was remembering. Nic Nicosia:

http://www.ccsb.com/images/art_photos/gallery/near_modern_disaster.jpg
posted by stresstwig at 2:36 PM on March 14, 2007

Sorry, here's his real website, with that photo (Near (modern) Disaster #8) in his early work section:

http://www.nicnicosia.com/#
posted by stresstwig at 2:40 PM on March 14, 2007

That's not it. It was a city streetscape with multi-storey buildings in the background.

But thanks for all your help, everyone. I think it might be time to abandon all hope. :(
posted by uncanny hengeman at 5:14 PM on March 14, 2007

(same links as here).

this popped up here, as did this.

You could try here (some pos NSFW), too.
posted by Dub at 6:15 AM on May 31, 2007

(Addenda: Sorry, I should have mentioned, I used Google Ripper and Dogpile image searches)
posted by Dub at 6:21 AM on May 31, 2007