Pictorial album 31 x 22.8 cm, bound in quarter red calf over marbled boards with gilt lettering “SCÈNES | DE | LA VIE | PRIVÉE” and gilt ornament to spine; marbled endpapers, flyleaf, blue original wrapper (title-page) lettered SCÈNES | DE LA VIE PRIVÉE. | {vignette} | SIX DESSINS || «Six dessins» struck out, ms inscription beneath “Douze”. Twelve hand-coloured lithographs, some inscribed with letters and/or numbers in reverse, each in a double-rule frame 22 x 16.5 cm, images 18 x 14.5 cm (approx.); series title “Scènes de la vie intime” printed above the frame, image title printed in the lower compartment; ms numbers above the upper-right corner of the frame (state before sequential numbers, ms numbers do not correspond with artist numbering). Flyleaf at the end. Two bookplates to front pastedown: “EX-LIBRIS PAUL GAVAULT” and armorial “IN ROBORE ROBUR | Ex Libris Bourlon de Rouvre”.

Content (Roman numerals in parenthesis are publisher’s numbers; numerals in italic are Armelhault-Bocher reference numbers):

1. Titre de la couverture (Title-page) – 2001
2. (III) Un nid dans les blés (A nest in the wheat) – 2004
3. (II) Amitié de pension (Friendship in the pension) – 2003
4. (XI) Bras dessus, bras dessous (Arm up, arm down) – 2012
5. (I) Causerie (Chat) – 2002
6. (VI) Prélude (Prelude) – 2007
7. (IX) Le guet-apens (Ambush) – 2010
8. (V) Le cabinet noir (The dark chamber) – 2006
9. (IV) Distraction (Entertainment) – 2005
10. (X) Leçon de paysage (Landscape lesson) – 2011
11. (VII) Avant le péché (Before sin) – 2008
12. (VIII) Après le péché (After sin) – 2009
13. (XII) La femme du peintre (The painter’s wife) – 2013

Catalogue raisonné: Armelhault-Bocher (2004) p. 478-80, №№ 2001-2013, all marked ‘RRR’ – extremely rare.

Ref.: J. Armelhault & E. Bocher. Gavarni: Catalogue raisonné of the graphic work / A revision of the 1873 edition, with essays by Gordon N. Ray and Robert J. Wickenden, and 61 new plates. — San Francisco: Alan Wofsy Fine Arts, 2004 [LIB-1581.2018].

Artist: Paul Gavarni [Sulpice Guillaume Chevalier] (French, 1804 – 1866)

Provenance: Charles Bourlon de Rouvre (French, 1850 – 1924) and Paul Armand Marcel Gavault (French, 1866 – 1951).