-
Chromolithography on thick wove paper, 473 x 315 mm sheet, 372 x 260 mm image, black ink stamp “5050” to reverse. Signed on stone "Jules Gaildrau"; below centre: "GÉNERAL DE DIVISION, GRANDE TENUE DE SERVICE"; Bottom left: "Paris, J. Gaildrau, rue de Seine, 16"; right: "Imp. Lemercier, Paris." Joseph Lemercier (French, 1803 – 1887) – printer. Jules Gaildrau (French, 1816 – 1898) – artist. -
Description: One volume bound in green morocco, sunned spine with raised bands and gilt lettering, collated 8vo, 28.3 x 23 cm, original wrappers and spine preserved, top margin gilt; numerous in-text woodcuts, 30 full-page plates and one plate tipped-in. Front wrapper (red and black): RABELAIS | GARGANTUA | LITHOGRAPHIES DE SCHEM | {publisher’s device lettered in red “ÉDITIONS DU MANOIR”} | HENRI PASQUINELLY | DIJON || Half-title: LA VIE TRESHORRIFIQUE | DU | GRAND GARGANTUA | PERE DE PANTAGRUEL | JADIS COMPOSÉE | PAR MAISTRE ALCOFRIBAS | ABSTRACTEUR DE QUINTE ESSENCE | — | LIVRE PLEIN DE PANTAGRUELISME || Title-page (red and black): RABELAIS | GARGANTUA | LITHOGRAPHIES DE SCHEM | AVEC UNE PRÉFACE ET DES RÉSUMÉS EXPLICATIFS PAR | PIERRE HUGUENIN | UN GLOSSAIRE ET DES NOTES DE | LOUIS PERCEAU | {publisher’s device lettered in red “ÉDITIONS DU MANOIR”} | HENRI PASQUINELLY | DIJON || Collation: 2 blanks, front wrapper, [1] 2-118, spine, back wrapper, 2 blanks, total 88 leaves between the wrappers plus 30 plates incl. frontispiece, two of which are double-page, extraneous to collation with lettered tissue guards, and one cancelled plate with lettered tissue guard tipped-in. Pagination: [1-7] 8-171 [172] [2 colophon] [2 blank], total 176 pages, ils. Printed on February 20, 1937, at Imprimerie Darantière (Dijon), lithographs were printed by Desjobert (Paris). Limitation: The print run of 3,335 copies, of which 10 (№ I-X) on Japon Impérial, 300 copies (№ 1-300) on Vélin de Rives, 3000 copies (№ 301-3,300) on Bouffant Dauphinois, and 25 copies (A-Z ) on Vélin de Rives for collaborators. This is copy № 45 on Vélin de Rives, enriched with one cancelled plate (see image below).Collaborators: François Rabelais [Alcofribas Nasier] (French, c. 1494 – 1553) – author. Pierre Huguenin (French, 1874 – 1937) – author. Louis Perceau (French, 1883 – 1942) – author. Raoul Serres [Schem] (French, 1881– 1971) – artist. Éditions du manoir; Henri Pasquinelly [Pasquinelli] (French, 20th century) – publisher. Imprimerie Darantière (Dijon) – printer. Edmond Desjobert (French, 1888 – 1963); Edmond et Jacques Desjobert – lithography printer.
Ce petit paillard tousjours tastonnoyt ses gouvernantes cen dessus dessous, cen devant darriere.
-
Description: Softcover, French flapped wrappers, lettered front, back (advert.) and spine, collated in-4to, 24.3 x 20.2 cm, printed on thick wove paper Vélin pur fil Lafuma-Navarre, print run limited to 335 copies from which this is copy № 219; outer margin untrimmed, some leaves uncut, glassine DJ. Limitation: 1 copy (A) on Japon Impérial + double suite of plates + suite of original drawings, 4 copies (B-E) on Japon Impérial + double suite of plates, 15 copies on on Japon Impérial + suite of plates on Vieux Japon teinté (F-T), 315 copies on Vélin pur fil Lafuma-Navarre, of which 15 (I-XV) not for sale. Copyright: Libraire Gallimard, 1924. Printed: March 10, 1924 – text by Coulouma (Argenteuil) under direction of H. Barthélemy, lithographs printed by Marchizet (Paris). Front wrapper (in letterpress two-colour border): Tableaux Contemporains – no 4 | . TABLEAU | de | L'AMOUR | VÉNAL | par | FRANCIS CARCO | Illustré | de douze lithographies en noir | par Luc-Albert Moreau | PARIS | ÉDITIONS DE LA NOUVELLE REVUE FRANÇAISE | 3, rue de Grenelle || Title-page: Same, without a frame, in black, L'AMOUR | VÉNAL in brown. Collation: 4to; 14 a4 2-164, total 68 leaves with wrappers included in collation plus 12 plates, incl. frontispiece, extraneous to collation. Pagination: [2 wrapper] [6] [i] ii-vii [viii blank] [9] 10-122 [2 colophon] [2 blank] [2 wrapper]; total 136 pages incl. wrappers, plus ils. Contributors: Francis Carco [François Carcopino-Tusoli] (French, 1886 – 1958) – author. Luc-Albert Moreau (French, 1882 – 1948) – artist. La Nouvelle Revue Française (nrf) (Paris)– publisher. Gaston Gallimard (French, 1881 – 1975) – publisher. -
Title-page: FRANCIS CARCO | RUE PIGALLE | LITHOGRAPHIES EN COULEURS | DE | VERTÈS | PARIS | BERNARD GRASSET | Éditeur | 1927 || Description: 25.7 x 19.5 cm, French flapped cream wrappers with black lettering similar to title, lettering to spine, [2] 1st blank leaf, [2] h.t. / blank, plate / blank, [2] t.p. /blank, dedication “A | FRED ANTOINE ANGERMAYER” / blank, [1-2] d.t.p. “CHAPITRE | PREMIER” / blank, [3] 4-124, [2] limitation / blank, [2] last blank leaf; collation: 4to; π4 1-164; total 68 leaves and 14 plates printed by Frères Mourlot after watercolours by Marcel Vertès. Printing : September 15, 1927 by Coulouma in Argenteuil (H. Barthélemy, director); plates printed by Frères Mourlot in Paris; Edition: print run limited to 338 copies of which 22 on Japon Impérial (numbered Japon 1-15 and I-VII) enriched with one original watercolour drawing, one suite in black and one in colour, etc.; 43 copies on Hollande van Gelder (Hollande 1-33 and I-X) with additional suites in black and in colour; 270 copies on Vélin d’Arches (Arches 1-250 and I-XX); and 3 “special” copies. This copy is numbered Arches № 162. Contributors: Francis Carco [François Carcopino-Tusoli] (French, 1886 – 1958) – author. Marcel Vertès [Marcell Vértes] (Jewish-Hungarian-French, 1895 – 1961) – artist. Frères Mourlot – lithographer. Robert Coulouma (French, 1887 – 1976) – printer. Bernard Grasset (French, 1881 – 1955) – publisher. Fred Antoine Angermayer (German, 1889 –1951) – dedicatee. Other names: Marcel Vertès, Marcel Vertes, Marcell Vértes -
Four maps 34 x 47.5 cm each. Include insets of Versailles, Fontainebleau, Saint Cloud and St. Germain en Laye. Lithograph by Edward Weller after a map drawn and engraved by John Dower. "These maps originally appeared in the Weekly Dispatch newspaper from 1856 to 1862. They were reissued between 1863 and 1867 by Cassell, Petter and Galpin and then published collectively as Cassell's Atlas. The plates were acquired by G.W. Bacon & Co., and reissued in 1876 under the title Bacon's New Quarto Atlas ... of the Counties of England, and many times since under various titles." [WorldCat]Dimensions: 34 x 47.5 cm each.
Contributors: Weller, Edward (British, 1819 – 1884) – lithographer. Dower, John Crane (British, 1791 – 1847) – artist, engraver. Dower, John James (British, 1825 – 1901) – artist, engraver (son of John Crane Dower). -
Colour (tone) lithography, image 396 x 508 mm, sheet 532 x 654 mm; before signature, undated; pencil ms inscription: Föhrenhain — E. Pelikan / 200M to the lower-right corner of the sheet. Contributor: Emilie Mediz-Pelikan (Austrian, 1861 – 1908) – artist. Seller's description: Austrian-German painter and graphic artist. Emilie Mediz-Pelikan was born in Vöcklabruck in 1861. She studied at the Vienna Academy and followed her teacher Albert Zimmermann to Salzburg and in 1885 to Munich. In 1891 she married the painter and graphic artist Karl Mediz (1868 - 1945), with whom she lived in Vienna and from 1894 in Dresden. She was in contact with the Dachau Artists' Colony and went on study trips to Paris, Belgium, Hungary and Italy. In the Dachau artists' colony she was friends with Adolf Hölzel and Fritz von Uhde. In 1889 and 1890 she spent time in Paris and in the Belgian artists' colony Knokke. In 1898 she was represented at the first art exhibition of the Vienna Secession, and in 1901 at the International Art Exhibition in Dresden. In 1903 she and her husband had a group exhibition, at the Hagenbund in Vienna. In 1904, she showed graphic works at the Dresden royal court art dealer Richter, and in 1905 and 1906 she exhibited at the Berlin Künstlerhaus. It was not until around 1900 that she achieved her artistic breakthrough with her landscape paintings. Since the estate of the artist, who died prematurely in Dresden in 1908, was lost in the former GDR until the 1980s, it was quite late that the artist was rediscovered and revalued both in Austrian art history and on the art market. In 1986, the first major exhibitions took place at the Upper Austrian State Museum and the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, followed by numerous smaller exhibitions in private galleries in Vienna, Linz and Munich. The artist received recognition during her lifetime from numerous prominent fellow painters as well as from the art critic Ludwig Hevesi. Together with Tina Blau, Herbert Boeckl, Marie Egner, Theodor von Hörmann, Franz Jaschke, Eugen Jettel, Ludwig Heinrich Jungnickel, Rudolf Junk, Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoschka, Johann Victor Krämer, Heinrich Kühn, Carl Moll, Rudolf Quittner, Rudolf Ribarz, Emil Jakob Schindler, Max Suppantschitsch, Max Weiler, Olga Wisinger-Florian and Alfred Zoff, she was a protagonist of the reception of Impressionism in Austria. This style went down in Austrian art history under the term "Stimmungsimpressionismus". -
Colour (tone) lithography, image 268 x 410 mm, sheet 317 x 470 mm; signed on bottom-left of the image “Pelikan 1905”, and pencil ms inscription: E. Pelikan to the lower-right corner of the sheet. Contributor: Emilie Mediz-Pelikan (Austrian, 1861 – 1908) – artist. Seller's description: Austrian-German painter and graphic artist. Emilie Mediz-Pelikan was born in Vöcklabruck in 1861. She studied at the Vienna Academy and followed her teacher Albert Zimmermann to Salzburg and in 1885 to Munich. In 1891 she married the painter and graphic artist Karl Mediz (1868 - 1945), with whom she lived in Vienna and from 1894 in Dresden. She was in contact with the Dachau Artists' Colony and went on study trips to Paris, Belgium, Hungary and Italy. In the Dachau artists' colony she was friends with Adolf Hölzel and Fritz von Uhde. In 1889 and 1890 she spent time in Paris and in the Belgian artists' colony Knokke. In 1898 she was represented at the first art exhibition of the Vienna Secession, and in 1901 at the International Art Exhibition in Dresden. In 1903 she and her husband had a group exhibition, at the Hagenbund in Vienna. In 1904, she showed graphic works at the Dresden royal court art dealer Richter, and in 1905 and 1906 she exhibited at the Berlin Künstlerhaus. It was not until around 1900 that she achieved her artistic breakthrough with her landscape paintings. Since the estate of the artist, who died prematurely in Dresden in 1908, was lost in the former GDR until the 1980s, it was quite late that the artist was rediscovered and revalued both in Austrian art history and on the art market. In 1986, the first major exhibitions took place at the Upper Austrian State Museum and the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, followed by numerous smaller exhibitions in private galleries in Vienna, Linz and Munich. The artist received recognition during her lifetime from numerous prominent fellow painters as well as from the art critic Ludwig Hevesi. Together with Tina Blau, Herbert Boeckl, Marie Egner, Theodor von Hörmann, Franz Jaschke, Eugen Jettel, Ludwig Heinrich Jungnickel, Rudolf Junk, Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoschka, Johann Victor Krämer, Heinrich Kühn, Carl Moll, Rudolf Quittner, Rudolf Ribarz, Emil Jakob Schindler, Max Suppantschitsch, Max Weiler, Olga Wisinger-Florian and Alfred Zoff, she was a protagonist of the reception of Impressionism in Austria. This style went down in Austrian art history under the term "Stimmungsimpressionismus". -
Binding: Grey double-slipcase 34 x 16.5 cm, pictorial folder, French flapped pictorial wrappers, both folder and wrapper with green ms lettering and vignette in sanguine, green ms lettering to spine. Collation: folio in-4to, two leaves in wrappers at the front and back, π8, 104 [11]2, total 50 leaves, incl. plates. Pagination: [4], [2] h.t. / limitation, [2] blank, [1-3] blank, [4-6] frontis., t.p., blank. 7-86 [2] [4] colophon, 100 pages total. Title-page (sanguine and black): COMPLEXES | 40 | DESSINS DE | Vertès | PREFACE DE | PIERRE MAC ORLAN | ANDRÉ SAURET | ÉDITIONS DU LIVRE ★ MONTE-CARLO || Illustrations: One on the front covers, one on the back one headpiece vignette, 37 plates, incl. frontispiece in colour and three on a double-page (full leaf), and one original pencil drawing. Limitation: 890 copies of which 40 (№ 1-40) signed by the artist and contain one original drawing; this copy is № 27. Edition: published by André Sauret, lithographs after Vertès drawings by Georges Duval, printed by Fernand Mourlot; text printed at “La Ruche” under the direction of A. and P. Jarach. Print run completed on November 9, 1948. Contributors: Pierre Mac-Orlan (French, 1882 – 1970) – author. Marcel Vertès [Marcell Vértes] (Jewish-Hungarian-French, 1895 – 1961) – artist. André Sauret (Monaco, fl. 1952 – 1976) – publisher. Other names: Marcel Vertès, Marcel Vertes, Marcell Vértes -
Title-page: COLETTE | LA | VAGABONDE | LITHOGRAPHIES EN COULEURS | DE MARCEL VERTÈS | PARIS | A LA CITE DES LIVRES |—| M DCCCC XXVII || Binding: French flapped wrappers 28.5 x 22.5 cm, in glassine dustcover, front wrapper lettered similarly to title-page but in red and black: COLETTE | LA | VAGABONDE | LITHOGRAPHIES EN COULEURS | DE MARCEL VERTÈS | PARIS | A LA CITE DES LIVRES |—| M DCCCC XXVII ||, in a red marbled cardboard folder 29 x 23 cm with paper label to spine, slipcase missing. Pagination: [2] 1st leaf blank, [2] h.t. / limitation, [2] t.p. / blank, [2] d.t.p. /blank, [3] 4-277 [278 blank], [4 colophon], ils. Collation: π3 1-354 χ1, plus 15 leaves of plates extraneous to collation, incl. frontispiece, chromolithographs by Marcel Vertès. Edition: Limited edition of 305 copies of which this is № 15 (out of numbers 10-24) printed on Japon Impérial paper with three additional suites of plates in black, sanguine and colour, plus 4 refused plates. Printed on the 15th of September 1927: text by Robert Coulouma (Argenteuil, director H. Barthélemy), lithographs by E. Duchatel (Paris) and published by La cité des livres. Missing black versions of LIB-2892.2021-5 and LIB-2892.2021-10 (43 out of 45 prints in place). Refused plates:
Plates in black, sanguine, and colour.
Contributors:
Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette [a.k.a. Colette] (French, 1873 – 1954) – author.
Marcel Vertès [Marcell Vértes] (Jewish-Hungarian-French, 1895 – 1961) – artist.
Other names: Marcel Vertès, Marcel Vertes, Marcell Vértes -
Lithography and etching on wove paper432 x 362 mm, black ink stamp “5022” to reverse, horizontal and vertical centrefolds. Depicts Diogenes (Ancient Greek, 412/404 – 323 BC) beside his barrel and extinguishing his torch when approached by Napoléon III ahorseback. Top: "1857 | HONNEUR ET PATRIE"; lettering on ribbons (top-down): SCIENCES, TRAVAIL, COMMERCE, ARTS, CHARPENTIERS, IMPRIMEURS, "MECHANICIENS, AGRICULTEURS, MAÇONS, FONDEURS, TERRASIERS, CIZELEURS, CARRIERS, ORFEVRES, BIJOUTIERS, CHAPELIERS, MENUISIERS, VERRIERS, SERRURIERS, TAILLEURS, SELLIERS, POTIERS, PORCELAINIERS, CORDONNIERS, TISSERANDS, INDUSTRIE, COMMERCE | CALENDRIER DE L'ABEILLE | EMPIRE, FRANÇAIS. Below left: "lith. Barousse Cour du Comm. 11 et 12. Paris"; right: "Dépôt rue des Cannettes, 20. Paris"; bottom: "Et, pour trouver un homme, il quitte son tonneau, | Voyant Napoléon, – il éteint son flambeau!" [And, to find a man, he leaves his barrel, | Seeing Napoleon, – he extinguishes his torch!]. Six months on the left and six months on the right-hand side of the calendar, surrounding the image. -
Hand-coloured lithography on wove paper, 250 x 332 mm; black ink stamp “5035” to reverse. Under the frame left: "Paris, chez Riboni, éd. r. Galande, 51"; right: "Paris, lith. Bulla, Pl. Maubert, 26". Below: "BOMBARDEMENT DE SEBASTOPOL. — THE BOMBARDMENT OF SÉBASTOPOLE". Text to bottom. Printers/publishers: Antoine Bulla (fl. 1815 – 1877), François Bulla (fl. c. 1814 – 1855). -
Hardcover volume 28.5 x 20.8 cm, quarter brown morocco over marbled boards, ruled in gilt, spine with raised bands, gilt in compartments, gilt lettering, marbled endpapers, top margin gilt, original lithographic wrappers designed by A. Willette preserved; pp.: [4] h.t., t.p., [1] 2-350 [2], 300 b/w ils in-text and 12 coloured photomechanical reproductions extraneous to collation; collated in-4o: π2 1-444; Title-page: L'ART DU RIRE | ET DE | LA CARICATURE | PAR ARSÈNE ALEXANDRE | 300 FAC-SIMILÉS EN NOIR ET 12 PLANCHES EN COULEURS | D’APRÈS LES ORIGINAUX | {vignette} | PARIS | ANCIENNE MAISON QUANIN | LIBRAIRIES-IMPRIMERIES RÉUNIES | 7, RUE ST-BENOIT | MAY & MOTTEROZ, DIRECTEURS || Contributors : Librairie-Imprimerie réunies (Paris, 1880-1908) – publisher. Arsène Alexandre (French, 1859 – 1937) – author. Adolphe Willette (French, 1857 – 1926) – artist (wrapper) -
Artist: André Gill [real name Louis-André Gosset] (French, 1840 – 1885). L'Esclave Ivre [The Drunken Slave] was a Parisian weekly, published in 1881, 4 issues total. Léon Gambetta (French, 1838 – 1882) stands arm in arm with Marshal Patrice de MacMahon (French, 1808 – 1893). Dead bodies of communards lie in the midground and a landscape is faintly perceived in the background. 1871 is written on the hill on the left. L'Esclave Ivre, Issue 1. Entre Amis. Text below the image: - Qu'est-ce que je veux, moi? Faire notre affaire. / - Bien sûr! Moi aussi. / - Comme il me comprend cet animal-là, et on ne veut pas que je le gobe! [In between friends / - What do I want? To make a deal. / - Of course! Me too. / - How well this animal understands me, and we do not want me to swallow him!] -
Title: A COMPLETE | COURSE OF LITHOGRAPHY: | CONTAINING | Clear and Explicit Instructions | IN ALL THE | DIFFERENT BRANCHES AND MANNERS OF THAT ART | ACCOMPANIED BY | ILLUSTRATIVE SPECIMENS OF DRAWINGS. | TO WHICH IS PREFIXED A | HISTORY OF LITHOGRAPHY, | FROM ITS ORIGIN TO THE PRESENT TIME. | By ALOIS SENEFELDER, | INVENTOR OF THE ART OF LITHOGRAPHY AND CHEMICAL PRINTING. | WITH | A PREFACE | By FREDERIC VON SCHLICHTEGROLL, |Director of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Munich. | TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL GERMAN, BY A.S. | London: | PRINTED FOR R. ACKERMANN, 101 STRAND. | 1819. || Pagination: [i-iii] iv-xxviii, [4] [1] 2-342. Collation: 4to; [a]-d4, B-2U4 2X2, +14 lithographed plates by Ackermann (incl. 1 folding, 1 colour frontispiece and 1 portrait of A. Senefelder); plates opposite to pp. [i], [1], 193, 198, 203, 228, 232 (fold.), 256, 258, 264, 269, 290, 302, and 305. Binding: By Anne Krawitz (Philadelphia, PA), 27.5 x 21 cm, modern full mottled calf, boards ruled in gilt, flat spine, compartments ruled in gilt, crimson label with gilt lettering to spine, printed on wove paper; round book-plate to front paste-down “TWM, The Whitehead Library”. Edition: 1st in English. Ref.: MET: Accession Number: Ref.20; RCT: RCIN 1195886; Contributors: Alois Senefelder (German, 1771 – 1834) – author of the original and translator. Friedrich Schlichtegroll (German, 1765 – 1822) – author of preface. William Clowes (British, 1779 – 1847) – printer. Rudolph Ackermann (German-British, 1764 – 1834) – publisher and lithographer. Samuel Prout (British, 1783 – 1852) Maximilian Joseph, King of Bavaria (German, 1756 –1825) – dedicatee. -
Description: One volume, 27 x 21 cm, collated 4to, bound in ¾ red morocco over marbled boards, raised bands, gilt in compartments, gilt lettering to spine, marbled endpapers, publisher’s wrappers and spine preserved, T.E.G. Title-page: ALFRED MACHARD | – | PRINTEMPS | SEXUELS… | L'EPOPEE AU FAUBOURG | Des anges ? Non. | Des petit d’hommes… | LITHOGRAPHIES DE | JEAN AUSCHER | PARIS | ÉDITIONS M.-P. TRÉMOIS | 43, AVENUE RAPP | – | 1928 || Collation: 1st blank, front wrapper, 3 blanks, π5 (h.t./limitation, t.p./copyright, dedication, Freud, Rimbaud), 1-214, 2 blanks, back wrapper, spine, last blank; total 94 leaves between the wrappers, and 10 plates extraneous to collation, incl. frontispiece – chromolithographs by Jean Auscher. Pagination: [6 blanks] [1-10] 11-175 [176] [2 colophon] [4 blanks], total 178 pages, ils. Limitation: Print run limited to 352 copies, one № 0 unique on Japon paper, enriched; one № 00 on Japon paper, enriched; 15 copies marked A-O on Japon paper, enriched; 35 copies on Hollande Van Gelder, enriched with one suite in black, № I-XXXV; 300 copies on vélin d’Arches, № 1-300, of which this copy is № 127. Colophon: Printed on April 20, 1928; text by Coulouma (Argenteuil), plates by Mourlot Frères (Paris). Contributors: Alfred Machard (French, 1887 – 1962) –author. Jean Auscher (French, 1896 – c. 1950) – artist. -
La vénus espagnole et le prince de Joinville par Zut [The Spanish Venus and the Prince of Joinville, by Zut]. Empress Eugénie poses naked for the Prince de Joinville holding a cigarette in her hand. He stares at her intently from his easel. -
Description: one volume in French flapped wrappers 25.3 x 19 cm, lettered “MUSSET” to front, 5 gatherings of 4 and one of 6 leaves, 26 leaves total, pp.: [4] [2] 3-43 [44] [4], total 52 pages, incl. those in wrappers, unbound; plus coloured and uncoloured suites of 12 lithographs, in a paper folder; in a cardboard tan slipcase 2.8 x 19.3 cm. Artist unknown, publisher unknown, published at the end of 1940s (per J.-P. Dutel). Illustrations are a loose interpretation of original lithographs by Devéria and Henri Grévedon or Octave Tassaert for the 1833 edition ((1926 re-print LIB-3135.2023). Limitation: Edition limited to 250 copies printed on Vélin Chiffon numbered 1 -250 and 24 copies marked by letters A to Z. This is copy № 246, with two suites of plates, one coloured and one b/w. Catalogue raisonné: Dutel (1920-1970) № 1657, p. 189. Alfred de Musset (French, 1810 – 1857) – author. -
An album of the "Le Bon-Bock" dinners for the year 1884. Author, designer and publisher – Emile Bellot (French, 1831 – 1886), a Parisian artist and engraver. "Le Bon-Bock" was a monthly dinner of artists and men of letters, who gathered in Paris for good food, good company, and artistic performances, from 1875 to at least 1925. The story behind these gatherings as told by Emile Bellot, the founder, is this:In February 1875, Pierre Cottin1 came to me and said: 'I discovered a poet and tragedian of immense talent and who interprets the poems of the Great Victor Hugo in an astonishing way. Monsieur Gambini. I promised him that I would make it heard by an audience of artists and men of letters. I am counting on you who have many connections to keep my promise to him'. I gathered about 25 of my friends and acquaintances in a picnic dinner which took place at a restaurant 'Krauteimer' on the rue Rochechouart in Montmartre. They heard from Mr Gambini first, then my friends Étienne Carjat2, J. Gros3, Adrien Dézamy4, etc. performed. These gentlemen completed the evening so brilliantly that it was unanimously decided that we would start a similar dinner every month. Poets, musicians, men of letters, singers would be invited to this dinner. I was in charge of the organization of this little party and as it was the dream of my life to bring together old comrades, I was careful not to refuse and I pursued this good idea. Cottin and René Tener5 were kind enough to help me in this joyous task and especially my old friend Carjat. The following March began our 1st monthly dinner.
The name "Le Bon-Bock" means "The Good Bock", whilst Bock is a kind of beer, a dark, malty, lightly hopped ale. The dinner was named "Le Bon-Bock" in honour of the Éduard Manet painting (1873), a famous portrait of Emile Bellot, called "Le Bon-Bock".
The invitations to the dinner were also produced by the artists and looked like this one by Alexandre Ferdinandus (October 3, 1883).
Besides this sketch of the Parisian social and artistic life at the end of the 19th century, the provenance of the album in our collection generates additional interest. The ink stamp to the front flyleaf reads: "Docteur Henry Uzan, 29 Avenue Perrichont, Paris XVI".
Doctor Henry Uzan was Jewish. He was arrested by the Pétain police on October 1, 1941, and interned in Drancy. With the few means at his disposal, he undertook to treat the sick whom he then saw leaving, week after week, towards their terrible destiny in the extermination camps. In October 1943 doctor Uzan was deported to the island of Alderney. After the Normandy Landing of June 6, 1944, Nazis evacuated the island detainees and transfer them to the Neuengamme camp, via northern France and Belgium. During the transfer, doctor Uzan managed to escape from the train on the night of September 3 to 4 around Dixmude in Flanders. He was taken in by the Belgian Resistance, which he joined before being repatriated to France.
In France, he continued working as a physician and was one of the founders of Association des internés et déportés politiques (AIDP). In 1945, together with his friends, the doctor designed the symbol for the Fédération nationale des déportés et internés résistants et patriotes:
The story behind the number on the emblem (178284) is fascinating but it is out of the scope of this material.
1. Pierre Cottin (French, 1823 – c. 1887) – Engraver, mezzotinter, genre and landscape painter; born in Chappelle-Saint-Denis (near Paris), a pupil of Jazet. Exhibited at the Salon from 1845, also in London from 1876 to 1879.↩ 2. Étienne Carjat (French, 1828 – 1906) – Journalist, caricaturist and photographer. ↩ 3. Jean Baptiste Louis Gros (French, 1793 – 1870) – Painter. ↩ 4. Adrien Dézamy (French, 1844 – 1891) – Writer, poet, general secretary of the Théâtre des Bouffes in Paris. ↩ 5. Rene Tener (French, 1846 – 1925) – Painter. ↩ Sources:Auguste Lepage. Les dîners artistiques et littéraires de Paris / Bibliothèque des Deux mondes (2e éd.) – Paris: Frinzine, Klein et Cie., 1884. [Accession № LIB-2606.2021 in this collection]
