Jean François Millet (1814–75)

“La Couseuse” [Woman Sewing], c.1855–56

Etching on very thin laid paper

Size: (sheet) 20.5 x 13.9 cm, (plate) 10.5 x 7.4 cm

State: iii (of iii) described by Melot “with plate bevelled down, the vise mark in the lower right effaced.”

Delteil 9.II; Melot 9

The British Museum offers the following description of this print: “Peasant woman seated to left beside window in interior, sewing. Early 1850s? Etching, printed on pale buff paper” (http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1355021&partId=1&searchText=millet+Woman+sewing&page=1)

Condition: good impression with generous margins. The top edge of the margin has a stain (probably from previous mounting) and there is a spot in the margin below the impression.

I am selling this famous and original etching by Jean François Millet for AU$988 (currently US$741.06/EUR646.94/GBP512.19 at the time of posting this print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing this print by the most famous artist of the Barbizon School, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

There is a special dimension of timelessness underpinning this image. To my eyes it has the quiet stillness of a Vermeer in that the portrayed woman is delicately bathed in soft light from a window as she sits stoically focused on her domestic chore.

This print, along with four others executed from 1855-56 (viz. “Woman Churning”, “The Gleaners” and the two prints that I have listed previously, “Peasant Returning from the Manure Heap” and “The Diggers”), was executed to satisfy the market demands at the time for prints. What makes these prints especially interesting is their marketing.

In my discussion about “The Diggers” I lightly touched upon unease between printers concerning who should print the plates and the supervision that was perceived to be necessary to ensure that unauthorised prints were not made.

Building upon this earlier discussion, I wish to add a few insights about how some dealers wished to proceed with the marketing of these prints.

According to Michel Melot (1980), in “Graphic Art of the Pre-Impressionists”, Millet “simply could not imagine that prints could be commercialized like other works of art” (p. 15). Indeed, Millet was unable to determine what his prints were worth, but was assured by Cadart (one of the pre-eminent publishers in Paris) that the publisher should be entitled to a third commission on sales.

In some ways the marketing of these prints foreshadowed many of the later marketing conventions in terms of limiting the numbers of prints in an edition to make them desirable, cancelling the plates to ensure that further editions were not possible and signing the prints to ensure that only signed prints were “authorised.” These proposed marketing strategies, however, proved impossible as Philippe Burty’s proposal that the edition should be set for only ten subscribers and that the plates should be destroyed afterwards seemed outrageous to Millet. I suspect that Millet could see a “green-eyed monster” in the guise of a dealer giving him advice.

Edward Joseph Lowe (1825–1900)

Illustrated by A.F. Lydon

Printed by Benjamin Fawcett “Plate XII”; “Plate XIII”; “Plate IV”; “Plate LV”, 1856

From Lowe's "Ferns: British and Exotic", published 1856 by Groombridge and Sons, London.

Woodblock/chromoxylograph (see description of the process below) on cream wove paper

Size: (each sheet) 24.9 x 14.5 cm

Rare Prints Gallery offers the following insight into Lowe’s publication and printing process: “It was Lowe’s botanical expertise and funding that produced the work, but A.F. Lyon was the artist for the work, and Benjamin Fawcett’s printing talent created the plates. Fawcett was a well-known color printer of the time. His technique of using multiple engravings from the end-grain of the wood, known as chromoxylography, was used on this work. It was one of the first large publications to be printed in color with no hand-finishing.”

Condition: rich colour, crisp impressions with minor age-toning and very faint foxing otherwise in good condition.

I am selling these four eye-catching prints for a total cost of AU$78 (currently US$58.14/EUR51.14/GBP39.94 at the time of posting these print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing them, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

Although this and the previous prints are clearly designed for scientific identification purposes, the specialised printing technique—essentially woodblock printing—has produced dazzling colour (without hand finishing) that is outstanding.

In terms of composition, the artist's interest may be about a brutish uncompromising central placement with no borders or other devices to charm the eye, but, for me, this "no frills" approach is what makes his prints so powerful. Despite the artist's intention to present each leaf "front on" without adding the niceties found in nature like free-roaming caterpillars, holes or dead bits, I like the fact that each leaf has its stem on the right. This consistency has turned me into a Sherlock Holmes in wondering why.

Charles Émile Jacque (1813–94)

(upper image) “Marchand de Melons” [Melon Seller], 1844 printed by Auguste Delâtre (1822–1907)

Etching on cream chine-collé on thick wove white paper

Inscribed (within image, lower left) with the artist’s initials and date; numbered (below the borderline, lower left): “33” and lettered with production details

Traces of a publication address (Marchant's) and a printer's address (Delâtre's) alongside the bottom.

Size: (sheet) 18.9 x 22.6 cm; (plate) 11.1 x 14.4 cm; (chine-collé) 9.7 x 11.5 cm; (image borderline) 7.6 x 10.2 cm

Guiffrey 1866 299; IFF 114

The British Museum offers the following description of this print:

“Melon seller: a man sits in a corner, smoking a pipe; three melons on a shelf at left, a bowl and a pitcher underneath; a later impression, with production and publication detail burnished, of a plate executed in 1844”. Etching, with some roulette and some engraving, and some slight surface tone” (http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=3502478&partId=1&searchText=charles+jacque+smoking&page=1) Note that this impression is earlier than the one in the collection of the British Museum in which the lettered production details have been burnished (i.e. partly erased). The use of plate tone in the BM’s copy may have been designed to conceal a weak impression from a worn plate of the late editions. This impression has little or no plate tone and the impression is crisp and well-printed without significant plate tone.

Condition: superb impression in near pristine condition.

(lower image) “La Cruche Cassée” [The broken pitcher], 1844, printed by Auguste Delâtre (1822–1907)

Etching on cream chine-collé on thick wove white paper

Inscribed (within image, lower left) with the artist’s signature and date; numbered (below the borderline, lower left): “85”; lettered with production detail (below the image borderline, lower right): "Paris Imp. Aug. Delâtre rue de Bievre 9"

Size: (sheet) 26 x 20.8 cm; (plate) 21.8 x 15.8 cm; (chine-collé) 14 x 11.7 cm; (image borderline) 11 x 9.4 cm

Guiffrey 1866 27 (undescribed state); IFF 70

The British Museum offers the following description of this print:

“The broken pitcher: a peasant from Brittany sitting on a stool in a rustic interior gestures towards a broken pitcher which he holds in his left hand; with production detail. 1844”

(http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=3359455&partId=1&searchText=charles+jacque+broken&page=1)

Condition: superb impression in near pristine condition.

I am selling this rare and almost faultless pair of prints executed by one of the most important printmakers of 19th century France for AU$258 (currently US$191.91/EUR169.08/GBP127.54 at the time of posting these print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing these original Jacque etchings, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

Although Jacque’s later prints capture the immediate moment of the scenes that he portrays by his free handling of the etching needle, these two prints demonstrate his formal rendering skills designed to portray the featured subject matter in a mimetic way (i.e. Jacque chooses marks best suited to suggest the different textures of the portrayed subjects). For example, note how the marks and the gaps between them are all different in his representation of the materials of the figures’ clothes and how these marks are again very different to those representing the rough texture of the walls behind the figures.

Regarding this pair of etchings and their related subject of a man wearing a large brimmed hat, FL Leipnik in his very readable “History of French Etching from the Sixteenth Century to the Present Day (1924) offers the following insights about Jacque’s interests at the time when he executed these prints:

“He sketched various types such as street-hawkers, beggars and character-heads; and rustic scenes had an especially potent attraction for him. These little etchings, which show Jacque’s fondness for village life as it appeals to the imagination of the townsman, fill about 350 plates of the work he did between 1842 and 1848. All these plates show eagerness for pleasing effects, but the execution is still hampered by Jacque’s training as a map-engraver. Precision and the orderly arrangement of superfluous detail prevail over artistic feeling” (pp. 76–77).

Alfred-Louis Brunet-Debaines (1845–1939) after Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775 [B] – 1851), published by Hamerton, Seeley and Jackson, 1876

(upper image) "Boats"

(lower image) "A Storm"

Etching and aquatint

Size: (sheet) 35.5 x 25 cm; (upper plate) 11.2 x 15 cm; (lower plate) 11.1 x 15 cm

Condition: two crisp impressions in good condition printed on a single sheet of wove paper with margins as published by Hamerton et al. There is faint scattered foxing.

I am selling this pair of nineteenth century etchings after Turner, along with two additional pages of etchings by Debaines that I will be listing further below (i.e. 6 etchings in total) for AU$155 as group purchase (currently US$113.63/EUR100.22/GBP78.99 at the time of posting this listing) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing this folio of etchings, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

Alfred-Louis Brunet-Debaines (1845–1939) after Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775 [B] – 1851), published by Hamerton, Seeley and Jackson, 1876

(upper image) "City on Rivers of France"

(lower image) "Ruined Castle"

Etching and aquatint

Size: (sheet) 35.5 x 24 cm; (upper plate) 11 x 15 cm; (lower plate) 11.2 x 15 cm

Condition: two crisp impressions in good condition printed on a single sheet of wove paper with margins as published by Hamerton et al. There is faint scattered foxing.

This pair of prints are worth close examination. The upper image is composed like a spiral in perspective with the placement of two children in the foreground angled so that their positions point to the inside of the spiral: rock face fortifications. (I may be wrong about my description of this point of focus, but I did consult with my cook—who knows everything—about what is portrayed in this area and I'm advised that the area is like the walled fortifications on the rock faces of Malta.)

The lower print is a real peach. It is beautiful. It has everything that a romantic artist loves: a partly obscured moon and an ominously impenetrable ruin in mist. Love it. I also love Debaines' treatment of the castle textures that are suggested without too much detail in a manner not too dissimilar to what Piranesi sometimes employs to render details without actually showing details.

Alfred-Louis Brunet-Debaines (1845–1939) after Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775 [B] – 1851), published by Hamerton, Seeley and Jackson, 1876

(upper image) "View of the Loire"

(lower image) "Rome"

Etching and aquatint

Size: (sheet) 36.5 x 24.9 cm; (upper plate) 11 x 14 cm; (lower plate) 11 x 16.7 cm

Condition: two crisp impressions in good condition printed on a single sheet of wove paper with margins as published by Hamerton et al. There is faint scattered foxing.

I don't know why Hamerton chose to publish this combination of a views—one of the Loire and the other of Rome—but the juxtaposition of the two etchings is difficult to contemplate without seeing complementary ways of looking.

At first glance I see a difference between the light and delicate treatment of the upper image rendered mainly by line with the dark and solid treatment of the lower image rendered mainly by tone. Beyond recognising this critical difference there are much more subtle and fascinating differences. Note, for example, how the composition of the upper image almost invites a viewer into the pictorial depths of the scene while the composition of the lower image sets the viewer at a distance—both visually and psychologically—away from the city in the middle distance.

Joseph Mathias Negelen (1792–1870)

"Victor”, 1828, printed by Jean-François Villain (1822–52 fl.) and published by John Henry Rittner (1802–40)

Lithograph on wove paper

Size: (sheet) 41.8 x 31.3 cm

Signed and dated by the artist in the plate (lower right) and lettered with the title and production details below the image.

Condition: superb impression in near pristine condition.

I am selling this marvellous lithograph by one of the exceptional Swiss portrait artists of the nineteenth century for AU$72 in total (currently US$53.04/EUR46.66/GBP36.54 at the time of posting this listing) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing this very sensitive rendering of a young boy, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

There may be many books written about the craft of drawing but few writers address the subtle principles behind creating a convincing portrait of a young boy. Consequently, I thought I would have a go.

To make a boy look like a boy and not like a young man is partly to do with proportion of the head size to the rest of the body. More critical, however, a young boy needs to be portrayed so that the viewer looks slightly down on him (i.e. more of the top of his head is shown). Conversely to portray an older youth or an adult, the viewer’s viewpoint is more likely to be at eye-level.

Another principle—and a more contentious one—that is often employed by artists is that young boys seem more like young boys when they are portrayed facing towards the right. Conversely, youths and adults seem more “grounded” (i.e. wise to the world around them) if they are portrayed facing towards the left. The importance of such an arrangement may seem like nonsense but it works. If one were to take a mirror image of this portrait so that the boy faced towards the left rather than the right the psychological meaning of this portrait changes significantly and the boy would seem much older than his young face suggests. This principle is the same as how saints and sinners are portrayed: saints nearly always face towards the left whereas sinners nearly always face towards the right!

Cornelis Bega (aka Cornelis Pietersz Bega) (1620–1664)

"Mother and Child with Peasants in a Tavern” [La mère au cabaret], c.1650

Etching on fine laid paper trimmed to narrow margins and supported on buff coloured card

Size: (support sheet) 16.7 x 13.1 cm; (plate) 15.4 x 11.9 cm

The British Museum offers the following description of this print: “A mother sitting with her sleeping baby in an inn; she is accompanied by a man sitting on the left, and by a man standing between them, who holds a tankard; unfinished Etching” (http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1608815&partId=1&searchText=S.3702&page=1)

Hollstein 31.I; Bartsch (1803) V.238.31; Bartsch (1978) VII.238.31

Condition: strong impression with minimal wear and with small margins supported on card—possibly from McCreery’s 1816 edition.

I am selling this unfinished oldmaster etching of exceptional rarity for AU$306 in total (currently US$225.40/EUR198.31/GBP155.29 at the time of posting this listing) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing this print offering a fascinating insight into oldmaster procedures in making an etching, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

Very seldom does one get the chance to see an old master etching showing the first tentative sketched lines at the commencement of making a print merged with a full tonal rendering of the final stage of the portrayed scene. This is certainly a rare and extraordinary print!

Bega is one of those artists whose prints stand out from his contemporaries, as he has a distinctive style all of his own. From my standpoint, there is an awkward angularity to his portrayed figures who seem somehow compacted into shallow space that is lit with a film-noir type of theatricality—please forgive me if you don’t agree with this broad overview of his style.

Certainly, ES Lumsden in his now classic book, “The Art of Etching” expresses strong enthusiasm for Bega’s vision as he proposes: “His work has a breadth of vision which far surpasses that of his master [van Ostade], and lacks Ostade’s cloying “prettiness. Bold, simple (both in design and execution) and dramatic, it deserves careful study of every serious student.” (p. 186)

After Paolo Veronese (also known as Paolo Caliari) (1528–88) by an unknown printmaker “Dwarf Halberdier with a Greyhound” 17–18th century

Etching on paper with fragments of wood in the paper and cut within the plate marks.

I would normally propose that this is wove paper as I am unable to see chain-lines within it, but I suspect that the paper may be an early imported paper. I am mindful that Rembrandt made many of his prints on what scholars term “Oriental papers” imported from India, China and Japan. Moreover, the Japanese papers are often buff coloured like this sheet and seldom show the screen pattern of the mould from which they were cast.

Inscribed within the plate (upper right) “Paolo Caliari pinx”, (sheet) 13.4 x 8.1 cm

Condition: crisp and well-inked impression trimmed within the plate marks in excellent condition but with remnants of mounting hinges (verso).

I am selling this finely executed study after Veronese for AU$137 (currently US$100.91/EUR88.79/GBP69.52 at the time of posting this print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing this remarkably beautiful etching by an oldmaster, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

I acquired this stunning print many years ago from a dealer in Holland whom I had previously purchased many prints before but this is the only one that he stated unequivocally: “This is a beautiful print” and added “my wife likes this one!” The admiration that he felt towards this very small print is easy to understand: it really is a superb image. For me the lightness of its execution and its expression of open space captures not only the spirit of Veronese but also that of Tiepolo.

Before concocting an appropriate descriptive title for this print (I have been unable to locate this etching in my research to find its “correct” title) I did a little exploratory fact finding about the custom of showing dogs and dwarf courtiers—especially ones carrying a sword—in the paintings of this time. Rather than discovering that such subjects were simply as representation of what court life was like at the time, I found that Veronese was even hauled over the coals (metaphorically speaking) for featuring them in his religious paintings—specifically “Feast in the House of Levi”. Regarding this painting, the following snippet of questions from the Inquisition and answers from Veronese are fascinating:

“Q. And who are really the persons whom you admit to have been present at this Supper?

A. I believe that there was only Christ and His Apostles; but when I have some space left over in a picture I adorn it with figures of my own invention.

Q. Did some person order you to paint Germans, buffoons, and other similar figures in this picture?

A. No, but I was commissioned to adorn it as I thought proper; now it is very large and can contain many figures.”