Félix BRACQUEMOND: Portrait d’Edmond de Goncourt, 6th state- 1881
SOLD
Etching and tools, 512 x 340 mm. Beraldi 54, 6th state (of 9).
Impression of the 6th state (of 9), the letters on the portfolio strengthened – especially the last letter of Goncourt’s name – as well as some shadows, but before a few slight reworks, for instance in the cigarette smoke.
Superb impression printed on laid japan paper, inscribed in pencil by Bracquemond bottom left 6em. Wide margins (sheet: 545 x 360 mm). In very good condition. A few light foxmarks in the bottom margin and slight discoloration of the paper verso.
Very rare impression. According to Beraldi, there are around 20 impressions of the 1st state; 6 impressions of each of the following states to the 7th state; 25 impressions on vellum and 150 on japan paper of the 8th state. Later impressions, corresponding to the 9th state, bear a title engraved and were printed in 1912: thet were therefore not described by Beraldi in 1885. The inscription 6em on our impression, without the final e of « sixième », is written in pencil by Bracquemond.
Jean-Paul Bouillon, a specialist of Félix Bracquemond's œuvre, wrote a study of Portrait d’Edmond de Goncourt for the exhibition “Le Portrait gravé de Goncourt par Bracquemond : une exceptionnelle conjonction d’art”, at the museum of Gravelines in 2004-2005. The exhibition presented seven successive states that were bought by the museum of Gravelines in 1999. In the exhibition catalogue, Bracquemond/Goncourt, Jean-Paul Bouillon reminds us of “the meaning and the significance of the notion of 'state'” for Bracquemond (our translation). Each state is, according to Bracquemond, a tool in the artist's work, “indispensable in order to show the engraver the various relationships between all the values in his print”, that is, as Jean-Paul Bouillon points out, the full range of blacks and whites on the brightness scale. At the same time, each state reveals to the collector the “art value” of the print. In Bracquemond's eyes, “an affection for the different 'states' is, in a collector, a sign of affinity, the point of contact, in a given work, between his mind and the engraver's. […] The collector is more of an artist when he can discern the art value of a certain 'state', than the professional who puts the finishing touches to his work before he has even begun, so to say.” (Félix Bracquemond as quoted by Jean-Paul Bouillon, p. 44, our translation).
For this print, a few very rare series of seven or eight states are known, which were created by Bracquemond himself. He sometimes numbered and signed, and sometimes only numbered the prints. Apart from the series kept in Gravelines, Jean-Paul Bouillon mentions one in the British Museum, another one in the New York Library, and finally one in the Bibliothèque nationale de France. (Jean-Paul Bouillon, p. 52, annex 1).
Reference: Jean-Paul Bouillon: Bracquemond/Goncourt, Paris, 2004.