| DR Number 968 |
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| Background Details |
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LE CHARIVARI Click for detailed information about LE CHARIVARI. HISTOIRE ANCIENNE (Stories from Antiquity). This series of 50 prints appeared in the Charivari between December 1841 and January 1843. ALBUM. All the lithographs from this series have also been published in the „Album Comique“ and in the „Album Histoire Ancienne“. The ALBUM COMIQUE containing all 50 lithographs of the series on wove paper was covered by a green coloured front page and a green back page as a support. The album appeared in basically two different forms: As a bound album protected by hard covers at the front and on the back. The single lithographs were directly sewn to the back in typical book-binding fashion. A second form was offered in which each lithograph was under-laid on a supporting page, which in turn was attached in a small paper ‘shoe’ to the inner back of the album. The advantage of this procedure was that the entire page was visible, without a section being lost by direct binding to the back of the album. No stitches were used, thus making this album the more valuable version of the two. Both albums appeared in black and white as well as in hand coloured versions. A complete black and white version is quite rare and this difficult to find. ABOUT THIS PRINT. In the print we find red-nosed Anacreon, at 85 years of age still thoroughly enjoying the more attractive things in life. Little did he know that he would eventually suffocate from the grape so elegantly served by his lightly dressed companion. The exhibition catalogue of the Winckelmann Society "Antike auf die Schippe genommen" (Winckelmann Museum, Stendal 16.12.2023 to 03.03.2024) provides the following background to this picture: The lyrical poet Anacreon from Teos (575/570-495 BC) is known for his songs about love, wine, roses and socialising. He described erotic feelings as an expression of the soul. However, only a few of his poems have survived. During his life, he had to emigrate several times before the Persian invasion and was active as a respected court poet at various courts, including that of the tyrant Polycrates of Samos (death 522 BC). Anacreon is said to have died at the age of 85; according to the Roman Valerius Maximus, he choked on a grape. The latter provoked the mockery of Daumier, who depicts the old man at table with a frivolous lady throwing and snapping open the berries. ABOUT THIS SERIES. A quarrel between painters of the classic and romantic schools had fully flared up. Delacroix asked the "loaded" question: “Qui me délivrera des Grecs et des Romains?”. Daumier succeeded to answer it his own way by showing historic personalities such as Hercules, Pygmalion or Agamemnon in absurd situations. It was his method to put history into perspective. Dr. Claude Keisch supplies these explanations concerning the famous question: “ 'Qui me délivrera des Grecs et des Romains?' (Who redeems us from the Greeks and Romans?) was the first verse of an elegy which appeared shortly before 1800 by Joseph de Berchoux (1760-1838). While the poet is no longer known to us, his verse became a dictum, and "Qui me ..." was transformed into "Qui nous délivrera". It is quoted to this day, some attribute it to Boileau, but mostly the author remains anonymous - as is usually the case with such phrases. Baudelaire used it, apart from his essay on Daumier also in "L'école paienne" (1853), again in connection with Daumier, but just as a quotation. Delacroix appears as the author of this phrase, and so did Baudelaire. But correctly the author is Berchoux. " In December 1841, the Charivari announced the arrival of this series as follows: “We have sent Monsieur Daumier to Greece, alone and without any scientific support. He worked day and night to reveal the Greek soul of the past.... Daumier brings antiquity back to us”. Besides Daumier, Philipon as well as Albéric Second, Louis Huart, Albert Clerc (Jules Bréval) and Ernest Jaime were responsible for the series’ overwhelming success. It was especially Jaime who created some of the most absurd ideas later to be transformed by Daumier into caricatures. The lithographs of the series „Histoire Ancienne“ were published between 1841 and 1843. Daumier was far ahead of his time when he started as one of the first to show how relative the importance of Greek and Roman Mythology can be in a modern world. The admirers of ancient history especially in Arts however were not dissipated easily. It would take another 15 years until Baudelaire in literature and Offenbach in music de-mystified the “old Greeks” and removed the centuries old dust from them. On October 21, 1858 „Orphée aux Enfers“ opened at the Bouffes Parisiens-theatre in Paris (by Hector Crémieux and Jacques Offenbach) and scored a huge success. The public was thrilled about the “old Greeks” finally “coming down to earth”. On December 17, 1864 “La Belle Hélène” (libretto by Meilhac and Halévy, music by Offenbach) opened at the Théatre des Variétés in Paris. The music critic for the Figaro, Jouvin, wrote an enthusiastic review in his paper, while the conservative papers of the time were talking about sacrilege. The public decided differently: “La Belle Hélène” became one of the most successful operettas in music history. The DAUMIER REGISTER has produced a short, not so serious video on this series. Click on the image below to see the video. BOSSUET, Jacques Bénigne (1627 – 1704) was a preacher, writer and bishop of Meaux. SECOND, Albéric (1816-1887) was a writer, author, and journalist working for the „Charivari“. He wrote the texts for the series “Histoire Ancienne” and for „Paris au XIX Siècle“. |
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