16. Jean-Louis Forain
(1852-1931)
L’Avocat Parlant au Prévenu (2e planche)

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Forain, L’Avocat Parlant

L’Avocat Parlant au Prévenu (2e planche)

Etching, 1909, 217 x 291 mm., Guérin 55 ii/ii, Faxon 66 ii/ii, ex collection : Paul J. Sachs (Lugt 2113). Fine, strong impression on laid paper with large margins, signed in pencil and numbered from the edition of 25. There were only two or three proofs of the first state. Forain’s early etchings were straightforward representations of drinkers, stage-door Johnnies, street walkers and the usual Montmartre cast. From 1908, however, he came to etching as a different man, in both style and subject. Stylistically, a rapid etched line produced tangles, crossings and zig-zags out of which the figures, the setting and the depth almost miraculously emerged. In subject, he turned to the courtroom and its victims and to religious subjects. Forain’s legal scenes are never funny, the way Daumier’s could be, but they are even more acerbic. The accused are largely humble men, caught in a system they do not understand, the lawyers are mostly predators, and the innocent, the women and children, are the true victims. These are powerful prints.