Réunion d'Hommes d'Etat - Quid Nunc's, BAL2013.31, Henry Monnier, En 1827

Author(s): monnier, henry bonaventure (paris, 07–06–1799 - paris, 03–01–1877 — 3–6–1877), designer senefelder et cie, designer-lithographer production date: in 1827 dating in century: 19th century type(s) of object(s): graphic arts, print name(s): print materials and techniques: lithography, vellum paper, watercolor dimensions - artwork: height: 20. 5cm width: 28. 1cm description: colored print marks, inscriptions, hallmarks: title of the work - under the image: meeting of statesmen. / quid nunc's author inscription - below the image on the right: senefelder lith. Inscription concerning the author - under the image on the left: henry monnier iconographic description: five middle-aged men stand in a circle. They are all wearing worn, shapeless hats and their outfits, although bourgeois, are shabby. Some have a cane, a jacket. One of the protagonists hands a document to another. This assembly is playing "behind the scenes" politics. Actor, playwright and designer, henry monnier helped illustrate la comédie humaine. His engravings of administrative morals, and especially his play scenes from bureaucratic life, clearly inspired balzac for his novel la femme supérieure, renamed les employés. The same references to the customs of their time often inspired the two artists on numerous subjects at the same time, as we can see in the following extract: "three days later, the neighborhood's businesses were in turmoil with the announcement of the ball that birotteau was preparing. Everyone could also see the exterior props required by the rapid change of the staircase, the square wooden pipes through which the rubble fell into the parked dump trucks. The workers in a hurry who worked by torchlight, because there had day workers and night workers, stopped the idle, the curious in the street, and gossip relied on these preparations to announce enormous sumptuousness "[extract from history of the grandeur and decadence of césar birotteau, by honoré de balzac] themes / subjects / places represented: social subject, morals, politician, sewing and needlework, game of skill mode of acquisition: purchase institution: maison de balzac inventory number: bal2013. 31. Date: En 1827.