19th Century Figurative Prints

Uses and Customs - Horse Mounting Method is a lithograph on paper realized in 1862. The artwork belongs to the Suite Uses and customs of all the peoples o...

Paul César Helleu. La Duchesse de Marlborough, Consuelo Vanderbilt. c. 1901. Drypoint. 21 1/2 x 13 3/4 (sheet 24 x 15). A rich impression printed o...

Courtesan is an original modern artwork realized by Keisai Eisen in the first half of the 19th Century. Signed and inscribed on plate. Total dimension...

Image dimensions: 24.3 x 17.5 cm. Single sheet with passepartout. "...The unhappy man had approached that mysterious spot where, amid a thousand aquatic plants, the Water-arrow grows." T. Delord. Les Fleurs animées...

Utagawa Hiroshige Dawn Inside the Yoshiwara, circa 1857 Woodblock print 11 x 7 inches Utagawa Hiroshige is recognized as a master of the ukiyo-e woodblock printing tradition, havin...

The present print is one of several examples produced for Nathaniel Currier by his longtime collaborator Frances F. "Fanny" Palmer. Harry T. Peters wrote of her: "There is no more interesting and appealing character among the group of artists who worked for Currier & Ives than Fanny Palmer. In an age when women, well-bred women in particular, did not generally work for a living Fanny Palmer for years did exacting, full-time work in order to support a large and dependent family ... Her work ... had great charm, homeliness, and a conscientious attention to detail." One of a series of four prints showing American country life in different seasons, the image presents the viewer with a picturesque view of a successful American farm. In the foreground, a gentleman rides a horse with a young boy before a respectable Italianate country house. Two women and a young girl pick flowers in the garden and several farm workers attend to their duties. Beyond are other homes and a city on the coast. 16.63 x 23.75 inches, artwork 28.13 x 33.38 inches, frame Entitled bottom center "American Country Life - May Morning" Signed in the stone, lower left "F.F. Palmer, Del." Signed in the stone, lower right "Lith. by N. Currier" Copyrighted lower center "Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1855 by N. Currier in the Clerk's office of the Southern District of N.Y." Inscribed bottom center "New York, Published by N. Currier 152 Nassau Street" Framed to conservation standards using silk-lined 100 percent rag matting and Museum Glass with a gold gilded liner, all housed in a stained wood moulding. Nathaniel Currier was a tall introspective man with a melancholy nature. He could captivate people with his piercing stare or charm them with his sparkling blue eyes. Nathaniel was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts on March 27th, 1813, the second of four children. His parents, Nathaniel and Hannah Currier, were distant cousins who lived a humble yet spartan life. When Nathaniel was eight years old, tragedy struck. Nathaniel’s father unexpectedly passed away leaving Nathaniel and his eleven-year-old brother Lorenzo to provide for the family. In addition to their mother, Nathaniel and Lorenzo had to care for six-year-old sister Elizabeth and two-year-old brother Charles. Nathaniel worked a series of odd jobs to support the family, and at fifteen, he started what would become a life-long career when he apprenticed in the Boston lithography shop of William and John Pendleton. A Bavarian gentleman named Alois Senefelder invented lithography just 30 years prior to young Nat Currier’s apprenticeship. While under the employ of the brothers Pendleton, Nat was taught the art of lithography by the firm’s chief printer, a French national named Dubois, who brought the lithography trade to America. Lithography involves grinding a piece of limestone flat and smooth then drawing in mirror image on the stone with a special grease pencil. After the image is completed, the stone is etched with a solution of aqua fortis leaving the greased areas in slight relief. Water is then used to wet the stone and greased-ink is rolled onto the raised areas. Since grease and water do not mix, the greased-ink is repelled by the moisture on the stone and clings to the original grease pencil lines. The stone is then placed in a press and used as a printing block to impart black on white images to paper. In 1833, now twenty-years old and an accomplished lithographer, Nat Currier left Boston and moved to Philadelphia to do contract work for M.E.D. Brown, a noted engraver and printer. With the promise of good money, Currier hired on to help Brown prepare lithographic stones of scientific images for the American Journal of Sciences and Arts. When Nat completed the contract work in 1834, he traveled to New York City to work once again for his mentor John Pendleton, who was now operating his own shop located at 137 Broadway. Soon after the reunion, Pendleton expressed an interest in returning to Boston and offered to sell his print shop to Currier. Young Nat did not have the financial resources to buy the shop, but being the resourceful type he found another local printer by the name of Stodart. Together they bought Pendleton’s business. The firm ‘Currier & Stodart’ specialized in "job" printing. They produced many different types of printed items, most notably music manuscripts for local publishers. By 1835, Stodart was frustrated that the business was not making enough money and he ended the partnership, taking his investment with him. With little more than some lithographic stones, and a talent for his trade, twenty-two year old Nat Currier set up shop in a temporary office at 1 Wall Street in New York City. He named his new enterprise ‘N. Currier, Lithographer’ Nathaniel continued as a job printer and duplicated everything from music sheets to architectural plans. He experimented with portraits, disaster scenes and memorial prints, and any thing that he could sell to the public from tables in front of his shop. During 1835 he produced a disaster print Ruins of the Planter's Hotel, New Orleans, which fell at two O’clock on the Morning of the 15th of May 1835, burying 50 persons, 40 of whom Escaped with their Lives. The public had a thirst for newsworthy events, and newspapers of the day did not include pictures. By producing this print, Nat gave the public a new way to “see” the news. The print sold reasonably well, an important fact that was not lost on Currier. Nat met and married Eliza Farnsworth in 1840. He also produced a print that same year titled Awful Conflagration of the Steamboat Lexington in Long Island Sound on Monday Evening, January 18, 1840, by which melancholy occurrence over One Hundred Persons Perished. This print sold out very quickly, and Currier was approached by an enterprising publication who contracted him to print a single sheet addition of their paper, the New York Sun. This single page paper is presumed to be the first illustrated newspaper ever published. The success of the Lexington print launched his career nationally and put him in a position to finally lift his family up. In 1841, Nat and Eliza had their first child, a son they named Edward West Currier. That same year Nat hired his twenty-one year old brother Charles and taught him the lithography trade, he also hired his artistically inclined brother Lorenzo to travel out west and make sketches of the new frontier as material for future prints. Charles worked for the firm on and off over the years, and invented a new type of lithographic crayon which he patented and named the Crayola. Lorenzo continued selling sketches to Nat for the next few years. In 1843, Nat and Eliza had a daughter, Eliza West Currier, but tragedy struck in early 1847 when their young daughter died from a prolonged illness. Nat and Eliza were grief stricken, and Eliza, driven by despair, gave up on life and passed away just four months after her daughter’s death. The subject of Nat Currier’s artwork changed following the death of his wife and daughter, and he produced many memorial prints and sentimental prints during the late 1840s. The memorial prints generally depicted grief stricken families posed by gravestones (the stones were left blank so the purchasers could fill in the names of the dearly departed). The sentimental prints usually depicted idealized portraits of women and children, titled with popular Christian names of the day. Late in 1847, Nat Currier married Lura Ormsbee, a friend of the family. Lura was a self-sufficient woman, and she immediately set out to help Nat raise six-year-old Edward and get their house in order. In 1849, Lura delivered a son, Walter Black Currier, but fate dealt them a blow when young Walter died one year later. While Nat and Lura were grieving the loss of their new son, word came from San Francisco that Nat’s brother Lorenzo had also passed away from a brief illness. Nat sank deeper into his natural quiet melancholy. Friends stopped by to console the couple, and Lura began to set an extra place at their table for these unexpected guests. She continued this tradition throughout their lives. In 1852, Charles introduced a friend, James Merritt Ives, to Nat and suggested he hire him as a bookkeeper. Jim Ives was a native New Yorker born in 1824 and raised on the grounds of Bellevue Hospital where his father was employed as superintendent. Jim was a self-trained artist and professional bookkeeper. He was also a plump and jovial man, presenting the exact opposite image of his new boss. Jim Ives met Charles Currier through Caroline Clark, the object of Jim’s affection. Caroline’s sister Elizabeth was married to Charles, and Caroline was a close friend of the Currier family. Jim eventually proposed marriage to Caroline and solicited an introduction to Nat Currier, through Charles, in hopes of securing a more stable income to support his future wife. Ives quickly set out to improve and modernize his new employer’s bookkeeping methods. He reorganized the firm’s sizable inventory, and used his artistic skills to streamline the firm’s production methods. By 1857, Nathaniel had become so dependent on Jims’ skills and initiative that he offered him a full partnership in the firm and appointed him general manager. The two men chose the name ‘Currier & Ives’ for the new partnership, and became close friends. Currier & Ives produced their prints in a building at 33 Spruce Street where they occupied the third, fourth and fifth floors. The third floor was devoted to the hand operated printing presses that were built by Nat's cousin, Cyrus Currier, at his shop Cyrus Currier & Sons in Newark, NJ. The fourth floor found the artists, lithographers and the stone grinders at work. The fifth floor housed the coloring department, and was one of the earliest production lines in the country. The colorists were generally immigrant girls, mostly German, who came to America with some formal artistic training. Each colorist was responsible for adding a single color to a print. As a colorist finished applying their color, the print was passed down the line to the next colorist to add their color. The colorists worked from a master print displayed above their table, which showed where the proper colors were to be placed. At the end of the table was a touch up artist who checked the prints for quality, touching-in areas that may have been missed as it passed down the line. During the Civil War, demand for prints became so great that coloring stencils were developed to speed up production. Although most Currier & Ives prints were colored in house, some were sent out to contract artists. The rate Currier & Ives paid these artists for coloring work was one dollar per one hundred small folios (a penny a print) and one dollar per one dozen large folios. Currier & Ives also offered uncolored prints to dealers, with instructions (included on the price list) on how to 'prepare the prints for coloring.' In addition, schools could order uncolored prints from the firm’s catalogue to use in their painting classes. Nathaniel Currier and James Merritt Ives attracted a wide circle of friends during their years in business. Some of their more famous acquaintances included Horace Greeley, Phineas T. Barnum, and the outspoken abolitionists Rev. Henry Ward, and John Greenleaf Whittier (the latter being a cousin of Mr. Currier). Nat Currier and Jim Ives described their business as "Publishers of Cheap and Popular Pictures" and produced many categories of prints. These included Disaster Scenes, Sentimental Images, Sports, Humor, Hunting Scenes, Politics, Religion, City and Rural Scenes, Trains, Ships, Fire Fighters, Famous Race Horses, Historical Portraits, and just about any other topic that satisfied the general public's taste. In all, the firm produced in excess of 7500 different titles, totaling over one million prints produced from 1835 to 1907. Nat Currier retired in 1880, and signed over his share of the firm to his son Edward. Nat died eight years later at his summer home 'Lion’s Gate' in Amesbury, Massachusetts. Jim Ives remained active in the firm until his death in 1895, when his share of the firm passed to his eldest son, Chauncey. In 1902, faced will failing health from the ravages of Tuberculosis, Edward Currier sold his share of the firm to Chauncey Ives...

This artwork from the suite "La Tauromaquia, Plate #10" engraved between 1815 and 1816, is a photogravure on creme wove paper after renown Spanish artist Francisco Jose De Goya...

PAUL GAUGUIN (French 1848 - 1903) DEAUX FEMMES MAORIES ACCROUPIES. 1894-5 (Kornfield 26: Guerin 87 ) Zincograph (Lithograph) on smooth, cream imitation Japan paper, edition 200. Pu...

ARTISTE: after Auguste RODIN TITLE : Dante & Virgilus MEDIUM : Etching/photogravure after the original drawing SIGNATURE : Unsigned YEAR : 1897 PAPER : Vellum SIZE : 13 x 10" INFOR...

Lithograph on wove paper, realized in 1828. Signed in the plate. Light foxing throughout, slightly heavier on the margins; faint handling creases; image impression clean and well-p...

Etching and aquatint on cream laid, watermarked Rives paper. 6 5/8 x 5 inches (167 x 126 mm). Sixth and final state, a posthumous impression. A fine, inky impression with full margin...

Foreign Soldiers from Five Countries at the Port of Yokohama Color woodcut triptych, c. 1860's Signed in the block lower left corner Signed: "Ichimosai Yoshitora ga" Condition: Mounted to a rose colored silk backing (stable) Staining (visible) in the joining of the right and center sheets Colors very slightly faded Image size: 15 3/8 x 31 3/8 inches (triptysch sheets joined to make one print) The 1854 Treaty of Kanagawa opened Japan to the West. Curiosity about the never-before-seen foreigners spurred a market in Yokohama-e (Yokohama prints), named for the area to which foreign dignitaries and merchants were confined. Yoshitora became one of the best known and most active artists of the Yokohama-e school. Utagawa Yoshitora (歌川 芳虎) was a designer of ukiyo-e Japanese woodblock prints and an illustrator of books and newspapers who was active from about 1850 to about 1880. He was born in Edo (modern Tokyo), but neither his date of birth nor date of death is known. However, he was the oldest pupil of Utagawa Kuniyoshi who excelled in prints of warriors, kabuki actors, beautiful women, and foreigners (Yokohama-e). He may not have seen any of the foreign scenes he depicted. Yoshitora was prolific: he produced over 60 print series and illustrated over 100 books. In 1849 he produced an irreverent print called Dōke musha: Miyo no wakamochi ("Funny Warriors—Our Ruler's New Year's Rice Cakes"), which depicts Oda Nobunaga, Akechi Mitsuhide, and Toyotomi Hideyoshi...

Lithograph hand watercolored. Belongs to the Series "Atlante di Botanica popolare ossia Illustrazione di Piante Notevoli di ogni famiglia" (Atlas of popular botany or illustration o...

Lithograph realized by Daumier in 1845, belonging to the Series "Les Gens de Justice" Table no. 12 of the Series. Very good condition. Ref. Delteil 1348

J. Becquet, Sculptor (The Fiddler). 1859. Drypoint. Kennedy 52 state iv; Glasgow 62. state i. 10 1/8 x 7 1/2 (sheet 15 5/16 x 9 3/4). Series: "Sixteen Etchings or Scenes on the Thame...

A delightful triptych by the Japanese ukiyo-e artist Yoshu Chikanobu (1838-1912). The three sections combine to make a single image of women in richly decorated kimonos surrounded by...

Madame Helleu Looking at Watteau drawings at the Louvre. (En regardant les Watteau de Louvre). c. 1895. Drypoint printed in 2 colors - black and sepia. 11 3/4 x 15 7/8. Goncourt 3, d...

Plate from Journal Des Demoiselles is an original artwrok realized in the 19th century by Paul Lacourière Mixed colored lithograph from the Le...

Stoats on a Rock is an original print realized in the late 19th century by an anonymous illustrator. Color lithograph representing a group of stoats: one has just captured a lttle b...

Takanawa no kihan is a modern artwork realized between 1843 and 1847 after Utagawa Hiroshige. Ukiyo-e color woodblock print from the Touto hakkei (The Eight Famous Views of the Capital of the East) series. Mounted under passepartout. The artwork depicts the port of Takanawa, a suburb of Minato in southern Tokyo, and is one of the very rare sheets by Utagawa Ando Hiroshige...

Georges de FEURE (1868 - 1943) Return,1897 Original lithograph Printed signature, as issued 1897/98 Printed on paper Vélin (wove) Size 40 x 31 cm (c. 16 x 12") INFORMATION : Publis...

Color Lithograph on wove paper, 1896. Artist's orange-red and black signature stamps, numbered in pencil (#12), from edition of 100 published by A. Vollard in the 2nd "Album des esta...

Pancratius is a lithograph on paper realized in 1862. The artwork belongs to the Suite Uses and customs of all the peoples of the universe: " History of the government, of the laws,...

Médecine Expérimentale (Experimental medicine), is an original etching, soft ground, on Japanese paper realized by Félicien Rops in 1854, signed in the ...

Le Village de Chanaz is a black and White etching realized by A. Appian in the 1860s.  Titled in the lower. Image size: 16x23. Very good impression with wide margins and a very fr...

Carthage is an original modern artwork realized in Germany in the Early 19th Century. Original B/W Lithograph on Ivory Paper. Inscripted on the lower margin in capital letters: Di...

Thomas Holloway, Noses, original Etching, 1810. The Physiognomy - The Noses is an original etching artwork realized by Thomas Holloway for Johann Caspar Lavater's "Essays on Physiogn...

The Light House, Aberdeen is an etching realized in 1845 by W. H. Bartlett. Signed on the plate. Titled on the lower center. Good conditions with slight foxing. The artwork is b...

Etching, burnished aquatint, drypoint, and engraving. Image dimension: 245 x 352 mm. Sheet dimension 330 x 475 mm. Numbered "19" at top right. Nineteenth plate from the Tauromach...

Paul LEROY Orientalism : Young Women Playing, 1898 Original lithograph (Champenois workshop) Printed signature in the plate On vellum, 40 x 31 cm (c. 16 x 12 in) INFORMATION: Litho...

Framed 46 x 57.50 in13 Printed by L. Angerer. Engraved by Paul Sigmund Habelmann after the original oil painting by Ludwig Knaus. The inscription "Wie die Alten sungen, so zwitschern...

Beautiful Detached Fresco shaped in Octagonal Form designed by a Roman Master of the beginning of 19th century. In excellent conditions. This artwork is shipped from Italy. Under ex...

Paris: Sagot, 1898. Wood engraving on cream wove paper, 8 1/2 x 6 1/4 inches (216 x 158 mm), full margins. Signed and numbered 11/25 in pencil, lower right. With the blindstamp of t...

Roses is an original modern artwork realized by François Langlois in the 19th Century. Mixed colored etching. Includes passepartout and a frame in ...

Lithograph after Alexandre-Gabriel Decamps (1803–1860). This striking lithograph by Eugène Le Roux interprets a dramatic composition by Alexandre-Gabriel Decamps, one of the leading...

"Diane Chasseresse" is an original color lithograph signed by the artist Gaston de Latenay. It is edition 36/100, which is written in the lower right...

CAMILLE PISSARRO (French 1830- 1903) MARCHE AUX LEGUMES A PONTOISE, 1891 (D. 97ii/ii) Etching and aquatint, Unsigned as published in Le Peintre-graveur Illlustre: Pissarro, Sisley,...

Man with the Dragon is a superb color woodbloock print on rice-paper, realized by the great master of ukiyo-e print, Utagawa Toyokuni I (1769-1825) Depicti...

"The Battle of the Golden Spurs" Avante Garde Print This print of the massive Bataille des Éperons d’Or, or Battle of the Golden Spurs, is considered one of Jame's Ensor's (Belgian ...

This lithograph titled "Thebes, Great Hall at Karnak" is a notable work by the Scottish painter David Roberts (1796-1864). This particular scene is part of Roberts' most famous colle...

The Mersey at Liverpool is an etching realized in 1845 by J.C.Armytage. Signed in plate. The artwork is realized in a well-balanced composition.

Artist: Henri Fantin-Latour (French, 1836-1904) Title: "Vison" Portfolio: Gazette des Beaux-Arts *Issued unsigned Year: 1895 Medium: Original Lithograph on chine appliqué on wove pap...

Etching and drypoint on watermarked Hudelist laid paper, 9 5/8 x 5 inches (245 x 129mm) full margins. Second state (of five) after lettering. A superb condition with a pencil inscrip...

Etching realized by Charles Courtry after Eugéne Delacroix in 1891. Not signed as issued, very good condition.

'Robert Macaire Dentiste' Lithograph by Honore Daumier after Charles Philipon. 1837. Plate 57 from the Robert Macaire 'Caricaturana' series. Translation of the French text below th...

Asagiri is a woodcut print realized by Utagawa Hiroshige in 1832.  It is part of the suite "The Fifty-three Stations of Tokaido". Very good condition.

Klimt’s association with Martin Gerlach dates back to the early 1880s when Gerlach and Schenk published their first edition of Allegorien und Embleme. By the mid-1890s, they were pla...

"Walking Tiger" Antoine Louis-Barye Antique Engraving by Firmin Gillot Circa. 1870 11 1/3 x 7 3/4 (21 3/8 x 17 1/2 frame) inches This is "Walking Tig...

Alphonse MUCHA (1860-1939) "The Seasons" Variante 3 Rare original lithograph Each Season is signed at the lower part of the plate "Mucha". This lithograph is rare, since it was neve...

Benjamin Franklin Steel-engraving by WJ Edwards after Joseph Siffred Duplessis. C1860. . Vignette below image titled 'Declaration of Independence'. When Franklin arrived in France ...

Stage 48 of the 53 Stages of the Tokaido - Japanese Woodblock on Rice Paper Woodblock print of clothing vendors by Utagawa Hiroshige (Japanese, 1797-1858). Originally printed in 183...

Steinlen, Theophile "Lait Pur Sterilise de la Vingeanne" Original lithograph, c. 1894 Rennert 12 Printed by Charles Verneau, Paris Bright Fresh Colors, RARE...

'Fisom degli abiti dell' America Nord-oe / Uomo donna dell' Isola Nootka' / 'Nipissonghi / Ottovaeri' Italian lithograph, c1841. Originally from 'Galleria universale di tutti i popo...

Androne della Villa di Mecenate a Tivoli, per cui passava l'antica Via Consolare Tiburtina Image dimensions: 50x60 cm. From the collection “Le antichità de’ contorni di Roma (...)” a...

'Position' Chromolithograph, 1874, after Ape (Carlo Pellegrini 1839-1889) Vanity Fair portrait of the Duke of Devonshire. 380mm by 260mm (sheet)

The Prince of Borbone is an original lithograph by Antonio Zezon. Naples 1851. Interesting colored lithograph which describes the Prince Francesco II di Borbone riding his horse, in...

Ernst Haeckel, 'Art Forms in Nature' (Plate 79 - Basiliscus), offset lithograph, 1899. Signed and titled in typeset, upper left. Titled 'Tafel 79 — Basi...

La Terrasse de la Villa Brancas, Sevres (The Terrace of the Villa Brancas) etching & drypoint, 1876 Signed in the plate bottom right corner (see photo) in plate, at lower left: xbre ...

Subject : Ancient Greek vase-painting from depicting a Silenus with tambourine and two maenads from a Campanian bell-krater. Technique : Copper-line engraving with original hand-col...

Edouard MANET Spain : Women at Prado, 1865 Original etching Printed signature in the plate On Japan paper 45 x 40 cm (c. 18 x 16 inch) REFERENCES : - Catalog raisonne Guerin #46 ...