Realism—From Daumier to Courbet ..............................................

Lecture 41

Honoré Daumier, who was born in 1808 and died in 1879, often gets

slighted in survey courses because the work that made him famous

and inÀ uential was newspaper work—his lifelong À ood of lithographs

attacking the government, ridiculing lawyers, and generally deÀ ating

social and intellectual pretentiousness wherever he found it.

L

ithography is a printmaking technique that exploits the mutual
repulsion of grease and water. In lithography, a porous surface is
used, often Bavarian limestone. An artist draws a design with grease
crayons or washes on the stone. Through a complicated process, the design is
¿ xed to the stone, where it may be repeatedly inked and printed. Lithography
had only been invented in 1798, and it made the mass illustrated popular
press of the 19th century possible, including the acid caricatures by Daumier
and others.

We begin with Daumier’s Freedom of the Press (1834). As we see, the
typographer stands his ground, ¿ sts clenched, while his political targets fall.
In the right background, the last Bourbon king, Charles X, has fainted and is
being revived. Intentionally, and perhaps wisely, Daumier had not aimed this
picture at the newly installed Citizen King, Louis Philippe.

But the government could not count on much leniency from Daumier, as
we see in Rue Transnonain, 15 April 1834 (1834). Riots had erupted in
Lyons because the silk workers there could no longer live on their wages.
Troops were sent in and ¿ ghting continued for four days. On April 14, before
dawn, troops in Paris were ¿ red upon from an apartment building in the Rue
Transnonain. They panicked and rushed into the building, breaking down
doors, ¿ ring their riÀ es, and stabbing at bedclothes with their bayonets.

When the day dawned, scenes like the one Daumier imagined, or re-created
from accounts, came to light. We see four dead family members: the
grandfather, the wife, the husband, and the infant. The father—the worker—