Honoré Daumier
The Good Friends
1858-1868
Scroll
Honoré Daumier
The Good Friends
1858-1868
Physical Qualities
Black conté crayon, charcoal, watercolor, pen and black ink, and brush and black wash, with scraping, on paper, Sheet: 236 × 304 mm. (9 5/16 × 11 15/16 in.)
Credit Line
The George A. Lucas Collection, purchased with funds from the State of Maryland, Laurence and Stella Bendann Fund, and contributions from individuals, foundations, and corporations throughout the Baltimore community
Object Number
1996.48.18684
George Lucas collected hundreds of works by Honoré Daumier, including this undated drawing of two friends chatting over glasses of wine. An astute psychological observer who captured his subjects with quick, vigorous pen strokes, Daumier honed in on the men’s most salient features: the pained expression of the man on the left, and the sympathetic, questioning gaze of the man on the right.
Charles Baudelaire considered Daumier one of the greatest draftsmen of the day. He wrote, “His drawing is abundant and easy—it is sustained improvisation: and yet it never descends to the ‘chic.’. . .He evokes color, as he does thought—and that is the sign of higher art.”
The Baltimore Museum of Art by purchase, 1996; Maryland Institute College of Art,
through Henry Walters, Baltimore, by bequest 1909; from George A. Lucas, Paris
through Henry Walters, Baltimore, by bequest 1909; from George A. Lucas, Paris
The Essence of Line: French Drawings from Ingres to Degas
2011-09-19 00:00:00
2011-09-19 00:00:00
Fisher, Jay McKean, et al. The Essence of Line: French drawings from Ingres to Degas. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2005, p. 170-71, ill.
Bruce Laughton, Honoré Daumier, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996, p. 120-21, fig. no. 152, ill. p. 121.
'Daumier visto por Henry James. Lo que unas litografias inspiraron', Saber Ver, 36 (September/October 1997), p. 59.
Roger Passeron, Daumier, New York: 1979, p. 271.
Sarah Symmons, Daumier, London: 1979, p. 85, plate 63.
Robert Rey, Honoré Daumier, New York: 1966, p. 32.
K. E. Maison, Daumier: Drawings, London: Thomas Yoseloff, 1960, p. 20, no. 39.
A Picture Book: 200 Objects in the Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, 1955, ill. p. 50.
Adelyn Breeskin, 'Three Generations of Buying French in Baltimore', Art News, December 1951, p. 38.
K. E. Maison, Honoré Daumier: Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, Watercolours and Drawings, Volume II, Watercolours and Drawings, London, 1968, p. 108, no. 319, plate 89.
Inscribed: lower right in black ink: "h Daumier"; lower right in black ink: "h"; by later hand, lower center verso in brown ink: "1892 (illegible) 54 7.49 (illegible) mardi matin"
