Show NAPOLEON AMt AM-t CARICATURISTS French Caricaturists of Napoleon Generally of Little Herit THE ENGLISH THE BEST 1VOKK OF GILLRAY CRUIKSHANK AND ROWLANDSON Former is Par Excellence tile Caricaturist Cari-caturist of Napoleon and lIe Incarnates In-carnates in His Work all the Hatred Ha-tred oi England Awiiiist the En jieror Only His Death Caused the Pencil to Drop i I < Copyright 1S35 by S S McClure Limited Lim-ited Paris May 20 1893 From the abdication t ab-dication to the return from Elba and from Waterloo to 1890 antiNapoleonic caricature in France was so coarse and so destitute of all art that it is really not worth noticing During these j periods the Bourbon government J govern-ment openly favored this production of anonymous caricatures vilely colored and with grosly insulting commentaries t commen-taries by the appearance of which r they hnped the Napoleon legend would I be effectually stifled In a short time repulsive pictures of Xapoleon WEre everywhere conspicuous f conspicu-ous a hideous nightmare in the print A sellers windows Farewell to the Bonaparte at the bridge of Arcola Nor No-r more of the first cOnsul crossing the Alps No longer Napoleon appears in F majesty beneath the arches of Notre Dam > or in the cathi ral at Milan his r brows encircled by the imperial diadem dia-dem or the iron crown of the Lom bards To the famous engravings signed by the names of Gros David Isabey Gerard Ger-ard and Appiani to the popular pictures pic-tures with dithyrambic legends have succeeded innumerable caricatures nearly all anonymous of astonishing coarseness ard absolutely devoid of artA A iact worthy of mention is that in France no artist of talent consented to desrad his brush in this base campaign cam-paign of insults against the thunder blasted Titan It was necessary that all possible means should be used to inspire in the people a horror even of the name of Bonaparte The task was certainly a difficult one the people being always r ady with the instinctive generosity of their heart to pardon the offences of those who have accomplished really great things and to forget very quickly quick-ly sufferings by the excess of glory It is in England we must seek for really good caricatures of Napoleon There art was combined with satire and certain caricatures by Gillray and Rowlandson might occupy a place of honor in the finest collections of engravings en-gravings Gillrajs Celebrated Caricatures t Among the numerous caricaturists who attacked Napoleon Gillray is by far the most celebrated His influence on satiric painters of his time was considerable = not only in England but also in France Germany Italy and especially in Russia he had innumerable innumera-ble imitators J Gillray is par excellence the caricaturist cari-caturist of Napoleon and he incarnates incar-nates in Ins work all the hatred of England against the emperor Moreover More-over the satiric vocation was nevermore never-more imperious than in the case of this artist He seems to have been born In the world for the purpose of ridiculing his contemporaries Nobody was safe from his attacks and George III was among the first to experience the stings of his poisoned darts Numerous Numer-ous are the caricatures in which he ridicules with merciless humor the eccentricities ec-centricities and avarice of his sovereign sove-reign British spleen was delighted with those biting Criticisms but at last the court became displeased and a minister minis-ter was commanded to buy the terrible terri-ble pencil of Gillray who drunkard and gambler lent himself with a good grace to the bargain One if the articles in the convention probably required him to turn the ar t rowJ of his satire against the Corsl can ogre the Corsican plague for from the day the imbecilities of George III ceased to serve as a butt for his raillery Napoleon became his daily target And it must be admitted that his inexhaustible fancy did not suffer from the change of direction Tlie Feast of Belsliazrar From the coup detat of Brumaire until 1S15 the year of his death he held on to his victim It was the unceasing un-ceasing attack of the hornet on the lion The list of pictures illustrating that Homeric light is a long one Among the most celebrated may be mentioned Napoleon Putting an End to the French Revolution The 3 rnteI1ew Between Britannia and the u wench Citizen and The Feast of r ejshazzar in Whi h Bonaparte Jo o ephine and the courtiers are feasting d en the riches of England I H c c u c L < < I On one plate served like calfs head Is the head of King George on another an-other a gigantic pie representing the Bank of England Josephine enormous I enor-mous and expansive It is thus that I history is written is emptying her I glass at a gulp one of the guests is swallowing the Tower of London But at the moment when the first consul I attacks a cake representing St James palace the three fateful words of the scriptural story shine out on the wall I and Bonaparte shrinks back in horror while behind him stand his trembling sisters attired in costumes of the slightest Then there are The Valley of the Shadow of Death The Plum Pudding Pud-ding In Danger The Toreador The Unexpected Meeting Castles i in the Air etc I shall describe only the principal The subject of The Toreador was I suggested to Gillray by the Spanish i war Here we see the emperor in I matador costume in the arena He has broken the head of his espada on I the shoulder of one of the bulls who maddened by the wound stabs him with his horns The sovereigns of I Europe form the audience and contemplate contem-plate the scene with evident delight I In the Valley of the Shadow of I Death Napoleon is represented as I entering the gloomy valley holding in leash the Northern bear He encounters encoun-ters here the British lion the terrier of Sicily the wolf of Portugal and last of all Death mounted on an An dalusian steed with arched neck and urging them to combat Other Eiigrlisli Caricatures Some of Gillrays compositions might be reproached for their obscure symbolism sym-bolism in spite of the extensive explanatory ex-planatory notes that cover more than half the drawing or escape in scrolls from the mouths of the personages like streams of gall A long way after him comes George Cruikshank who is only his pale imitator im-itator but whose Satirical History of Napoleon with its colored plates constitutes a curious study in carica cure I Thomas Rowlandson completes the trinity but among his numerous works although entirely consecrated to the painting of manners and customs cus-toms md especially the evil ones of his oi 11 country Napoleonic satire only appears by the way We may I mention as an example of this great artists work the colored print The Two Kings of Terror a title the laconic la-conic eloquence of which forms a contrast con-trast to the interminable commen tories of Gilbrays obscure designs Rowlandson here represents a conference con-ference between Death and Napoleon who sit face to face one on a cannon the other on a drum in attitudes of meditation In the background are batallions mingling in the shock of battle under a stormy sky That is all and yet the picture Is painful in its impressiveness It is of the highest high-est art F There Is alsq a series of prints either anonymous or s4gned by obscure ob-scure names published at the time of the formation of the camp at Bou logne in which is reflected under an appearance pf defiance the very real terror spread throughout England by 3 co 2 fl > the prospect of an invasion We may mention also the satiric prints executed at St Helena from nature by such men as Marryat Bunbury Dodgin and Crockatt which in spite of intentional and often grotesque gro-tesque exaggeration of the characteristic character-istic features of the model form a valuable iconographic series Only the death of Napoleon caused the pencil to drop from the hands of the English caricaturists and from this moment freed from all cause to fear they bowed respectfully before the coffin of their glorious adversary while France on the other hand governed by the Bourbons proteges of the Holy Alliance abounded in coarse prints that threw insult even on the long and cruel agony of the great captive of St Helena Gillray like Rowlandson and later I 1I 1 I I i f fiuc ur v K SS < SS 0WI < 3 W Wif if iiI1ll1 I A I I THE FEAST OF DEL SHAZZAIt GIILRAY I George Cruikshank in spite of the difference in the historic epochs he represented never varied the features of Napoleon in any of his designs For the English satirist the Bonaparte Bona-parte of the Kremlin Is the same as the Bonaparte of Toulon and on the rock of St Helena he is as lean and longhaired as on the bridge at Arcola Ar-cola always the same puny raging dwarf with long hooked nose everlastingly ever-lastingly frowning brows thin flanks and the jaws of a mad wolf always dressed in an enormous plumed hat and the consular overcoat loosely belted and always incoherent movements move-ments epileptic gestures bullying attitudes at-titudes a continual agitation It is the invariable formula German Caricatures of Napoleon In Germany caricatures of the General Gen-eral or consul are rarely seen The satirists of Dresden Berlin Munich and Vienna maintain a prudent pru-dent reserve until the disaster of 1S12 After that date German caricature appears in the form of Kleins bitter and ghastly cartoons and soon satirical satiri-cal sketches are multiplied to infinity In nearly every case the image of Napoleon the Napoleon of declining days is nothing but a rough distortion distor-tion of the lIfelike portrait by Dahl in Less cruel than the English artists the German caricaturists show us now in the Island of Elba now at St Helena a Napoleon grotesquely accoutered ac-coutered bewailing his sins while smoking a large clay pipe or dressed I I The 5 i Ic 1 I F I I I I I i i I I TIlE PLOI PUDDING IN DANGER GILIRAY like Robinson Crusoe contemplating I with profound melancholy from under the shade of a great umbrella legions of rats who are gnawing at his boots I At times however German caricature carica-ture assumes a savage harshness and Napoleon then becomes the great gravedigger seated with a shovel in hand on a throne made of heapedup skulls There Is little to be said regarding Italian caricature which is a feeble imitation of the German For reasons easy to understand It did not appear until the close of the Empire and then only timidly LEstampe Russe of which the most curious plates have been carefully care-fully collected by M Rawinski contains con-tains a considerable number of Napoleonic Na-poleonic caricatures Almost all of them have reference to the campaign of 1812 < I Many are only clumsy adaptations of German and above all of English drawings due to the audacious imagination im-agination of the Muscovite Lepede heer who with one stroke upsets the order the original composition and the spirit of the legend Then there is the series of popular sketches which are of an infantile art and atrociously colored but at times reflect with extraordinary violence and bitter eloquence tile feelings feel-ings of the Russian people from the passage of the Niemen to that of the Beresina I have constantly before my eyes that emanclated Napoleon holding a review of skeletons in the middle of a vast white plain And that return to Paris that departure in a sledge drawn by a pig whose wretched pace is accelerated by the lances of the Cossacks He is well worth seeing that melancholy Napoleon in sordid rags from whose long very long nose hang stalactites of ice Sad and cruel images of old time I very different from those which the French and Russian peoples exchange today with touching confidence in the mysterious future ARMAND DAYOT Inspecteur des Beaux Arts |