Jérôme-François Chantereau’s etching, “Marche de Troupes”, c1740

Jérôme-François Chantereau (1710–1757)

“Marche de Troupes” (Marching Troops), c1740.

Etching on fine laid paper, trimmed slightly within the platemark and backed with a support sheet. Interestingly, the lower area of the original printing plate seems to have been burnished resulting in the loss of inscriptions (such as publication details) on this impression; nevertheless, there are still partial remnants of what may have been there.

Size: (sheet) 8.8 x 8.8 cm.

IFF 3 (Inventaire du Fonds Français: Bibliothèque Nationale, Départment des Estampes. Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris, 1930–, cat. no. 3); see also https://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb44538042c.

For those unfamiliar with the artist, Jérôme-François Chantereau, beyond being a printmaker, he was a painter to the King of Denmark as well as being an art dealer and no doubt a restorer, as the profession at the time tended to include that appellation. I mention his latter role, as I understand that his passion for appraising artworks led to a purported murder of a fellow art dealer and restorer, Joseph Ferdinand Godefroid, in an after-dinner altercation about the attribution of a painting by Carlo Maratti (see Yasemin Altun’s (2018) thesis, "Aprons Made from Canvas: The Legacies of Marie-Jacob Godefroid, Restauratrice to the French Royal Art Collections, 1741–1775”, p. 1).

Condition: a richly inked impression, trimmed slightly within the platemark and laid upon an archival support sheet of millennium quality washi paper. The sheet is in excellent condition with no tears, holes, folds, abrasions, stains or foxing.

I am selling this exceptionally rare etching showing an informal procession consisting of a man leading a heavily laden horse accompanied by a leaping dog and goat, followed by sheep, a camel and other men through what may be a scene of devastation (based on my reading of portrayed smoke/fire and distant ruins) for AU$356 (currently US$265.70/EUR244.71/GBP203.86 at the time of this listing) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world (but not, of course, any import duties/taxes imposed by some countries).

If you are interested in purchasing seldom seen etching, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.