Louis-Charles Gautier-Dagoty (1746-after... - Lot 31 - Ader

Louis-Charles Gautier-Dagoty (1746-after 1787) The Return of the Prodigal Son. Manière noire after Le Guerchin. I.F.F. 1; Singer 2; F. Rodari, ed. in Anatomie de la couleur ; l'invention de l'estampe en couleurs, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, and Lausanne, Musée Olympique, 1996, n° 132-133. Printing in colors (tetrachromy). Interesting proof, fresh of colors, formerly stretched on cardboard (frame background), without apparent margins, the edges folded. Small rubs, snags and accidents on the surface and on the edges. On verso, rare printed note from the period, "Avis aux amateurs", pasted on the cardboard. Set of 3 pp. This engraving reproduces the painting by Guerchino (oil on canvas, 192 x 203 cm) kept in Turin, Sabauda Gallery. The Notice to amateurs printed on the reverse is an interesting document on the engraver's approach as well as a promotional argument serving the sale of the print: "If Italy boasts, with reason, of possessing the Masterpieces of Michelangelo, Paul Veronese, Titian, Correge, Guido, Tintoretto, Julius Roman, Raphael, Dominiquain & other great Masters, France should not be less proud of having today the means to multiply at will the sublime productions of these Great Men. Indeed, which discovery more happy than that which gives a so perfect copy of their works, that the connoisseurs find there with the first glance, the character of the Artist who was copied... For approximately 50 years, the Sr. Jacques Dagoty, wanting to adapt the engraving to the true goal of its invention, applied himself to the research of the means suitable to transmit on the paper the imitation of the colors as perfectly as what the burin expresses the drawing there, & to manage to give an exact copy in all points of the tables of the greatest Masters. (...) Death having taken him away at the moment of arriving at his goal, Sr. Louis Dagoty, his son, inherited his processes." The last printed lines of this note are partly completed in pen: "It is the color Print of this painting which represents the Prodigal Child at the feet of his Father that Sr. Dagoty has the honor to propose to the Public (...) It is sold at the Author, 12 fr in sheet. He will work [incessantly?] on this painting. " Enclosed: Jacques-Fabien Gautier-Dagoty. Benedict XIV; The Cardinal of Fleury. 1741. Black Manner. 160 x 216 and 215 x 155. I.F.F. 16 and 17; Singer 233 and 242. Color printing (tetrachromy). Good trial proofs, the 1st trimmed to the subject, the 2nd with small margins, enhanced with white and gold gouache (especially for the lace), with strikeouts and red pencil inscriptions in German in the subject as well as on the reverse for the 2nd. Minor surface damage to the first and a small fracture in the center, consolidated on the reverse.