Les Gens de Justice. Un Defenseur en Justice de paix causant affaires dans son cabinet habituel

Artist Honoré Daumier (Marseille, France, 1808 - 1879)

Date1840

Mediumlithograph on paper

ClassificationsPrints

DimensionsOverall: Height: 33.5 cm, Width: 24.8 cm

AcquisitionPurchased in 1963.

CopyrightOut of copyright - CC0

LocationView by Appointment - Aberdeen Treasure Hub

Object numberABDAG005929

Keywords

About MeHonoré Daumier, an unrivalled caricaturist, showed with wry humour the absurd aspects of contemporary Parisian life. Les Gens de Justice is one of his most celebrated lithographic series, in which the major theme is the victims to justice subjected to the special pleading of cynical lawyers. In this lithograph a lawyer discusses the case of a working class client, whilst enjoying a drink at his preferred place of 'work' - the bar. In lampooning the legal profession, Daumier makes an irreverent joke at the expense of the bourgeoisie, the most powerful class in France throughout the 19th century.

Daumier drew his early lithographs directly onto the stone without preparatory drawings and the quality of his draughtsmanship is very much in evidence. Whilst his caricatures established a following amongst the general public, Daumier was also an important member of the french Realist school and was admired as such by the writers Balzac and Baudelaire. The latter commented of Daumier, that "the man who each morning keeps the population of our city amused" was, in fact, "one of the most important men, not only in caricature, but in the whole of modern art".
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Daumier again lampooning the legal profession, here suggesting that the lawyer's preferred place of work is a "pub"!