print;
popular print
- Museum number
- 1998,0607.11
- Title
- Object: Les Etrennes (The New Year gift)
- Description
-
Two sisters Jeanne and Louise Damey from Neuville-sur-Vannes, near Troyes, give their blind old mother a hen as a New Year's gift on 1 January 1782 in their poverty-stricken hovel; a charity print for the benefit of the mother who is being supported by her two daughters as she is now suffering from a type of paralysis that afflicts every member of their family from the age of 55. 1784
Etching and engraving
- Production date
- 1784
- Dimensions
-
Height: 195 millimetres
-
Width: 225 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- This benefit print was available from François Godefroy, who was both engraver and publisher, for the price of 1 livre tournois and 16 sous. Half the price was to go to the two sisters shown in the print supporting their mother with the gift of a hen for the New Year. The paraph in the lower right corner is probably that of M.Trutat, the notary, to whom the accounting had been entrusted. On the verso, possibly in the same hand is the number 1880.
The curé wrote again to the 'Journal de Paris' on 9 February 1784 (p.179), drawing attention to Godefroy's print (with its price and Godefroy's address), and thanking him for his act of generosity. He wrote 'J'ignore si le burin s'étoit honoré jamais de quelque oeuvre charitable; je désire que cette seconde lettre, insérée dans votre journal, témoigne le bienfait et la reconnoissance.'
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
2001 May-Sep BM, P&D, 'Paper Assets' (no cat.)
- Acquisition date
- 1998
- Acquisition notes
- Annotated in brown ink on recto with initials (barely legible, possibly 'IB').
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1998,0607.11
