Provenance:

D.L. Collection, Germany

Sold: Amsler & Ruthard Auction, Berlin, October 29, Lot 200

Private Collection

Sold: Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox, June 22-July 22, 1989, Lot 17

Private Collection, by 1992

Exhibited:

London, Tate Gallery, Daumier: Paintings and Drawings, 1961, no. 219

Frankfurt, Städelsches Kunstinstitut und Städtische Galerie, Daumier Drawings, November 17, 1992 - January 17, 1993, p. 196, no. 94, fig. 118 (also traveled to New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, February 26 - May 2, 1993)

Literature:

Kunstwanderer, 1925, p. 66

K.E. Maison, Daumier Drawings, New York & London, 1960, p. 138, illus.

K.E. Maison, Honoré Daumier: Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, Watercolours and Drawings, vol. 2, Greenwich, Conn., 1968, p. 226, no. 677, pl. 260

Claude Roger-Marx, L'univers de Daumier, Paris, 1972, p. 68, illus.

Lot Note:

Executed in the 1870s, the present work represents a preparatory study for Daumier’s celebrated composition Une Cause Célèbre, first exhibited at Galerie Durand-Ruel in 1878. Notably, this version features a reversal of the figures’ positions, as well as a change of mood. Contrary to the final work, which presents the two lawyers viciously shouting at each other, the study here depicts the two men mid-plea—one animated and impassioned, the other more restrained and composed, almost aloof beneath his traditional cap.

With rapid yet expressive strokes, Daumier captures the theatrical intensity of the courtroom. Étude de Deux Avocats proves his unmatched ability to distill character and gesture in a few fluid lines: hallmarks of a master caricaturist turned psychological observer.