The Newborn Lamb after William Bouguereau, Antique Photogravure, circa 1880
€ 320
Original antique · The actual sheet photographed · Certificate of authenticity on request · Sold unframed · Worldwide shipping from € 15 (rates)
Date
circa 1880
Mapmaker / artist
William Bouguereau (painter), Goupil & Cie (photogravure)
Publisher
Goupil & Cie, Paris
Technique
Photogravure
Coloring
Uncolored
Sheet size
34.5 × 25 cm (13.6 × 9.8 in)
Condition
Good
Reference
BG-13194-36
What the condition grades mean
Excellent
Bright and clean, with no faults worth mentioning.
Very good
Only light signs of age, such as faint toning.
Good
Normal signs of age for a sheet of this period: toning, some foxing, small marks or neat old repairs.
Fair
Clear faults such as staining, tears or repairs, priced to match.
Every fault we see is written in the condition note, and the whole sheet is shown uncropped in the photos.
Condition
Light age toning; light handling soiling along the edges and a few small spots in the margins. Printed image clean.
About this sheet
A young shepherdess stands barefoot on a woodland path, cradling a newborn lamb against her chest and looking down at it with quiet tenderness. Beside her, a long-fleeced ewe stretches up her neck toward the lamb, mouth open as if calling to it. The girl wears a headscarf, a loose blouse and a long apron over her skirt, and the soft folds of the cloth are rendered with the same care as the curls of the ewe's wool. Behind the pair, leafy trees and a tangle of brambles close in, with a glimpse of open ground at the left.
The picture reproduces William Bouguereau's painting known as L'Agneau nouveau-né (The Newborn Lamb); the painter's signature and the date 1873 can be read in the image at lower left. Bouguereau was one of the most admired academic painters of nineteenth-century France, celebrated for exactly this kind of idealized rural figure, painted with a smooth, polished finish. The margin is lettered "Peint par W. Bouguereau" at left and "Photogravure & Imp. Goupil & Cie" at right, the line of the Paris house of Goupil and Cie, which made and printed the plate. Goupil was the leading publisher of reproductions after contemporary French painting, and its photogravures carried the work of Salon painters to collectors across Europe and America.
Photogravure is an intaglio process in which a photograph of the painting is etched into a copper plate and printed in ink. It gives a continuous, velvety tone that a line engraving cannot match, and here it preserves the soft modeling of the girl's face and arms and the fine detail of the foliage. The print is in a warm black on cream paper, with a plate mark surrounding the image and the lettering.
The upright format and gentle subject would sit well in a bedroom, a nursery or a hallway, framed simply in gilt or pale wood.
This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed. Any framed or interior images are shown for presentation and inspiration only, unless the listing explicitly states that the item is sold framed.
