Honore Daumier: The Complete Story
Honore Daumier was the great satirist of nineteenth century France, a printmaker who skewered kings, lawyers and the smug middle class in thousands of biting cartoons. He was also, almost in secret, a powerful painter of the poor. In his own time he was famous for the jokes. Today he is recognised as one of the most humane artists of his age.
He once went to prison for drawing the king as a greedy giant.
Born: Marseille, France, 1808
Known for: biting lithograph caricatures, The Third Class Carriage, social satire
Died: Valmondois, France, 1879
The cartoonist who went to jail
Daumier produced around four thousand lithographs for the satirical papers of Paris, mocking politicians, profiteers and pompous officials with savage wit. His line is quick, exaggerated and merciless. See what is lithography.
In 1832 he drew King Louis Philippe as Gargantua, a giant swallowing the people's money. He was prosecuted and spent six months in prison. The cartoon had hit its target hard.
Lawyers, crowds and power
He returned again and again to the law courts, drawing fat, scheming lawyers and frightened clients, a whole comedy of justice for sale. The series is still quoted whenever people mock the legal world.
He sculpted too, modelling small clay busts of politicians as grotesque caricatures, and a figure called Ratapoil who embodied shabby political thuggery. His satire worked in clay as well as ink.
The hidden painter
Away from the presses, Daumier painted, though few saw it in his lifetime. His canvases show washerwomen, third class train passengers and weary workers, treated with deep compassion and broad, modern brushwork. See what is realism.
His masterpiece, The Third Class Carriage, packs the tired poor into a railway car with a tenderness no caricature could hold. As a painter he pointed straight toward modern art. See what is portrait painting.
The cartoonist the poets defended
Even in his own time, sharp eyes saw Daumier was more than a jobbing cartoonist. The poet Baudelaire praised him as one of the most important artists in France, ranking his draftsmanship with the old masters.
Later painters agreed. Degas, Van Gogh and the young Picasso all studied his strong, economical figures. The man paid by the newspaper to make people laugh quietly taught modern artists how to draw.
Questions that come up about Daumier
What is Honore Daumier famous for?
Thousands of satirical lithographs, and paintings of the poor like The Third Class Carriage.
Was he really jailed?
Yes, for six months, for caricaturing King Louis Philippe as a money swallowing giant.
Was he a painter too?
Yes, though his compassionate paintings were barely known until after his death.
When did he die?
In 1879, nearly blind and poor, in a cottage given to him by his friend Corot.
Why the satire still stings
Daumier invented much of the language of modern political cartooning, and his lawyers and crowds feel uncannily current. The man dismissed as a mere cartoonist turns out to be both the father of the editorial cartoon and a great, tender painter of ordinary life.
One last detail. He grew almost blind and destitute in old age, and the painter Camille Corot quietly bought him a house so he would not be evicted. One great artist saving another, with no fuss and no publicity.