L’Amant Surpris

Wash manner etching and engraving printed in blue, red, yellow, and black inks. In lower margin, beneath the image, at left: Schall pinx. at right: Descourtis sculp.

A young woman surprises her sweetheart, whom she has found reading love letters in a wooded park. The love-struck fellow carries a miniature portrait of her as a keepsake. Verdant foliage, a nearby brook, and a blooming rosebush signal fertility and the bounty of life. The nude female statue sitting on a pedestal seems to watch the playful lovers.

This meticulously crafted color print reproduces an oil painting by Jean-Frédéric Schall, an artist best known for his pastoral and mildly erotic scenes. During the French Revolution (1789–99), the market for deluxe color prints declined, as titillating subjects and signs of luxury were considered immoral. When attitudes relaxed around 1800, printmakers like Descourtis made a few color prints using multiple plates to layer tinted inks as they had before the Revolution. Descourtis learned his method of multiple-plate color printing from Jean Frarnçois Janinet and like him used toolwork on the plate rather than aquatint, an acid immersion process used to create general areas of shading. However, this time-consuming and expensive process was soon replaced by hand coloring that workers could more cheaply and easily accomplish.

Very good example.