Description

FIRST EDITION.
ONE OF THE FIRST 8 NUMBERED COPIES ON JAPON PAPERfollowed by 20 copies on Chine and 40 copies on Hollande.

After the death of his wife in 1868 and his son, Charles Hugo, in 1871, Victor Hugo took charge of the education of Georges and Jeanne Hugo, his grandchildren. He welcomed them in Vianden in 1871, then in Guernsey in the summer of 1872, and settled with them in Paris in 1874. The joy of being a grandfather inspired 27 poems, mocking the spirit of seriousness by teaching children to see the world as a game, The Art of being a grandfather is the last of Victor Hugo's great poetic works.

AN EXCEPTIONAL COPY ILLUMINATED WITH 20 ORIGINAL SIGNED WATERCOLOURS BY HENRI CARUCHET

The second son of the painter Eugène Caruchet, Henri Émile Caruchet (1873-1948) entered the École nationale des beaux-arts in Paris in 1892, where he studied under Gustave Moreau, Mathias Duval and Ernest Ange Duez. A close friend of the artists and writers in the magazine La Plume, he successfully illustrated major bibliophile works that are now considered masterpieces of art-nouveau illustration,  Litanies of the Sea by Jean Richepin (1894), the  Enamels and Cameos by Théophile Gautier (1895), the A journey around your room by Octave Uzanne (1896). Caruchet was also inspired by Chinese and Japanese representations, notably in The Pavilion on the water by Gautier (1900).

The book opens with a watercolour on the title page depicting a grandchild in a cradle, and Henri Caruchet went on to illustrate each of the 18 parts of the book, from the seagulls of in Guernseysucceeds Jeanne asleep framed by birds, then a joueur de biniou leaning against an illustrious cross The moon. All the watercolours are extremely fine, and some depict themes dear to Hugo - the cathedral of Notre-Dame-de-Paris at sunset (page 109), the author with his back to the window, framed by bats and lit by a star (page 191) - others borrow from the imagery of art-nouveau, such as the four angels who seem to be emerging from flowers (page 227).
This unique copy is probably the result of a commission from a bibliophile, a rare exercise for Henri Caruchet since we have found no equivalent copy.

A soberly bound copy by Michel Ritter (1853 -1898) in grey morocco.

Details of the watercolours :

faux-titre : The Art of being a grandfather (The grandchild in a cradle)
page 1 : in Guernsey (seagulls)
page 39 : Jeanne asleep (sleeping child, framing nests and magpies)
page 45 : the moon (biniou player leaning against a cross)
page 61 : the plant garden poem (hippopotamus, elephant and monkey)
page 109 : Jeanne asleep (Notre-Dame-de-Paris cathedral at sunset surrounded by bats)
page 113 : Old and young together (girl carrying a bridge of jam on a stringed instrument fountain)
page 143 : The Immaculate Conception (central cartouche: Mary holding Jesus, framed by children playing in the Tuileries Gardens)
page 148 : Schoolboy doodles (field of wheat decorated in the foreground with a sickle and key)
page 159 : Les Fredaines Grand-Père as a child (landscape of the Spanish coast, Pépita in local dress with a rose in her hair)
page 167 : Children, birds and flowers (farmer and oxen ploughing the land, cherry trees in blossom, frame of cherries)
page 191 : Jeanne Lapidée (Hugo with his back to the window, a frame of bats illuminated by a star)
page 195 : Jeanne asleep (At night, on a mulberry tree, a chick in its nest guarded by its mother)
page 203 : The Lion Epic (A lion with a bloody mouth has just devoured a soldier)
page 227 : À des Dames envolées ( four angels, seemingly coming out of their thoughts, fly away )
page 230 : Laus Puero (Christ on the cross surrounded by magpies)
page 265 : Two Songs (army of soldiers in a medallion, plant ornament)
page 273 : Jeanne asleep (bird perched on a flowering branch, Japanese decoration)
page 277 : For children to read when they grow up (rooster perched on two law tablets framed by mistletoe)
page 314: [opposite the table] (medallion: two graves in a field of flowers)