35. Félix Buhot
1847-1898

La Traversée (The Crossing)

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La Traversée

La Traversée (The Crossing)

Etching with drypoint, aquatint and roulette, ca. 1879, 319 x 243 mm., Bourcard/Goodfriend 143 iii/iv. The reference of the print is to the cross-channel ferry, with which Buhot, since he married an Englishwoman, was probably all too familiar. An exceptional impression in two colors, brown for the main subject, black for the symphonic margins, notated in ink on the reverse "Coll. H.B."(almost certainly Henrietta Buhot, the artist's wife) and with the triangular stamp of the Buhot family. Buhot sardonically inscribes the plate "A Holiday. Rain, Storm and Music." Figures from the Débarquement and Jetée reappear here in the left margin, promising an end to the voyage, and the smoke is so intense it escapes the confines of the main subject and intrudes into the upper margin.