DE LARMESSIN NICOLAS I ( 1632-1694 )
From the set of Grotesque Costumes and Trade Clothes.Proof with some color highlights, cut to the limit of the copper on the right border, thinning of the paper and small loss on the back of the left margin.The address of Chiquet (active circa 1707-1721) allows us to date the print to around 1710.Even more than Arcimboldo, the engravings are part of a tradition that dates back to the 16th century, that of masquerades or freer court balls where costumes were “rather made to entertain and give entertainment, than to appear magnificent ” (Mercure galant, March 1683, p.325).Certain ballet costume plates, engraved by Lepautre after drawings by Berain or Gissey, certainly also inspired the engravers behind the Grotesque Costumes series."Maxime Préaud thus provided an unprecedented ordering and enumeration of a series "of variable dimensions [published] in several installments" while providing valuable documents to understand its genesis and its fortune. He identifies the three chronological phases of its creation and publication, by Nicolas I (author of the “first series”, divided into two sub-series), by his widow Marie Bertrand then by his younger brother Nicolas II, before reissues by Jean Colart, François Hurand or Jacques Chiquet.” "The first episode, the most important, includes 62 plates: it is the initiative of Nicolas I de Larmessin (1632-1694). 14 plates are then published by his widow, “between May 23, 1694 and May 20, 1701 , perhaps engraved after drawings by her late husband...As for Nicholas II [1645-1725, younger brother of Nicholas I but who was not his heir], he published 22, which he draws and engraves himself, at the address of the Golden Cup, from 1695”Roger-Armand Weigert, "Sur les Larmessin et les Costumes Grotesques", in Nouvelles de l’estampe, 2, 1969, pp. 67-75Pascale Cugy, « Un nouveau chaînon dans la genèse des Costumes grotesques de la famille Larmessin », Nouvelles de l’estampe [En ligne], 263 | 2020, mis en ligne le 20 juin 2020, consulté le 23 août 2024. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/estampe/1416 ; DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/estampe.1416Maxime Préaud,"L'estampe au Grand Siècle : études offertes à Maxime Préaud", Edité par Ecole des chartes. Paris ; Bibliothèque nationale de France - 2010..