Erotica in Art

 

" In art, immorality cannot exist.
Art is always sacred"

                                                     August Rodin

 

Achille Deveria

1800-1857

Achille Deveria was a curator and portrait and genre scene lithographer. He was appointed the director of the department of engravings at the Bibilotheque Nationale in 1849. Deveria taught drawing and lithography to his son, Theodule and also collaborated on a family portrait album together until his death in 1857.

The 10 prints by French 19th century illustrator Deveria shown here are reproduced from a 20th century reprint of the 'Cabinet Secret du Prince G' one of the most curious bibliographies of all times.

The original edition of this catalogue was published by an anonymous printer-publisher in Brussels in 1887. It contained some 1100 titles of the most rare erotic books and prints of those days. Nobody has ever since been able to establish with certainty the identity of the so called 'Prince G', although bibliographers like Gershon Legman and Patrick Kearney nowadays agree that this unique collection was offered for sale from the collection of the Prince Galitzin.

Even the catalogue of the sale became rarissimi and is nowadays an ultimate collector's item. In the 1980's however the catalogue was reprinted in 250 copies, which also became very rare within short. This reprint was based on a copy of the original catalogue in the possession of Dutch antiquarian book dealer N. Schors from Amsterdam.

The Schors reprint also contains the ten prints shown here. They did not make part of the original issue of the Prince's catalogue but were in the possession of the Prince and are noted under number 115 of the supplement to his catalogue. They appeared between 1835 and 1840 in Paris, being part of a larger series of lithographs based upon water colored prints by a very well known artist of those days, Deveria.