SCHUITEN - Lot 151

SCHUITEN FRANÇOIS SCHUITEN ◊ 12 La Douce, Casterman 2012 Original plate no. 26. Signed. India ink on paper 44.4 × 60.7 cm (17.48 × 23.9 in.) Beautiful plate from Schuiten's tribute to La Douce, a legendary Belgian train from the 1930s, the "Type 12", nicknamed La Douce by a railway worker who refused change and modernity. Here we find Schuiten's characteristic style, inherited from the engravers who illustrated Jules Verne in the Hetzel cartoons of the late 19th century: dark, detailed masses, often in the foreground, whose volumes are suggested by a multitude of pen-and-ink strokes, contrasting with a light, almost overexposed background. This technique makes for a fluid, if strange, narrative: his characters sometimes give the impression of spectres crossing the page.