STEEL ENGRAVING – “THE CONNOISSEUR” from the original painted by G. Boldini, and etching by L. Richeton, published in 1885.  This engraving is in very good condition.  The actual picture measures 9 ¾” x 7 ¼”, and is matted to 12” x 16” for easy framing.

M. Boldini, in “The Connoisseur,” has treated a subject which Meissonier’s genius long ago made famous, and M. Richeton has produced an etching of it.  Persons who knew the late Mr. Horace Greeley – and who, in this country, is not familiar with the features of that great journalist and candidate for the presidency? – will be very much reminded of him by the old man whom M. Boldini has pictured as looking at the just completed representation of Mother Eve.  That he is intensely interested in the aspect of that well-known woman appears, both from the pose and the facial expression, which the painter, who stands near him, holding the picture and gazing upon it with a look of great satisfaction, has given.  The frame is an extremely elaborate and extravagant piece of plasterwork gilded, which overpowers the subject on the canvas.  Above the wardrobe is a cast of what may be supposed to be a relic of antiquity in the shape of a male figure, together with a head of a child.  On the wall near by are a military sketch and some drawings in charcoal, but the eye returns at once to the central figure of the old connoisseur, who holds his hat and cane behind him, while his face almost touches the figure which he is examining with such a critical air.  If curiosity is a good quality in a connoisseur, this particular picture, which the painter is holding in its best light for the consideration of the old man, will soon find a purchaser.  M. Boldini painted the original of this work about 1870, and, although he is best known by the charm of his evanescent aerial landscape effects, he has succeeded very well with this interesting genre.  In those works, he is absolutely original and an acknowledged master, but they do not content him; he must imitate Meissonier in figure painting.