STEEL ENGRAVING – “THE GAME AT CARDS” etching by L. J. Rajan, from the painting by J.L. Meissonier, published in 1877.  The engraving is in very good condition.  The engraving measures 5 ¼” x 6 7/8”, and is matted to 11” x 14” for easy framing.

No work of Meissonier’s is better known than the beautiful and wonderfully drawn “Card Players”.  A party of soldiers in one of their hours of ease has gathered in a richly furnished room of an old chateau, which they have either captured or in which for some other reason they feel at home, and are playing a game of cards.  There are seven in all of them.  The most distant one lies fast asleep on a settee.  Near him another stands smoking his pipe philosophically, while a third leans upon his elbows against the back of a chair, like two others near him, watches the progress of the game.  Very elaborate, costly, and picturesque are the costumes of these military revelers of the seventeenth century; and, if one were to compare the technical ability with which Meissonier has rendered them with that of similar renderings by the most conscientious of the old Dutch painters, a contrast would strike him between not only the literary interest of the two interpretations, but also between the charming grace of line, the ease of pose, the faithfulness of facial expression, and the general delightfulness of presentation of the modern painter, and the corresponding traits of his celebrated predecessors.  This picture is skillfully rendered by the distinguished etcher, M. Rajan, and the original shows the fruit of so much genius and skill.  It overflows with some of the finest technical and literary qualities of art in France.

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