"Parisienne" - Lithographie originale sur Chine - L'Estampe Moderne

Rare original lithograph, executed by Paul-César Helleu for L'Estampe Moderne, series number 20 published in December 1898.
One of 50 deluxe proofs printed on China paper with wide margins, artist's signature in the plate, publisher's dry stamp representing a child's profile in the lower margin, laid down on a sheet of laid paper with the numbered luxury edition stamp on the verso, some foxing; engraving preceded by a tissue guard inscribed with the artist's name, title, and an extract from a work.
Lithograph inspired by an extract from Nos parisiennes by Alfred Labarre.
Magnificent French monthly publication edited between May 1897 and April 1899, L'Estampe moderne consists of unpublished chromolithographs which, unlike other magazines such as Les Maîtres de l'Affiche and as stipulated on the tissue guards, were created specially by each artist for the magazine. Thus 100 prints appeared in total, covering the major artistic movements of the end of the 19th century: Symbolism, Art Nouveau, Pre-Raphaelites, Orientalists and Belle Époque. Each delivery of four prints was issued in 2000 copies sold for 3.50F and 100 on Japan paper offered at 10F. Henri Piazza also planned a confidential printing of very grand luxury: 50 copies on Japan paper with wide margins and 50 in black on China paper at the considerable price of 30F.
This print of handsome format is superbly printed on one of the most prestigious papers: China paper. "Despite all its qualities, China paper, too insubstantial, owes its reputation not to its own beauty, but rather to its particular affinities with printing ink. Its texture, smooth and soft together, is more apt than any other to receive a beautiful impression. This property makes China paper sought after for printing engravings..." (Anatole France).
French collectors' interest in artistic posters grew at the beginning of the 1890s. Octave Uzanne, to qualify this fever, invented the term "affichomania." The poster, originally popular and plastered in the streets of the capital, then became an art object and its ephemeral medium became precious and devoted to preservation.
Piazza decided to remove the poster from its advertising vocation and elevate it to the rank of a work of art in its own right, on the same level as the luxury illustrated book. He thus composed a prestigious collection of entirely original works by the most prominent European artists of the moment: Georges de Feure, Eugène Grasset, Henri Detouche, Emile Berchmans, Louis Rhead, Gaston de Latenay, Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer, Gustave-Max Stevens, Charles Doudelet, Hans Christiansen, Henri Fantin-Latour, Steinlen, Ibels, Engels, Willette, Henri Meunier, Evenepoël, Bellery-Desfontaines, Charles Léandre, etc.
Handsome copy.