Portrait signé de Victor Schoelcher

Pencil portrait of Victor Schoelcher by Louis-Pierre Henriquel-Dupont, signed and dated 1832.

Uniformly browned, some foxing. A small wove paper label with the name of Victor Schoelcher in pen pasted on the verso, accompanied by a mention of a previous bibliographer in pencil, also on the verso.

A precious unpublished early portrait of the abolitionist Victor Schoelcher, at the age of 28.
This portrait was presented at the 1833 Salon: 'M. Victor Schoelcher [...] whose charming portrait, drawn by M. Henriquel-Dupont, can be seen just beside the Salon's entrance. Charming indeed, broad and full of character' (Augustin Jal, Salon de 1833, les causeries du Louvre, p.159).
 
Schoelcher had begun his fight against the slave trade two years earlier with an article in the Revue de Paris. He also took an interest in the fine arts, writing a review of the Salon de peinture in 1835 in the same journal. This drawing is the work of Henriquel-Dupont, a distinguished pupil of the painter Pierre-Narcisse Guérin. Renowned as a master engraver, he reproduced the works of his contemporaries, particularly Ingres, whose style is distinctly reflected in this portrait.
Schoelcher and Henriquel-Dupont both sat on the jury of the 1879 Salon in the engraving section.

A pencil drawing of exceptional execution, one of Henriquel-Dupont's "delightful portraits in pastel and graphite" (Charles Lenormant)