Auguste Brouet - About the cataloguehome

This list of prints, dated and described as precisely as possible, is a catalogue raisonné of the original etchings in black authored by Auguste Brouet.

Why a new catalogue raisonné?

The catalogue edited by Boutitie(i) and published in 1923, is still a major source of knowledge on Brouet's prints, especially thanks to the number and quality of the reproductions. However, this catalogue has been hastily put together at the time of Brouet's sudden notoriety. The prints reproduced in the catalogue at the time have not been commented upon nor dated. A second obvious gap which had to be filled is the ca. hundred prints created after 1923.

Why didn't you keep the Boutitie numbering where available?

The Boutitie catalogue is not exactly a catalogue raisonné, but the listing of a collection, the Bonabeau collection: impressions of different states of the same print received consecutive catalog numbers, while they should have been sub-itemized as states. This numbering system has been carried on by Henri Petiet. Prints created before 1923 but not present in the Boutitie catalog received numbers B. 272 (Ba 407) to B. 282 (Ba 2), while numbers B. 301 (Ba 326) to B. 366 (Ba 9904) where used for prints created after than 1923. However, a number of prints remained unknown to H. Petiet, and although he did list states as such, there were not enough numbers available to allocate all the remaining early prints between 283 and 300. In brief, it appeared difficult to develop a consistent numbering system out of the previous one, which was discarded.

What is the logic of the new numbering?

The present numbering adheres to the logic of the Boutitie catalog. It is partly chronological, dividing Brouet's production in three blocks:

  1. Pre War (la Belle Epoque)
  2. World War I
  3. Post ar (les Années Folles)

Within each block, the prints have been listed thematically, as outlined in the biography. Prints mentionned in sources but as yet unidentified have been listed under provivioinal numbers Ba 9901 à 9909 and gaps were left between blocks to accommodate newcomers. Among the unexpected prints which surfaced recently, let us mention this lithography (Ba 191), and which was included in the catalogue, although it is not etching.

Which prints are to be found in this catalogue?

Not all the prints created by Auguste Brouet are to be found in this catalogue. We adhered to the editorial spirit of Boutitie and felt concerned by the original etchings in black, the work of the painter etcher properly speaking. As a result two significant groups of prints have been excluded:

  1. book illustrations, especially numerous after 1924;
  2. colour etchings, a group of more than forty very large prints, some original and some reproductions, which will be listed separately.

Don't hesitate to contact me: I will be pleased to include comments, corrections and additions you might suggest.

  1. Gaston Boutitie, Catalogue de l'Oeuvre Gravé d'Auguste Brouet d'après la collection Bonabeau,
    précédé d'une étude de Gustave Geffroy, Paris 1923.