Henri Léon Curmer (1858)
The dance starts with a copy of Mechel's frontispiece.
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The best of them are quite good.
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This series is of high quality, and I must admit that I for a long time perfunctorily assumed
they were Holbein's originals with French subtitles
instead of the German headings used for
the so-called printers' proofs.
The best of them could easily be mistaken for genuine Holbein,
and those that are less stellar could be taken for smudgy prints of the originals.
But in fact we are dealing with copies of copies.
They were employed in the margins of books published by
Curmer in Paris in the 1850ies and 1860ies,
and according to these books,(1)
they are copies
of Joseph Schlotthauer's lithographs.
One way to see they are copies of Schlotthauer is that they have the same idiosynkrasi of giving
Death white, staring eyeballs.
Here is Death at the physician:
Original Holbein
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León Curmer
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Joseph Schlotthauer
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Death at the nun:
Original Holbein
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León Curmer
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Joseph Schlotthauer
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And Death at the senator:
Original Holbein
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León Curmer
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Joseph Schlotthauer
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Another similarity is that Schlotthauer has expurgated
the fool's private parts:
Original Holbein
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León Curmer
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Joseph Schlotthauer
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The series contains 53 scenes by Holbein, i.e. all those
woodcuts that were in the 1547-edition of Imagines Mortis.
The series starts with a copy of
Christian von Mechel's frontispiece,
and ends with nine additional pictures, among others from
Basel's dance of death.
Spanish version: Los novios
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The subtitles are a story in themselves. One gets the impression
that they are taken from the books by Hippolyte Fortoul that are
illustrated by Schlotthauer, but none of the books I have seen by Fortoul
have titles for the images.
The titles are written in a style that's reminiscent of
Simon Vostre's and a few of them
seems to be inspired by Vostre.
One example is
the duchess,
who for inscrutable reasons is called "la femme grosse" —
the pregnant woman — just like
Vostre's "la femme grosse".
Or the noblewoman,
who is called "l'amoureux" like
Vostre's suitor.
In the same manner Holbein's canon becomes an abbot,
while his abbot becomes an archbishop.
The painter's wife from Basel
is called "la vielleuse", which is a bit odd,
partly because she's not particularly old, and partly because we've already met
the old woman / "la vielle"
earlier in the dance.
The black hornblower from Danse Macabre in Paris becomes
"le roi more"
— the moor king. He's not dressed very royally so one gets the impression
that "le roi more" was inspired by
the dead king in Paris,
"le roy mort".
When it comes to the artists the information is a bit conflicting,
but it seems
Holbein's dance of death was copied by Judée, Anne, Bisson, Cottard, Dufresnoy and Dumont,
while the rest of the scenes were copied by Bisson & Cottard.
But no matter what the books say, it isn't true for The escutcheon of Death.
This hasn't been copied after Schlotthauer,
but is the same that is included in the various books with Holbein's dance of death-alphabet,
and in these books it is unequivocally stated the escutcheon has been copied
by Léon le Maire.
It is quite strange — especially because these books weren't published by Curmer,
but Edwin Tross. Nevertheless anyone can check
that The escutcheon of Death
is identical with
the one attributed to Léon le Maire published by Tross.
Resources
Frontispiece
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Sebald Beham
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Sebald Beham
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Merck's Wien
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Moor king
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April
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Other interpreters of Holbein's dance of death
Curmer had copied the frontispiece from Christian de Mechel.
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Curmer also published copies of Simon Vostre's marginals.
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Footnotes:
(1)
There are many allusions but the most concrete is:
»
Quant aux figures, j'ai donné la copie fidèle et complète de la belle Danse des Morts d'Holbeín,
d'après les gravures de Hans Lutzenberger, reproduites avec un soin et une exactitude parfaite par M. J. Schlotthauer«.
Quoted from Appendice à l'imitation de Jésus-Christ
in the very last chapter about la danse macabre.
Dances of death
Holbein's dance of death
Curmer
