Honore Daumier & Litography

      Honore Daumier in France continued William Hogarth’s tradition of using popular print, newspaper and magazine illustrations to make social and political commentary. He was best known for his caricature works and he used the classic caricature techniques of physical absurdity to lay bare the cruelty, unfairness and pretension of 19th century French society and politics. 

At the age of 16, Daumier began receiving training in the art of lithography with Alexandre Lenoir and studying at the Academie Suisse.

The medium of lithography allows for quick, sketchy, images, which create a sense of movement - and also a sense of a candid moment.

Here’s a video of how the process of lithography is developed:

        In my opinion, it is a time-consuming process; you really need to have a lot of patience and dedication, that’s why we should consider it as art. People used to work a lot harder back then and therefore feel more gratification with what they had done with their hands, nowadays it’s become so easy to just click a button and have something printed from a printer machine.