Artist

Emile Desmaisons

Emile Desmaisons is a Romanticism artist. 1 work is cataloged here, principally at Victoria and Albert Museum.

A Paris print-maker in the 1840s, Emile Desmaisons turned celebrity faces into lithographs for the boulevard audience. One surviving sheet, Mlle Laprairie Pas Grec (15 June 1844), shows the tight-corseted dancer caught mid-pose, her feathers slightly ruffled, while the caption punned on her last name. The print was sold at the corner of the Rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin, where street hawkers slid sheets under café doors.

Look next at the same sheet’s reverse: a second state printed in ochre that collectors prize for the extra shadow under her chin.

Works by Emile Desmaisons

Collections represented

Catalog records compiled from museum open-access collections; the artworks shown are in the public domain. Spotted an error in this record? Tell us.