1846
ink
From the collection of National Gallery of Art
Dominant colour
The Poor Family (Une famille pauvre) is a 1846 ink by Paul Gavarni, a Romanticism work, held at National Gallery of Art.
This black-and-white drawing shows three people huddled together on a cold floor. The woman is bent over, holding a baby while another child clings to her. Their clothes look worn, and the room feels drafty, with a thin blanket barely covering them. A small fire burns weakly in the corner, casting faint light on their tired faces. The artist used a technique called lithography, which lets you draw directly on stone and print many copies. This made the image easy to share widely, even though it’s just in shades of gray. Look up lithography to see how artists made prints like this one.
Paul Gavarni was the pen name of Sulpice Guillaume Chevalier (13 January 1804 – 24 November 1866), a French illustrator, born in Paris.
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