Cusset, Excursion de Vichy

Maxime Lalanne's landmark book A Treatise on Etching (1880), paved the way for the French etching revival in the mid-nineteenth century and led to a similar movement in  America. Lalanne's book deeply influenced the course of American printmaking. Many of Lalanne's etchings are marvels of precise observation and controlled etching to vary the strength of the incised line. This meticulous control allowed Lalanne to achieve a sense of distance and atmosphere using only line, with no inky manipulations.

This work shows The Belot House, where in 1440 Louis XI was pardoned by his father, Charles VII, during the signing of the Cusset peace treaty that ended the Praguerie rebellion (a revolt against the king).