| Hippolyte Guillaume Sulpice Chevalier -- much better known to the world as Gavarni -- is second only to Daumier as the greatest social commentator and satirical artist of nineteenth century France. Beginning his career as an engineers assistant he began to exhibit signs of his future genius in the late 1820s as a fashion designer and illustrator. His talent for caricature and satirical art, however, led him to the editorship of Les Gens du Monde in 1835. He afterwards took charge of the influential periodical, Charivari, and was then forced to live and work in England in the late 1840s in order to avoid political persecution. One of the most clever caricaturists of any time, Gavarnis draughtsmanship was without equal. With the greatest economy of line he captured the follies and foibles of his age. |
