Lovers
Jean-Emile Laboureur, The Amores, plate 5 (Impotence), etching in sanguine, 1931, signed. Reference: Sylvain Laboureur 440, volume 2, page 231. The rare first state (there were six proofs of the first state, only one printed in sanguine); in the second state the etching was included as part of the book The Amores at the Golden Cockerel Press, Waltham St. Lawrence, Berkshire. In very good condition, remains of prior hinging top corners, on a cream wove paper with the watermark AMV, the full sheet with wide margins, 5 3/8 x 4, the sheet 11 x 8 3/4 inches, archival window matting.
A fine fresh impression of this rarity; only 6 proofs were made before Laboureur’s monogram was added for the book edition, 5 in black ink and only one – this impression – in sanguine.
The book The Amores of P. Ovidius Naso was illustrated with 5 etchings by Laboureur. Plate 5, called Impotence, was to illustrate these words: “Though I desired it, and the girl desired it just as much, I could not use the pleasant part of my futile groin.”
The final production of this apparently steamy book was limited to 350 copies, issued in 1931; by 1933 the publisher conceded that book sales had not gone well in this period of the Great Depression. Of course today Golden Cockerel books, and the books illustrated by Laboureur are sought after by book collectors.