This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 8/25/2018
[Robert-Houdin] Butsha, E. Revue et Corrigee de Lhuillier par Fusier. Circa 1870. Gouache on paper. Being a unique painted advertisement for a revue-style show at the Theatre du Palais Royal, Paris, featuring a huge cast of French actors, singers, a trained bear, and quite prominently, Compars Herrmann and Jean Eugene Robert-Houdin alongside the star of the production, Leon Fusier. 51 x 34 ¼”. Chips at edges repaired, closed tears in image; B. Linen backed. A curious advertisement for what appears to be an all-star variety show made up of many of the most famous French stage artists of the 1870s. That Herrmann, performing a vanishing fish bowl, and Robert-Houdin (here captioned as the man who keeps watch over the revue with a spyglass) are featured so prominently in the makeup of the painting speaks to the prominent place in the cultural firmament held by these two great conjurers. Other fascinating elements of the composition include a distant view of America spied from a hot air balloon.