Louis Icart Decorative Art

Rare subject by Louis Icart, "L'ELANE", 1928. Colored etching on wove paper; signed in pencil lower right; windmill blind stamp and numbered 164 lower left; 20 x 15 inches plate...

"Mid century reproduction print of “Parasol” by Louis Icart, originally published in 1928, showing a a young woman seated on a stone bench, holding a paper parasol and watching birds nibble berries off her hat. “Louis Justin Laurent Icart was born in Toulouse in 1890 and died in Paris in 1950. He lived in New York City in the 1920s, where he became known for his Art-Deco color etchings of glamourous women. He was first son of Jean and Elisabeth Icart and was officially named Louis Justin Laurent Icart. The use of his initials L.I. would be sufficient in this household. Therefore, from the moment of his birth he was dubbed 'Helli'. The Icart family lived modestly in a small brick home on rue Traversière-de-la-balance, in the culturally rich Southern French city of Toulouse, which was the home of many prominent writers and artists, the most famous being Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Icart entered the l'Ecole Superieure de Commerce de Toulouse in order to continue his studies for a career in business, particularly banking (his father's profession). However, he soon discovered the play writings of Victor Hugo (1802-1885), which were to change the course of his life. Icart borrowed whatever books he could find by Hugo at the Toulouse library, devouring the tales, rich in both romantic imagery and the dilemmas of the human condition. It was through Icart's love of the theater that he developed a taste for all the arts, though the urge to paint was not as yet as strong for him as the urge to act. It was not until his move to Paris in 1907 that Icart would concentrate on painting, drawing and the production of countless beautiful etchings, which have served (more than the other mediums) to indelibly preserve his name in twentieth century art history. Art Deco, a term coined at the 1925 Paris Exposition des Arts Decoratifs, had taken its grip on the Paris of the 1920s. By the late 1920s Icart, working for both publications and major fashion and design studios, had become very successful, both artistically and financially. His etchings reached their height of brilliance in this era of Art Deco, and Icart had become the symbol of the epoch. Yet, although Icart has created for us a picture of Paris and New York life in the 1920s and 1930s, he worked in his own style, derived principally from the study of eighteenth-century French masters such as Jean Antoine Watteau, François Boucher and Jean Honoré Fragonard. In Icart's drawings, one sees the Impressionists Degas...

An original French signed Louis Icart engraving / aquatint of three ladies and a cat in its original oval frame. Louis Icart began as an illustrator in Paris in the 1900s, produci...

Three Louis Icart erotic Sepia engraving etching, 1946. Pencil signed lower right margin. Plate, 8" x 5 1/2". From La Nuit et la Moment published in...

Three Louis Icart erotic color engraving etching, circa 1938. Pencil signed lower right margin. Plate measures: 8" x 5 1/2". From La Dame aux Camelias published in 1938. 300 publi...

Three Louis Icart erotic color engraving etching, circa 1946. Pencil signed lower right margin. Plate measures 8" x 5 1/2". From Felecia ou Mes Fredaines published in 19...