Three Romany Caravans

Auguste Brouet was considered one of the finest etchers of the 20th century. He grew up in the streets of Montmartre, where his mother owned a circus, and his work provides a fascinating record of a rapidly vanishing aspect of French life, with its street vendors, Romany caravans, and itinerant tradesmen. Although these subjects were a frequently romanticized in 19th-century pictures, Brouet’s portrayal of this downtrodden encampment is realistic and poignant. The Romany struggle to survive is summarized in the figure of the little boy in the foreground, whose downcast head and ill-fitting clothes reveal the hardships of this bohemian existence.