Antoine Odier, banker, MP 1832

Curator: Right, let's delve into this remarkable piece by Honoré Daumier. We’re looking at “Antoine Odier, Banker, MP,” created around 1832. It’s a mixed-media sculpture with traces of charcoal, currently housed in the Musée d'Orsay. Editor: My gut reaction? Cranky! The kind of face you see when someone's lost their inheritance playing the stock market. The heavy brow, the pursed lips...it radiates dissatisfaction. Curator: Absolutely. Daumier sculpted a series of these portrait-charges, focusing on the bourgeoisie of the July Monarchy. Odier, as a banker and member of parliament, embodies that class. What visual cues speak to this for you? Editor: Well, it's in the slight condescension, that knowing sneer... And look at the scale, the way his jacket balloons around his tiny head almost making him look regal. Daumier definitely knew how to twist the knife. I suspect he felt the banker wielded too much economic control. Curator: Precisely. Consider too that Daumier was working during a period of immense social and political upheaval. The caricatures of politicians like Odier become powerful symbols of resistance against perceived injustice. The caricature accentuates unpleasant features of the subject, almost as a form of denunciation. Editor: Right, they're visual indictments! Almost like Daumier is pinning them down, specimen-like, for posterity. Did people at the time realize the lasting power these little busts would have? Curator: Doubtlessly, they understood his intention! These weren’t just portraits; they were critiques, holding power to account through satire. That Odier sat for this sculpture—unaware, perhaps, of the cutting edge Daumier brought to the task—says a lot about both men. Editor: It's a potent mix of the personal and the political. Seeing it now, there’s a strange timelessness to that grumble on Odier’s face. That face makes me feel better about the state of the world. Like someone, somewhere, always shares my level of existential dread! Curator: Daumier captures a truth about power and human nature. Perhaps these works were created to mock a particular individual, but Daumier also manages to capture how society felt at that moment in history. A work worth more than just a passing glance. Editor: Well said! It certainly is. Next!