Un divertissement qui ... de mode c. 19th century

This lithograph, made by Honoré Daumier in 19th-century France, depicts a scene of public weighing. A slender man observes as a stout woman is weighed on a large scale. The caption reads: ‘An amusement that never goes out of fashion.’ Daumier was a master of social satire, and his work often commented on the foibles and hypocrisies of bourgeois society under the July Monarchy and the Second Empire. Lithography was a key medium for disseminating such commentary through the popular press. In this image, Daumier is critiquing the public spectacle of weighing, which turned individuals into objects of scrutiny. The man's gaze, the woman's pose, and the act of measurement itself all speak to the way bodies were becoming increasingly subject to observation and regulation during this period. By studying the prints of Daumier, alongside periodicals and other visual and textual sources, we can better understand the changing social norms and power dynamics of 19th-century France.