Drawings of Victor Hugo

The great romantic painter, Delacroix, wrote to Victor Hugo that, had he decided to become a painter instead of a writer, he would have outshone the artists of their century.
Many of Hugo's paintings have survived. One recognizes in them accomplished draughtsmanship, boldness of execution and a sense of powerful creativity. Today his artwork still has the power to astonish us by the skill, the strong composition, and often by theatrical effects of light and shade which seem to have been achieved by the poet-draughtsman under a direct spell of inspiration.
Victor Hugo drew incessantly. He also studied the characteristics of his chosen materials or media under all possible angles. He rose above contemporary conventions and did not hesitate to elaborate on accidental effects if they satisfied his aesthetic sense. The result sometimes looked more like a 20th century abstract than a simple doodle. —Jersey Heritage Trust

"Once paper, pen-and-ink-well have been brought to the table, Victor Hugo sits down and without making a preliminary sketch, without any apparent preconception, sets about drawing with an extraordinarily sure hand not the landscape as a whole but any old detail. He will begin his forest with the branch of a tree, his town with a gable, his gable with a weathervane, and little by little, the entire composition will emerge from the blank paper with the precision and clarity of a photographic negative subjected to the chemical preparation that brings out the picture. That done, the draftsman will ask for a cup and will finish off his landscape with a light shower of black coffee. The result is a unexpected and powerful drawing that is often strange, always personal, and recalls the etchings of Rembrandt and Piranesi." —Charles Hugo

			Victor Hugo "Pęcherie at night", Painted in Jersey Indian ink, brown ink, washes, charcoal and a little blue ink, 220mmx170mm.

			Victor Hugo Paysage Brown ink spread on paper

			Victor Hugo Abstract Composition Sepia/brown ink wash on vellum paper 5x9 in

			Victor Hugo Taches with fingerprints, 1864-65 Brown ink and wash spread with fingers on cream paper 10x7 in.

			Victor Hugo "Justicia", 1858 Sepia, wash and indian ink, 53 x 35 cm, Hauteville House Germany

			Victor Hugo "The King of the Auxcriniers", c. 1864 Pen and wash, 19 x 25 cm, Bibliotheque Nationale Paris

			Victor Hugo Voilures Taches of brown ink, graphite pencil

			Victor Hugo Pattern Composition Stencil with washes, brush and pen on paper

			Victor Hugo "Silhouette fantastique", ca. 1854 Charcoal, stencil painted over with ink wash

			Victor Hugo Composition with taches ca. 1875 Wash of bluish ink on creme-laid paper, folded in two 17x21 in.

			Victor Hugo "The Mouth of Darkness", c. 1855-6 Wash, 18 x 12 cm, Private Collection, Paris

			Victor Hugo "Heraldic eagle" (Study of an eagle for a coat of arms), painted in Jersey ca. 1855. Silhouette of fine cut-out marked out with soft charcoal. Penned and painted in brown and blue ink with some lace print worked into the body of the bird.

			Victor Hugo "Old House" ca.1856 Ink wash on paper cut-out, mounted on a support

			Victor Hugo "Le Gai Château" Flandres ca.1847 Ink wash on paper

			Victor Hugo Mushroom, ca. 1850 Ink wash on paper

			Victor Hugo Calling Card, 1855 Ink wash on paper

			Victor Hugo "The Snake", c. 1866 Pen, Sepia and gouache, 31 x 47 cm, Maison de Victor Hugo, Paris

			Victor Hugo "The Wave" or "My Destiny", 1857 Pen, wash and gouache, 17 x 26 cm, Maison de Victor Hugo, Paris

			Victor Hugo Octopus with the initials V. H., ca. 1866 Ink wash on paper

			Victor Hugo Lace impression, ca. 1855 Ink wash on paper

			Victor Hugo (recto) Lace impression, spectral form ca.1855 Pen and ink wash on blue paper

			Victor Hugo "Lace and Ghosts", c. 1855-6 Wash (lace imprint) and ink, 6.5 x 6 cm, Maison de Victor Hugo Paris

			Victor Hugo "The Casquets" rocks between Jersey and Guernesey Sepia ink and watercolor wash on paper

			Victor Hugo "Setting sun", painted in Jersey 1852-1855. Ink wash on paper

			Victor Hugo "Planet", c. 1866 Pen and wash, 29 x 21 cm, Bibliotheque Nationale Paris

			Victor Hugo Torquemada Ink wash on paper

			Victor Hugo Town with tumbledown bridge, 1847 Ink wash on paper

			Victor Hugo "The Dead City", c. 1850 Ink, wash, charcoal (scraper), 42 x 64 cm, Lucien Scheler Collection, Paris

			Victor Hugo untitled drawing Pen and sepia ink wash and white gouache on paper

			Victor Hugo untitled drawing Pen and sepia ink wash and white gouache on paper

			Victor Hugo "The Upper Rhine", painted in Jersey, January 1st, 1855 Pen and brown ink wash, blue and sienna watercolour, highlights of white gouache; painted and blurred with feather and fingerprints on beige paper. Framed with a thin band of gilt paper and mounted on vellum. (60mmx190mm)

			Victor Hugo Ruined Aqueduct ca. 1850 Pen, brown-ink wash, black ink, graphite, black crayon, fingerprints and reserves (stencilling) on beige, gilt-edged vellum paper, partly rubbed (taches on verso) 9x12 in.

			Victor Hugo "Hic clavis, alias porta" (The key is here, the gate elsewhere) 1871 Pen, brown-ink wash, black ink, graphite, black crayon, charcoal, reserves and fingerprints or dabbings with highlights of white gouache on vellum paper, partly rubbed and scraped 18x18 in.

	What Hugo was searching for in these drawings were signs that would stimulate his imagination and suggest directions for his pen. Hugo interpreted these foldings, not for psychological purposes like the Swiss physician Hermann Rorschach with his famous tests introduced in 1921, but like a seer. He developed the symmetry, discerned resemblances, discovered figures and carried out all kinds of permutations. Reversal (or, better still, reversability), metamorphoses and fusion were themes so firmly rooted in Hugo's praxis that one commonly finds in his compositions a landscape reflected in water or a figure that reads equally well either way up. —Florian Rodari.


Links:	— Shadows of a Hand Octopus with the initials V. H. His art, his techniques... The Artwork of Victor Hugo The Roland Collection Drawings: Victor Hugo - Wikipedia

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