REAL SMALL PAINTING

Rare Art Nouveau Perfume Bottle or Soap Box Label Project & Painting

SMIC JUDGENDSTIL Around 1900 & Saint Chamond & Loire

Dimensions : 20cm x 10cm 

Dimensions of the cardboard sheet (the border on the left folds): 31 cm x 23.5 cm 

Technique Mixte : Gouache & Oil & Gilding

The Société Manufacturière d'Impression et de Cartonnages (SMIC) had been founded in 1855 by Antoine Poméon in the Commune of Saint-Chamond in the Department of the Loire.

Engraver and specialist in lithography, this man is innovative. Once installed, he never ceased to perfect himself, to multiply tests and experiments concerning lithography and typography, and to invest in increasingly modern equipment. 

In the 1900s, the printing press brought its experience to new processes in France, such as embossing. With a staff of 250 workers, it then experienced a boom period. Unfortunately the beautiful story ends one morning in October 1924, with a fire that ravages the workshops in a few hours.

The work that you are offering us was saved from the flames, and today traces the history of this printing press. 

Era of an Art Nouveau 

This cardboard comes from one of the files of the archives of the SMIC, gathering projects of painted labels, intended to illustrate perfume bottles or soap boxes.

Small miniature painting in the Taste of Mucha.