Auguste de Châtillon

He, Théophile Gautier, Gérard de Nerval and Arsène Houssaye formed the "bohème du Doyenné".

He designed costumes for Hugo's 1832 premiere Le Roi s’amuse and painted the woodwork in de Nerval's living room.

[1] In the preface to the 1855 edition, Gautier wrote of the writer-painter "he reconciles simplicity and artifice, and his poems can bawl at the cabaret and sign in the living-room.

[2] In a short letter to him on 8 April 1869, Hugo wrote "There is something in you of La Fontaine's easy grace combined with an extra melancholy charm".

[3] The collection includes works in both Romantic and earlier styles, portraits of the time and evocations of Montmartre and New Orleans.