The lawyer becomes sick, a last resort when his case is beginning to also look sick, plate 30 from Les Gens De Justice

Curator: Here we have Honoré Daumier’s 1847 lithograph, “The lawyer becomes sick, a last resort when his case is beginning to also look sick," part of his series "Les Gens de Justice.” Immediately, the frenetic energy of the scene leaps out at me. Editor: Sick is right! Everyone looks crammed together, and that poor lawyer is practically gasping for air, tilting his head back, like he's spotted an escape hatch in the courtroom ceiling. A dark cloud of injustice, perhaps? Curator: Possibly, given Daumier's social commentary. As a lithograph, consider the accessibility this medium afforded. Prints like this, readily reproduced and circulated, spoke directly to the bourgeoisie. Daumier wields lithography as a tool to disseminate these views on power structures. Editor: Exactly! I imagine those prints ending up crumpled in someone's pocket after causing a good belly laugh. I love how he’s captured the almost farcical nature of the justice system here. Look at the spectators all bundled together; their garments a dense, almost suffocating mass that mirrors the sickness mentioned in the title. Curator: That crowding really amplifies the tension, and emphasizes a central element for me. The rapid, cross-hatched lines evoke the frenzied atmosphere, produced with the material directly on the stone, an important physical and conceptual feature. Editor: True, and in doing so it reveals that justice wasn't dispensed with elegance, but with labor and grit, echoing the artist's labor, too. And is it just me, or does everyone look rather...ill? Like they're all suffering from the same ailment as the lawyer? Perhaps a symptom of their own professions? Curator: Perhaps that malaise points to the broader moral sickness of the system itself. These were difficult times, so that kind of commentary can find easy sympathy. Editor: Absolutely. It feels remarkably relevant today too. A bit unnerving. So, thanks Daumier, for the…diagnosis? Curator: Indeed. An artist revealing enduring tensions, but now brought into conversation within a very different system of valuation, consumption and viewing.