This color lithograph poster by Victor Lenepveu shows Émile Zola caricatured as a pig, seated on a tub filled with his novels and smearing the map of France with “international caca.”
The depiction of Zola as a pig belongs to a tradition of political caricature that developed in the late nineteenth century, notably in the context of the Dreyfus affair. Many images already associated Zola with animalization and excrement, symbols used to ridicule Naturalism and his works, and more specifically his novel La Terre, whose bestiality had shocked many readers. Several caricaturists, such as Sapeck, Alfred Le Petit and Caran d’Ache, exploited this imagery to attack his public stance, particularly after the publication of “J’accuse…”, accusing the writer of “soiling” France.
In this context, Victor Lenepveu’s series Le Musée des Horreurs offers one of the most violent depictions of Zola.
Circulated between 1899 and 1900 in a climate of extreme social tension, these anti-Dreyfusard propaganda posters, although quickly withdrawn, left a lasting impression on public opinion through their visual and ideological violence.
The depiction of Zola as a pig belongs to a tradition of political caricature that developed in the late nineteenth century, notably in the context of the Dreyfus affair. Many images already associated Zola with animalization and excrement, symbols used to ridicule Naturalism and his works, and more specifically his novel La Terre, whose bestiality had shocked many readers. Several caricaturists, such as Sapeck, Alfred Le Petit and Caran d’Ache, exploited this imagery to attack his public stance, particularly after the publication of “J’accuse…”, accusing the writer of “soiling” France.
In this context, Victor Lenepveu’s series Le Musée des Horreurs offers one of the most violent depictions of Zola.
Circulated between 1899 and 1900 in a climate of extreme social tension, these anti-Dreyfusard propaganda posters, although quickly withdrawn, left a lasting impression on public opinion through their visual and ideological violence.
