Abstract composition in red and black, etching with aquatint by Jacqueline Debutler, circa 1971-1974

Etching with aquatint in red, black and a finely textured tonal field by French artist Jacqueline Debutler (b. 1932, Compiègne). The composition is built from three interlocking faceted forms — a saturated solid black, a brilliant solid red, and a third form carrying a dense regular cellular texture, almost weave-like, that reads in black across the body of the image and shifts into a deep oxblood where the red plate overprints it. The print demonstrates the confident, hard-edged geometric idiom Debutler developed in parallel to her lyrical-abstract work, and which she exhibited at Galerie Pierre Hautot in Paris in April 1974 under the heading eaux-fortes originales. Signed ‘Debutler’ in pencil lower right and inscribed ‘E.A’ (épreuve d’artiste) lower left, this an artist’s proof outside the numbered edition. Debutler trained at the École des Beaux-Arts in Amiens before four years of post-graduate study with Johnny Friedländer in Paris, and her etchings were published in Paris by Éditions Hautot and Éditions de la Tortue and distributed in the United States by Editions AAA, with examples held in the Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris. Printed on heavy deckled-edge mould-made paper. Acquired directly from the artist’s family, with supporting archive material. France, circa 1971-1974.