Jehan Sennep, À l’Abattoir les Cartellistes!! Album-souvenir des Elections de 1928 (Paris: Editions Bossard, [1928.]). One copy of 200. Bookplate of the Baron de Cougny-Préfeln. Graphic Arts GAX 2012- in process.
In the French Third Republic, a coalition was formed of left-wing parties (the Socialists and the Radicals) in the Chamber of Deputies. They established the Cartel des gauches in opposition to the right-wing Bloc National, which they defeated in the elections of 1924. Led by Édouard Herriot (1872-1957) and later Aristide Briand (1862-1932), the Cartel was defeated in 1926.
On April 22 and 29, 1928, elections were held for the 14th legislature. The French caricaturist Jehan Sennep (whose real name was Jean-Jacques Charles Pennes, 1894-1982) cartooned the members of the Cartel in the Paris papers and then, brought them together in this send-up of the election. Herriot, Marcel Cachin (1869-1958), Georges-Étienne Bonnet (1889-1973), and Blaise Diagne (1872-1934) are among the Cartellistes transformed into cattle being led to the slaughter house. The book is sardonically printed on rough brown butcher’s paper.
