Toussaint, Maurice / Martin, Yves La Garde Imperiale au Combat. Premier Empire

Maurice Toussaint had an illustrious career as an illustration artist. He was active throughout practically the entire 20th century. He was born in 1882 as the son of an artist near Paris and died in Lyon in 1974 at the age of 92. His first official exhibition took place in 1903 and he remained active until the 1950s and 1960s. He was mainly active in the field of popular illustration: Posters, children's books, etc. However, his main interest was in the military field. He contributed to numerous publications on this subject. The best known is an official work on the new uniform regulations of the French army, written by Commander Bucquoy and published in 1935, which he illustrated profusely with full-page colour plates. Like many other artists of the time, he also worked on commissions from private individuals. Today, several private and public collections harbour works by him, most of which were created in the form of "series". This is also the case with the work made accessible to the general public through this volume. There is no indication of when it was created or who commissioned it. As a general work on the Imperial Guard and its feats of arms, it was probably commissioned by a Napoleon enthusiast in the interwar period. Apart from a title given to each plate, there was no text, so we endeavoured to give some information about the events Toussaint depicted visually. He was excellent at showing the military in context and in action, as we shall see. Thanks to the talent of Maurice Toussaint and the pen of Yves Martin, the legendary units of the Imperial Guard of the First Empire can be accompanied on the battlefields. Yves Martin presents 26 original plates that have never been published before.