The Eerie Codex of Fontaine’s Etching Atelier

The Etching Atelier resonates with suspended motion. Here, the codex directed every stroke: lines incised, shading applied, and impressions tested. Tools lie mid-use, plates half-inked, and prints unfinished.

The silence carries a precise tension, every object preserving the memory of methodical artistry abruptly interrupted.

Crafting in Metal

This atelier belonged to Lucien Fontaine, etcher and printmaker (b. 1879, Lyon), trained in French academies and apprenticed under master engravers. His skill is evident in fine line work, delicate cross-hatching, and careful plate preparation. A folded note tucked beneath a pile of prints references his mother, Marguerite Fontaine, reminding him to “complete the urban series for the gallery.” Lucien’s temperament was meticulous, obsessive, and deeply patient; ambition focused on documenting architecture, refining technique, and maintaining a perfect catalog of impressions.

Plates Left Mid-Work

On the press, a partially annotated codex shows sketches abruptly halted mid-line. Brayers, scrapers, and ink jars sit untouched, dust settled into every groove. Copper plates, pencil sketches, and printed proofs lie scattered, evidence of repeated experimentation abandoned mid-process. Each unfinished etching reflects suspended intention, halted with no explanation or continuation.

Marks of Decline

Notebooks, copper plates, and partially completed etchings reveal repeated corrections; lines retraced, shading adjusted. Lucien’s decline was physical: tremors in his hands and failing eyesight hindered precise incisions. Each unfinished codex embodies halted intention, professional mastery curtailed by bodily limitation, leaving printmaking permanently suspended.

In a drawer beneath the press, Lucien’s final codex remains half-etched, tools poised yet idle.

No explanation exists for his disappearance. No apprentice returned to continue his work.

The house remains abandoned, its plates, brayers, and codex a quiet testament to interrupted etching and unresolved devotion.