(Papier a Cigarettes Job after Firmin Bouisset)

Christophe Adrien (Count) Regley de Koenigsegg

An unusual - and perhaps startling by today's standards - image of a child chimney sweep rolling a cigarette using Job papers - Job being the company already famed for its imagery of sultry, smoking Art Nouveauwomen rendered by Mucha, Pal, and more. This is a miniature copy of the advertisement poster by Firmin Boisset. Boisset had his son Jacques pose in the uniform of a chimney sweep to create this work - a somewhat controversial choice due to the rising condemnation of child labor in France and beyond. It proved mildly popular nonetheless

Boisset often asked his children to pose for his advertisement drawings (he featured his daughter Yvonne in a Chocolate Menier ad), and when he created this work in 1895 his work was gaining popularity as the Art Nouveau style began to lose favor. Koenigsegg captures the image in miniature, down to badge on the boy's left shoulder.