CUZOR Lot n° 40

STEVE CUZOR HENRY FLEMING'S BATTLE Dupuis 2024 Original plate no. 45. Signed. India ink and white gouache on paper 48 × 62 cm (18.9 × 24.41 in.) In this plate, Steve Cuzor makes an exception to the classic layout he adopts for the rest of the album, by inserting a small square box in the middle of the page, in which - another rarity - we see Henry's two eyes, wide open. And it's his vision of horror that the artist shows us in the last large square... In a few moments, on the next page, Henry will desert. For Henry, up until now, war has been a fiction. He'd played out the battle so much in his head, talked about the enemy so much without ever having seen him, that suddenly, on the battlefield, his imagination took precedence over reality. The last panel sums up his vision, with his adversaries appearing to him as mythological heroes or bloodthirsty barbarians. S.C.