Les Harpies is a curious original print (a b/w lithograph) by Pierre Georges Jeanniot.

A wonderful artist's proof, before letter with a dry-stamp on the lower margin at the center "STE" on Japon nacré paper and hand-signed in pencil on the lower left margin.

It is the story through images of the myth of the three harpies, realized by a skilled draftsman with a quick and sure touch. In excellent conditions, including a white cardboard passepartout

The Harpies are divinities of Greek mythology. They were originally imagined as winged women, then as monsters with head, torso, and arms of a woman, the rest of a bird. Aello, "the storm", and Ocipete, "she who flies fast", Celeno, the "darkness" kidnap and transport the souls of the dead and sometimes the living as well.

They dwelled at first in the garden of the Hesperides, then in the Strofadi Islands.


Pierre-Georges Jeanniot (1848-1934) was a Swiss-French Impressionist painter, designer, watercolorist, and engraver. His work often depicts the modern life in Paris.

He most of all portrayed Parisian women during the "Belle Epoque", women in bathing suits at the beach (a new phenomenon in those times). These paintings are important because they give us a vivid sociological documentation of the artist's times.

In Paris, he became friends with Édouard Manet, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, Jean-Louis Carnival, Paul Helleu, and especially with Edgar Degas, whom he revered as a master. He spent much time with Edgar Degas at his home in Diénay (Côte-d'Or).

He illustrated a large number of literary books, among them Le Voyage à Saint-Cloud by Germinie Lacerteux (1886), Contes choisis by Guy de Maupassant (1886), Tartarin de Tarascon by Daudet (1887), Les Liaisons dangereuses by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos (1917). He also illustrated main French literary masterpiece like Les Misérables by Victor Hugo (1887), La Débâcle et La Curée by Émile Zola (1893-1894), Le Calvaire by Octave Mirbeau (1901), Le Misanthrope by Molière (1907), Les Paysans by Honoré de Balzac (1911), and Candide by Voltaire.
28.5 x 22 (foglio), 13 x 13 (image), 37 x 25 (passpartout)