Delacroix : carnets de voyage au Maghreb et en Andalousie

From January to June 1832, Eugène Delacroix accompanied the diplomatic mission led by Count Charles de Mornay to the Moroccan Sultan Moulay Abd er-Rahman. He stayed in Tangiers, went to Meknes for an official audience, left on his return to Tangiers for southern Spain, where he spent a fortnight, returned to Tangiers and then, on his way back to France, stopped briefly in Oran and Algiers, recently conquered territories, before arriving in Toulon.

Along the way, the painter kept detailed notes in notebooks about his experiences, and sketches and drawings to record what he had seen. Seven of these notebooks were sold posthumously from the painter's studio in 1864; six have now been identified, two of which were found in 2018. They are among Delacroix's finest achievements and the most remarkable testimony to a great work in progress.

This richly illustrated book recounts the political context of this journey and its decisive influence on Delacroix's thinking and art. It offers a complete reproduction of the six known notebooks. All of the texts written in the notebooks have been transcribed, allowing readers to follow his discoveries, reflections and aesthetic emotions day by day, step by step. Finally, biographies of each of the personalities mentioned in his notes are included in the appendices.