Penurie du coton en 1918 [Cotton Shortage in 1918]

This hand-colored lithograph depicts a domestic crisis during World War I: a woman in an apron, her hair in rags, sits at a table while a man holds a blue teapot and piece of cloth. The French text criticizes the use of cotton for making shirts instead of clothing: "If you take your shirts... one could dress the table and put it away." The cartoon targets wartime rationing and textile scarcity, when cotton was diverted to military uniforms. Rendered in the caricature tradition descending from Hogarth and Daumier, the exaggerated features and domestic setting make pointed social commentary on ordinary people's hardships. The hand-coloring and lithographic process reflect early twentieth-century popular print practices that would shape emerging comic and satirical graphic traditions.