Esquisse pour le cabinet du préfet à l'Hôtel de Ville : La recherche des blessés durant le siège de Paris en 1870

Paul Baudoüin's sketch for the prefect's cabinet at the Hôtel de Ville depicts the search for the wounded during the Siege of Paris in 1870-71, a subject of acute resonance for a building that had itself been at the center of that conflict. The Franco-Prussian War and the subsequent Commune left deep scars on Parisian civic memory, and the decision to commemorate the Siege in official decoration transformed personal and collective trauma into civic mythology. Baudoüin's scene focuses on humanitarian response — the searching for casualties — rather than military glory, reflecting the Third Republic's tendency to memorialize suffering and resilience rather than triumphalism.

The sketch uses a restricted palette of grey-blues and ochres appropriate to a scene of cold-season urban distress. Figures are loosely grouped in the middle ground, with the compositional energy directed toward a central searching or carrying action. Brushwork is gestural and rapid.