Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (French, 1864–1901) At the Moulin Rouge,
1892/95 Oil on canvas; The Art Institute of Chicago, Helen Birch Bartlett
Memorial Collection
Toulouse-Lautrec and Montmartre
July 16–October 10, 2005
Regenstein Hall
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) lived only to the
age of 36 and died in his mothers arms an alcoholic and
with syphilis. He was born into a wealthy family and used
his wealth to explore art and the provacative life to be found
in Montmartre.
Aside from dying in your mother's arms with syphilis, and
being a drunk, he also had the misfortune of a growth malady
that stopped his bones growing and left him at a height of
4 feet 11 inches. Perhaps something that came from these
afflictions was a sense of humor and a keen eye for
characiture. His use of characiture would help to simplify
things a bit in design, similar to some of the oriental paintings,
and also lend itself well to printings and posters. The
area that he worked in is a region on the outskirts of Paris,
a hill overlooking the city-Montmartre. Paris had a rich
history of the arts, painting, music, philosophy, and even
war.
Montmartre was a region where those of modest incomes
were forced to live when the cost in Paris became too much.
Montmartre then became sort of a frontier land for the
adventurous, the painters, the whores, the cabarets, and
those singing of social justice. To say the least, it was
colorful and that color found its way onto the posters and
paintings of Msr. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec , Equestrienne (At the Circus Fernando),
1887–88 The Art Institute of Chicago, Joseph Winterbotham Collection
The exhibition features mostly works by Toulouse-Laurtrec
at the top of his work between the time of 1888 and 1896.
He was not alone in Montmartre at the time and there are
other works by his contemporaries on display as well.
In the painting above called "Equestrienne" you might
find some of the humor of Msr. Lautrec, note the view
showing both the horses behind and the young woman.
The horse even has his xy chromosome distinction clearly
visible beneath the tail. It is realism too, but realism can
be viewed from many angles.
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (French, 1864–1901) Marcelle Lender Dancing
the Bolero in "Chilpéric," 1895–96 National Gallery of Art, Washington,
Collection of Mr. and Mrs. John Hay Whitney
In the painting above "Chilpéric", the dancer in view is a
Marcelle Lender. Mademoiselle Lender is a red head and
Msr. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec had a soft spot for women
with red hair. She though did not care for him at all and
would not even accept the painting above as a gift. Msr.
Lautrec died still owning the painting of her.
The Presses where Msr. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec had his posters
printed.
Photograph of Toulouse-Lautrec, 1892
Musée Toulouse-Lautrec
Montmartre was known to Toulouse-Lautrec, Vincent
van Gogh, Pablo Piccaso, Pierre-Auguste Renoir,
Edgar Degas, Pierre Brissaud, Alfred Jarry, Gen Paul,
Jacques Villon, Raymond Duchamp-Villon, Henri
Matisse, André Derain, Suzanne Valadon, Maurice
Utrillo, and Théophile Steinlen; to name a few.
The exhibit is large and we would recommend that if
you are not a member, that you become one-since
you will get two tickets to the show when you join. We
would also suggest that you get your tickets online so
that you are sure that you will be able to get them.
Below there are links for show information and hotels
in the area too.
It is a wonderful exhibit, beautiful and informative, take
the recorded tour.
TOULOUSE-LAUTREC AND MONTMARTRE
EXHIBITION WALKTHROUGH/HIGHLIGHTS
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901) will be forever linked to Montmartre,
the renegade district on the outskirts of Paris that became famous in the late 19th century for its daring entertainment industry. Montmartre's dance halls, cabarets, café-concerts, brothels, and circuses created an environment of racy, uncensored culture that attracted the local working-class residents, thrill-seeking bourgeois patrons from central Paris, and artists of all types. For young artists, Montmartre, with its unbridled energy, garish colors, and provocative celebrities, was both a way to live and a subject to depict.
In this exhibition, works by Lautrec are joined by those of other avant-garde artists, including Pierre Bonnard, Jules Cheret, Edgar Degas, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, and Theophile-Alexandre Steinlen, many of whom became friends with Lautrec. In addition to the paintings, drawings, and posters on view, Toulouse-Lautrec and Montmartre also features journals, invitations, albums, photographs, song sheets, and music programs from the era. Together these artworks and ephemera evoke the seductive, antiestablishment culture of Montmartre-an environment that was as much a state of mind as a place on the map.
The exhibition is divided into 14 main galleries.
Gallery 1: "Toulouse-Lautrec"
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, the quintessential chronicler of the Parisian district
of Montmartre, created some of the most memorable images of the exciting new culture of late-19th-century France-a culture that was worlds apart from the
artist's aristocratic upbringing in the French provinces. Born in the southern
town of Albi, Lautrec was a descendant of the counts of Toulouse, who had
once ruled over the Umguedoc region. Though he was economically privileged, Lautrec suffered from numerous health ailments-likely resulting from the intermarriage of his parents, who were first cousins. Lautrec's abnormally weak bones led to multiple leg fractures that stunted his growth and made walking a lifelong difficulty for him. Although he did not inherit the robust health of his father, the count, Henri shared his irreverent spirit and love of dressing up.
In 1872 Lautrec and his mother moved to Paris, where a decade later he began formal art studies. He immersed himself in Montmartre, painting and drawing by day and dwelling in the cafés and cabarets by night. Working in several studios, where he became friendly with other young artists enthralled by the district,
Lautrec honed his artistic skills. He soon gained recognition in Montmartre,
and once his first poster was pasted on walls all over Paris he quickly became
as famous as the celebrities his art promoted. Lautrec remained prolific, experimental, and original for the next decade, until his death in 1901 at age
36.
Gallery lB
Lautrec's irreverent wit announced itself early on. In the spring of 1884, Lautrec and Ms fellow students at Fernand Cormon's studio saw Pierre Puvis de Chavaimes's monumental mural painting The Sacred Grove, Beloved of the
Arts and Muses at the Salon, the annual state-sponsored exhibition of current artists' work. (A smaller version of the painting is seen in this gallery.) Although
they admired Puvis's unconventionally flat and simplified style, they questioned the relevance of his classicizing vision of an imagined, antique past. Lautrec and his friends strongly believed that modern art could only be meaningful if it was based on observation of the world of actual experience.
This conviction and Lautrec's playful sense of humor motivated him to paint a
huge parody of the older artist's work in which the tranquility of the muses'
grove is intruded upon by a procession of contemporary figures. Included are
a roughly dressed worker in checked overalls, a policeman frying to maintain
order, and even, seen from behind, the diminutive Lautrec, whose stance suggests he may be relieving himself. The classical frieze now bears a clock whose specific time, 9:05, undermines Puvis's suggestions of timelessness. Likewise, a tube of paint has been substituted for the harp carried by the winged figure floating in the air in the original canvas. The resulting painting is a witty subversion of Puvis's classicizing theme and an early manifesto of Lautrec's artistic goal to create a vibrant art of his time, set on the fashionably raucous stage of Montmartre.
Gallery 3 Introduction: "Montmartre"
Set upon a butte-or hill-overlooking Paris, late-19th-century Montmartre had the air of a small village with an identity distinct from the city. Its steep and narrow winding roads contrasted with the grands boulevards of Paris, while its hillside speckled with windmills gave it a semirural quality. As the advertising posters in
this room suggest, the culture of Montmartre fell into two camps: that of the daytime inhabitants-the working classes and the poor, who were attracted by the neighborhood's inexpensive rents-and that of the night visitors, made up of more affluent Parisians and tourists who indulged in the cheap pleasures of the cafés, dance halls, cabarets, and brothels.
Gallery 3: "Montmartre Places and People"
The freewheeling and bohemian atmosphere of Montmartre attracted artists from France and beyond, including Vincent van Gogh (the Netherlands), Eero Jarnefelt (Finland), Maximilien Luce (France), Henri Eugene Nocq (Belgium), and Santiago Rusiflol and Ramon Casas (Spain), whose works are on view in this gallery. Lautrec and his colleagues recognized that a unique draw of the district was
its mix of social types-bourgeois men and working-class women, prostitutes
and pimps, artists and tourists, and the stars and aspirants of the local
entertainment industry. The various personalities these artists encountered
in their nightly jaunts became favorite motifs in their art. Equally appealing
were the nightspots themselves, in particular the celebrated Moulin de la Galette, Moulin Rouge, and Chat Noir, all of which are indicated on the adjacent map of the Montmartre district.
Gallery 4: "Montmartre People and Places"
The theme of modem life (Lu vie moderne) in and around the French capital had been explored by Manet, Monet, Renoir, and Degas in the 1860s and 1870s.
By the mid1880s, when Lautrec settled in Montmartre, only Degas and Renoir, both residents there, remained based in Paris. However, Montmartre was never
featured in the often humorous modern urban themes that made Degas famous,
and his attention increasingly turned away from the observation of Parisian life toward a study of the human figure informed by the classical tradition.
Lautrec, and other artists of his generation based in Montmartre, focused on
modem subjects differently than had their Impressionist forebears. Instead of representing the activities of the Champs Elysées and the grands boulevards of Paris, the artists of Montmartre treated the rough, down-scale entertainments
and inhabitants of their own district. Acutely observed, Lautrec's canvases
reveal an insider's knowledge of the neighborhood and its denizens. Even
when he posed friends or models to typify the area's marginal characters-in paintings such as A La mie and The Hangover (on view in this gallery)-his
fictions assume the truth of lived experience.
The paintings in this room show the artist's fascination with two major social groups that Montmartre nightlife brought together: young, working-class women and bourgeois males. Lautrec would further explore their interactions in his more ambitiously composed dance-hall paintings beginning in 1889 (on view in Gallery 6).
Gallery 5: "Advertising Montmartre"
The modem-day publicity poster was born in the late 19th century, due in large part to the influence of lithography. Invented at the beginning of the century, lithography-a printing process based on the mutual repulsion of water and oil-had been used for both commercial and artistic ends. Jules Cheret, considered the father of the modern poster, employed both words and images as integral parts of the overall design, adding different styles of lettering for visual liveliness. He depicted beautiful, coquettish women, known as chérettes, whose alluring poses beckoned the public to visit the advertised nightspot.
Lautrec greatly admired Chéret's posters, but when the young artist from Albi turned his attention to lithography, he created designs with a modern sensibility
that are more graphic, with bold color and striking silhouettes. Additionally, by featuring specific celebrities rather than anonymous beauties, Lautrec infused his posters with star power. Three thousand copies of Lautrec's first poster, Moulin Rouge: Lu Goulue, spread throughout Paris in late 1891. An outpouring of critical acclaim turned Lautrec into an overnight sensation and fueled the popularity of the featured dancer known as La Goulue (the Glutton) dancing the chuhut-an
eroticized version of the cancan. John Huston featured the dance in his 1952 film Moulin Rouge, excerpts of which are shown in this gallery.
Gallery 6: "Dance Halls"
In the late 1880s and early 1890s, Montmartre's dance halls surged in popularity. Some of the most famous venues, including the Moulin de la Galette and the
Moulin Rouge, offered a wide variety of entertainments in a carnival-like atmosphere that included acrobats, puppet shows, and animal acts. The dance
hall, with its mixture of social classes, creative experimentation, sexual freedom, and free-flowing alcohol, was a popular subject for artists of the period. The
theme was particularly important for Lautrec, whose first major dance-hall
painting, Moulin de La Galette (1889), shows his interest in not only the physical activity but also the psychology of its patrons. This dueling artistic concern for surface appearance and underlying drama is present throughout Lautrec's career and is evident in some of his most mature works, including the masterful At the Moulin Rouge (1892/95).
Gallery 7: "The Chat Noir"
In 1881 the artist-cum-entrepreneur Rodolphe Salis opened a new cabaret called the Chat Noir (Black Cat) at the foot of Montmartre's hill. The black cat-the nocturnal creature that is mysterious, seductive, playful, and independent-became
a symbol not only for the Chat Noir itself but for all of Montmartre.
Salis's cabaret artistique was a gathering place for writers, poets, singers, and artists, including Lautrec. The customers added to the bohemian atmosphere by participating in nightly performances and donating works of art to decorate the walls. Theophile-Alexandre Steinlen created posters and paintings for the cabaret, and Adolphe Willette designed the monumental canvas Parce Domine (on view in Gallery 3), in which the pleasures and vices of Montmartre are displayed. The talented clientele also contributed to Salis's illustrated journal Le Chat Noir, which was as much a publicity vehicle for the cabaret as it was a place for the artists to publish their work.
The growing popularity of the Chat Noir prompted Salis to seek larger quarters
in 1885. The second Chat Noir continued to operate much as the first, with the addition of a shadow theater, in which zinc cutout silhouettes (several of which
may be seen in this gallery) were projected onto a screen. Although the shadow theater was an art form with roots in both French and Asian theater, the Chat Noir took it to a new level with elaborate cutouts, sound effects, painted backgrounds, and orchestral or choral accompaniments. Rodolphe Sails died in 1897, and with his death the Chat Noir closed its doors.
Gallery 7a: "The Chat Noir and Aristide Bruant"
One of the most popular entertainers in all of Montmartre, the singer and songwriter Aristide Bruant first performed at the Chat Noir and later at his own cabaret, Le Mirliton. Working as a railroad clerk by day, Bruant spent his evenings immersed in the unruly atmosphere of Montmartre, studying the rough vernacular arid attitudes of the lower classes. His verses, written in the language of the street, recount the struggles of those down on their luck. Frequently, Bruant rained insults on his increasingly bourgeois audience, who ironically seemed to revel in the "authentic" working-class experience of Montmartre that Bruant provided.
The careers of Lautrec and Bruant intersected in 1892, when both artists were gaining recognition. To promote his arrival at a new venue not in Montmartre but on the Champs Elysées in central Paris, Bruant commissioned a poster by Lautrec, the design of which perfectly suited the coarse performer's style. Using bold forms and a palette of just five colors, Lautrec distilled Bruant's personality into a few recognizable features, including his signature hat, red scarf, and black overcoat,
as well as his imposing posture and defiant gaze. Bruant was so taken by Lautrec's design ("Am I that grand?" he is said to have remarked) that he went on to commission three additional posters from the young artist, all of which are variations on the original design. These posters-among Lautrec's best known-are largely responsible for the image of Bruant that we have today, more than a
century after he first rose to prominence.
Gallery 8: "Café-Concerts"
Since the 1840s, café-concerts had flourished in the French capital. Less formal and less expensive than traditional theater, these establishments provided entertainment as patrons milled about socializing, smoking, and drinking. Most commonly the performances featured an individual singer, as seen in the
lithographs by Edgar Degas, the Impressionist painter whom Lautrec greatly admired. Lautrec went even further than Degas in his depictions of celebrities
who are identifiable by their hallmark clothing and facial features. Lautrec developed what he called fl1rias-obsessions with particular performers who captivated his attention for a single season or for several years. Lautrec's lithographs were sometimes published as small portfolios for print collectors
rather than as large public posters, as seen in his 1893 collaboration with his
fellow Montmartre denizen, Henri-Gabriel Ibels. Entitled Le Café-Concert, this album of monochromatic lithographs (on view in the case in this gallery) features portraits of the various stars of the café-concert, linking fine art and celebrity culture.
Gallery 9: "Stars of the Café-Concerts-Jane Avril"
Lautrec and other Montmartre artists tapped into and fed the cult of celebrity that reached a fever pitch in late-1 9th-century France. Select personalities from Montmartre's entertainment venues became fixations of young artists who portrayed the stars in endless variations.
The dancer Jane Avril-who performed at the Moulin Rouge, the Divan Japonais, and the Jardin de Paris-is best known for her unbridled energy, earning her the nickname "La Mélinite," which refers to an explosive compound. Avril, a close friend of Lautrec's, was depicted by the artist not only in her guise as a popular performer, but also as an introspective, private woman. Taken together, Lautrec's portraits of Avril highlight the contradictions between the public personae and private lives of celebrities.
Gallery 9a: "Stars of the Café-Concerts-Yvette Guilbert"
Nowhere was the cult of celebrity more evident than with the figure of Yvette Guilbert, the café-concert singer who sang irreverently about lost love and destitution. Guilbert's gangly body and lackluster voice made her an unlikely star, but rather than hiding these traits, the cunning performer made them her trademark-along with her signature black gloves and gown. Lautrec exaggerated these qualities, as did other artists who portrayed Guilbert in a variety of media, including lithography, oil, watercolor, photography, ceramic, and plaster. The proliferation of Guilbert imagery elevated her to iconic status.
Gallery 10: "Lole Fuller"
While Lautrec generally befriended his celebrity subjects, he worshipped the American dancer Lole Fuller from afar. Fuller, originally from Fullersberg, Illinois (now Hinsdale), performed at the Folies Bergère wearing a costume made up of layers of sheer cotton muslin that swirled around her as she moved. 1-Jer unique staging projected recently invented colored electric lights toward a glass floor surrounded by mirrors. The effect made Fuller's sinuous form resemble a flower or a flame, or something equally ethereal, which captivated many Montmartre artists, whose representations of her are on view in this gallery.
Lautrec depicted Fuller in a series of more than 60 lithographs that are among his most abstract works. Although he used the same lithographic stones for each print, he varied the colors, so that no two are identical. He dusted many of the prints
with powdered silver or gold, adding a metallic sheen that is evocative of the electric stage lights used during Fuller's performances. (Archival film footage of Fuller performing may be seen in this gallery.)
Gallery 11: "Maisons Closes"
Although brothels were considered immoral, they were also acknowledged as a societal reality. The maisons closes (closed houses)-the official French euphemism for brothels-were licensed establishments in which prostitution was discreetly regulated by the authorities. Prostitution, a subject already treated by artists as diverse as William Hogarth and Francisco de Goya in the 18th century and Edouard Manet in the 19th, was a popular theme for Lautrec and other Montmartre artists of the period, including Edgar Degas, to whom Lautrec
looked for both subject and composition, and Lautrec's friend from student days, Emile Bernard.
Lautrec, a social outsider, seemed to find comfort in the sexual subculture, even boasting to friends that he had lived for a time in a brothel (an unproven claim).
He depicted the women of the maisons closes from various perspectives-as
sensual and alluring or, more sympathetically, as women surviving under trying social circumstances. The prostitutes are shown awaiting clients, lying on beds,
or embracing. By turns compassionate and voyeuristic, Lautrec's brothel scenes
are one of the most complex aspects of his work. These brothel paintings were
not publicly exhibited during Lautrec's lifetime. Some were shown with private dealers, but even then they were displayed in secluded back galleries reserved for privileged clients. Only Files, Lautrec's 1896 album of 11 color lithographs depicting the daily routines of prostitutes (on view in this gallery) was published.
Gallery 12: "Marcelle Lender"
By the mid-1890s, Lautrec's attachment to the singers and dancers of Montmartre was divided with his interest in the more respectable theatrical performances of
the fashionable grands boulevards, in central Paris, which he began attending regularly. One of his furias, or intense attractions, was for the dancer Marcelle Lender, whom he first saw in 1893. Two years later she starred in the farcical operetta Chiipéric, which turned the turbulent history of a sixth-century king into
a palace-intrigue burlesque. Lautrec, who attended some 20 shows, was particularly inspired by Lender's performance as the Spanish wife, Galswinthe, whom the king plots to murder. This energetic painting depicts Lender at center stage, with a black-stockinged leg piercing through the pink layers of her skirt, perhaps recalling the cancan performers Lautrec admired in the dance halls of Montmartre.
Gallery 13: "The Circus"
The circus appealed to Montmartre artists for both its perpetual activity and its outlandish spectacle. The district's Cirque Fernando originally consisted of tents pitched on a street corner, but it was later consolidated under a single big top and eventually moved indoors in 1878. The flamboyant energy of the Cirque Fernando was a popular subject for Lautrec and other artists of the time, whose works are on view in this gallery. Lautrec's interest in the circus was a logical extension of his childhood paintings and drawings of equestrian scenes. One of his earliest mature works, Equestrienne (At the Circus Fernando) of 1887 to 1888, was purchased
by the Moulin Rouge's owner to hang in the famous dance hall.
While Lautrec never completely abandoned the subject of the circus in the 1890s, it was not until his 1899 institutionalization that he returned to it with full force.
Early that year, when the artist's alcoholism had become life-threatening, he was confined against his wishes to a clinic in suburban Paris. Determined to win his release, Lautrec made a series of crayon drawings of the circus from memory to convince his doctors of his soundness of mind. Recalling subject matter from his earliest days in Montmartre, the ailing Lautrec's late circus drawings are poignant images that succeeded in securing his release from the clinic.
Gallery 14: "The End of an Era"
In the years following his release from the clinic, Lautrec's health deteriorated as
his alcoholism progressed. One of his last paintings is the exuberant Rat Mort, which depicts a seemingly inebriated woman in masquerade costume with a male escort at the famous Dead Rat restaurant at the southern edge of Montmartre. By the time Lautrec painted this image of overindulgence and pleasure, he was scarcely able to get up in the morning. Yet, as he had done with his late circus drawings, he drew from his vivid memory, and he re-created the artificial and
garish realm of nocturnal entertainment in which he had played so vital a role. On September 9, 1901, at the age of 36, the artist died in the arms of his mother at
the Lautrec family home in southwest France.
Lautrec's experimentation with graphic techniques transformed the notion of "fine" or "high" art and opened exciting expressive possibilities for a new generation of artists. Among those who profited from Lautrec's vivid legacy was Pablo Picasso, whose Blue Room (on view in this gallery) pays homage to the older artist. Picasso included Lautrec's poster of the British singer May Milton above the bed, enlarging it from its original scale as if to mark Lautrec's centrality to his first experience of Montmartre.
Lautrec's passing coincided with a general decline in the creative spirit of Montmartre. As tourism increased so did rents and prices, pushing artists into the cheaper district of Montpamasse, where another chapter in modem art began.
Toulouse-Lautrec and Montmartre was organized by The Art Institute of Chicago and The National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
The Sara Lee Foundation is the Exclusive Corporate Sponsor of Toulouse-Lautrec and Mont rnartre.
This exhibition is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the
Arts and the Humanities.
The Art Institute of Chicago is a museum in Chicago's Grant Park, located across from Millennium Park. Museum Hours: 10:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday; 10:30 a.m.-S:00 p.m. Thursday; 10:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Closed Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day. Suggested admission: $12.00; children over 5, students, and seniors, $7.00; members always free. Visitors may pay what they wish, but they must pay something. Ford Free Tuesdays are free to all, except for certain special exhibitions that may require full or extra admission fee. Chicago residents with Chicago Public Library cards can borrow a "Great Kids Museum Passport" card from any branch library for free general admission to the nine members of Museums in the Park-including The Art Institute of Chicago-and other Chicago institutions.
© Oak Park Journal
published by Suburban Journals of Chicago Inc.
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