Toulouse-Lautrec

By Matthias Arnold

Book Overview

In our imaginings of Paris, painter and graphic artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901) has no small role to play. In his prints, posters, paintings, and drawings, the artist immortalized the city's Belle poque nightlife and put the northern neighborhood of Montmartre on the global map of creative-hedonist hotspots.

The son of old French nobility, Toulouse-Lautrec seems to have been drawn early on to visions of a demimonde, centering his attention on the dance halls, cabarets, and brothels of Montmartre and adopting famed dancers and singers as his subjects, most notably Jane Avril. His works include both lively performance scenes and quiet, tender "after-hours" portraits such as The Sofa and In Bed. Stylistically, he mastered both bold graphics, as celebrated in his promotional posters of Jane Avril, and a loose yet evocative sketchwork.

Though he died aged just 36, due to complications from alcoholism and syphilis, Toulouse-Lautrec's cultural influence was immense. This introductory book takes a walk through his world of singers, dancers, musicians, and prostitutes to reveal an artist of great humanity, striking figurative skill, and a pronounced sense for the energy and stories of a city.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 3836534908
• ISBN13: 9783836534901
• Release Date: March 2016
• Publisher: Taschen
• Length: 96 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 8.3" x 10.2"

Customer Reviews

a crippled genius

Toulouse-Lautrec is my favorite artist. He has always fascinated me the most, both his life and his work. He had one or two accidents as a child where his legs were broken and they stopped growing. As a result, he became a dwarf. This must have created a deep-seated inferiority complex in him that caused him, consciously or unconsciously, to draw unflattering caricatures of his contemporaries. But the drawing style was completely original and his own. He soon became famous for his lithographs or posters depicting entertainers at the Moulin Rouge, etc. He was highly productive but always a heavy drinker and inexhaustible party animal. In fact, it was his frequenting of brothels and romantic friendships with prostitutes that eventually did him in. He caught syphilis, a deadly 19th century venereal disease for which there was no cure in those days. However, he left behind some of the most unique Impressionist paintings of Parisian night-life ever painted. David Rehakauthor of "Love and Madness"