Toulouse-Lautrec - Luci e ombre di Montmartre a Pisa

Shared by Natalia Dantas —

Exhibition in Pisa, Palazzo Blu –

16 October 2015 – 14 February 2016 –

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec represents an epoch, and the exhibition is a unique opportunity to admire the corpus of the graphic work of the French artist. From 1891 to 1901, Lautrec lithographs, 351 produces 28 of which are the famous posters that made him famous and which today represent a real Visual clichés of Paris that he portrays.

The Paris of Montmartre, the Moulin Rouge, Cafe-concert and maison closes. To view the most complete collection of original graphic works of Toulouse-Lautrec in the world. Crucial as consisting of first editions, unique works of art that are not found in any other collection and numerous lithographs presenting original dedications.

“In his work is not a single human face of which do not have deliberately emphasized the unpleasant side was a relentless observer but his brush wasn't lying” –

(Artur Huc) –

Through its magnificent production of paintings, posters, lithographs and posters, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec has managed, more than anyone else, to describe and characterize a city, a way of life, colors of a generation and, more generally, the true lifestyle of late 19th century Paris, the Paris of the Moulin Rouge, Montmartre, the maisons closes; that magnificent period in which, at the turn of two centuries, the Ville Lumière was the undisputed world capital of art.

The Big Blue Building exhibition is meant to represent the extraordinary human adventure and Lautrec art through the exhibition of paintings and drawings imported from relevant international private and public collections in the essential nucleus of works of graphics, which consecrated the artist among the giants of European art and paved the way towards modernity, and towards the dissemination of advertisement that thanks to French artist becomes artwork.

The curatorship is entrusted to scientific Depth. Maria Teresa Benedetti, accredited scholar of French art of the 19th century and experienced artist. A great opportunity to admire the diversity and modernity of art by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec represents an era. The Moulin Rouge and Montmartre Hill have much of their fame and popularity to the fundamental graphic production artist's books. You can realize the greatness and importance of this extraordinary collection of posters and lithographs especially admiring it as a whole. These and various themes and characters, which only a vision and a simultaneous comparison make the idea of its value.

A unique opportunity to admire the Palazzo Blu corpus of artwork by French artist through the exposure of its posters and a selection of his most important lithographs form part of what is the most comprehensive graphic collection of Toulouse-Lautrec in the world.

In the period that divides Goya by Picasso only the work of Daumier and Degas can come close to its production, but none of them succeeded in so short a period of time, only 10 years old, to create so much. From 1891 to 1901, Lautrec lithographs, 351 produces 28 of which are the famous posters that made him famous and which today represent a real Visual clichés of Paris that he portrays. The Paris of Montmartre, the Moulin Rouge, Cafe-concert and maison closes.

To view the most complete collection of original graphic works of Toulouse-Lautrec in the world. Crucial as consisting of first editions, unique works of art that are not found in any other collection and numerous lithographs presenting original dedications in pencil and Clipboard in hand of the artist. The exhibition is divided into 5 sections.

THE SECTIONS

The star. Lights and colors of Montmartre

This first major section presents the star, the protagonists of the artistic life of Montmartre that stimulated the imagination and the artistic production of Lautrec. These characters are immortalized on the famous posters representing the life of the entertainment district of Paris.

Highly innovative posters than the anecdotal genre in vogue in those years, these masterpieces of graphic art are full of Japanese art experience, dell’ influence of the work of Degas and the decorative taste of Nabis.

Strongly characterised by two-dimensional synthetic style, large posters, are designed to be posted in the streets of Paris to attract the general public to attend the Moulin Rouge and the various cabaret, café-chantant in the area such as the Divan Japonais, the Mirliton, the Jardin de Paris.

The theatre, the Opera and avant-garde spectacle

The second section is devoted to that theatre Lautrec is regular visitor.

Love the red carpets of’ Opera and the Comédie-Française, but also the innovative character of the avant-garde theatres. Together with large such as Bonnard, Vuillard Nabis and others, performs numerous posters, posters and programs for the Théâtre Libre of Antoine and Théâtre de L'Oeuvre of Lugné-Poe, pictures of Sarah Bernhardt to phèdre and other shows and classic works such as Antigone. It also has a keen eye towards the public that represents for Lautrec another aspect of theatre and show business life that takes place in stages, in the hallways and in the Parisian theatres.

Loves actors, in which locates the excess of gesture, the tension of the faces and the taste for extreme attitudes and manifestations of’ excess which contradict the principles and characteristics of monotonous life in him.

The great advertising

From 1893 Lautrec created a series of graphic works to advertise furniture, cameras, bicycle chains, novels, literary works, music and magazines. It does so in a peculiar way of changing the rules and innovating the genre. Lautrec is among the first to understand and value the importance of advertising, opportunity for him creative expansion and addresses issues of its posters without intentions and sociological assumptions, but in a natural way and purposeful.

Maison Closes

Section dedicated principally to the 11 lithographs that make up the album Elles, built in 1896, in which Lautrec tells the daily life of all prostitutes’ inside the closed houses of which the artist is a regular visitor and witness.

Lautrec is deeply impressed by the human aspects of life in the brothels, demonstrates a propensity and a great sensitivity towards life hookers touting her affectionate attention and which become subjects of several paintings that represent the different aspects of life in maison closes.

This section contains the topic of female, very dear to the French artist and performed in beautiful painting on cardboard Femme se frisant borrowed from the Musée des Augustins de Toulouse where the artist portrays a woman from behind that system is the hairstyle.

In the sign. The passions

This section presents the extraordinary enigmatic paintings and lithographs representing themes dear to man Toulouse-Lautrec. A series of works that demonstrate the versatile artist's creativity.

Horses, circus, meetings and issues of everyday life are just some of the topics featured in this section that also collects a series of works made with the technique of lithography “drypoint”. Among others there are lithographs with portraits of some of his friends, animals and various other subjects. An intimate journey into the passions of man Lautrec.

The ’ ARTIST

Henri-Marie-Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec, unlike most artists of the French school who lived in poverty and degradation, comes from an old aristocratic family, the counts of Toulouse. The young Henri suffers the consequences of frequent consanguineous marriages, still very much in use in families and emblazoned on what is affected by genetic diseases. To worsen his already poor health contributes two unfortunate events, two crashes in less than two years the young cause breaking both legs, fractures remain and his legs stop growing and this causes the young Lautrec does not pass even in adulthood the meter height .52.

His miserable form, preventing him from carrying out the most diverse activities of his peers and pushes him to totally immerse themselves in his art. Its emblematic phrase “and to think that I never would have painted if my legs were just a little bit longer”. And as a reaction to this disability and possessiveness of the mother Adèle that Henri decides to abandon the patrician House and secure to the pleasures of the Belle Epoque, in fact, pass from the constraints of noble life of the late nineteenth century to Paris's La Bohème.

After his studies and arrived in the French capital he frequented the studio of Rene Princeteau, is this the time when signing his works with different aliases such as Maleknejad, Tolav-Segroeg or Trecleau, this request of father who did not want to tarnish the good name of the noble family. His early paintings are mostly hunting scenes, noble life, dogs and horses.

This is followed by various periods of apprenticeship studies of Alexandre Cabanel, Bonnat Cormon, Leon is now that Henri deeply with alloy Montmartre that so deeply affects him. This is also the period when approaching and explores the production of "Giants" such as Degas or Van Gogh, but is manifest vision Bonnard France-Champagne that marks a turning point in his career and moves him into the world of lithography, graphic design, which will make it known worldwide, thanks to posters that are commissioned by the most famous Parisian clubs like the Moulin Rouge , Le Divan du Monde and Les Ambassadeurs.

In a short time Toulouse-Lautrec is defined “the soul of Montmartre” and represents in his works, his paintings scenes of life at the Moulin Rouge, in the clubs, theatres and famous “Maisons closes”, the “brothels”, in which Lautrec settles for long periods intent on portraying this reality.