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Arts Intel Report

Toulouse-Lautrec: Icon Creator

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Jane Avril, 1899,

3 Rue Joseph Cabassol, 13100 Aix-en-Provence, France

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) was born into a noble family in Albi and broke both legs as a child, stunting their growth permanently. The condition cut him off from the aristocratic world and sent him instead to Montmartre, where he spent the 1880s and 1890s in cabarets, theaters, and brothels painting the demimonde. His posters—Moulin Rouge: La Goulue, Divan Japonais, Jane Avril—turned dancers, singers, and entertainers into icons through flat planes of color, bold contours, and an economy of means borrowed from Japanese woodblock prints. In collaboration with the Musée Toulouse-Lautrec in Albi, the Caumont-Centre d’Art is presenting nearly 100 of the artist’s paintings, lithographs, and sketches. —Elena Clavarino