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Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
Birth name	Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa
Born	24 November 1864(1864-11-24) Albi, Tarn, France
Died	9 September 1901 (aged 36) Malrome, France
Nationality	French
Field	Painter, Printmaker, draftsman, illustrator
Movement	Post-Impressionism, Art Nouveau

Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa or simply Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (pronounced [ɑ̃ʁi dø tuluz loˈtʁɛk]) (24 November 1864 – 9 September 1901) was a French painter, printmaker, draftsman, and illustrator, whose immersion in the colourful and theatrical life of fin de siècle Paris yielded an oeuvre of exciting, elegant and provocative images of the modern and sometimes decadent life of those times. Toulouse-Lautrec is known along with Cézanne, Van Gogh, and Gauguin as one of the greatest painters of the Post-Impressionist period. In a 2005 auction at Christie's auction house a new record was set when "La blanchisseuse", an early painting of a young laundress, sold for $22.4 million U.S.^[1]

Contents 1 Youth 1.1 Disability and health problems 2 Paris 2.1 Tremblement de Terre 3 Art 4 Early death 5 Selected works 6 Movies 7 References 8 External links

[edit] Youth

Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa was born in Albi, Tarn in the Midi-Pyrénées région of France, the firstborn child of Comte Alphonse and Comtesse Adèle de Toulouse-Lautrec. An aristocratic family (descendants of the Counts of Toulouse and Lautrec and the Viscounts of Montfa, a village and commune of the Tarn department of southern France). A younger brother was also born to the family on 28 August 1867, but died the following year.

[edit] Disability and health problems

The Comte and Comtesse themselves were first cousins, and Henri suffered from a number of congenital health conditions attributed to this tradition of inbreeding, the Toulouse-Lautrecs were feeling the effects of the inbreeding of past generations.

At the age of 13 Henri fractured his left thigh bone, and at 14, the right.^[2] The breaks did not heal properly. Modern physicians attribute this to an unknown genetic disorder, possibly pycnodysostosis (also sometimes known as Toulouse-Lautrec Syndrome),^[3] or a variant disorder along the lines of osteopetrosis, achondroplasia, or osteogenesis imperfecta.^[4] Rickets aggravated with praecox virilism has also been suggested. His legs ceased to grow, so that as an adult he was only 1.22 m (4 ft 6 in) tall,^[2] having developed an adult-sized torso, while retaining his child-sized legs, which were 0.70 m (27.5 in) long. He is also reported to have had hypertrophied genitals.^[5]

[edit] Paris

Physically unable to participate in most of the activities typically enjoyed by men of his age, Toulouse-Lautrec immersed himself in his art. He became an important Post-Impressionist painter, art nouveau illustrator, and lithographer; and recorded in his works many details of the late-19th-century bohemian lifestyle in Paris. Toulouse-Lautrec also contributed a number of illustrations to the magazine Le Rire during the mid-1890s. Toulouse-Lautrec was drawn to Montmartre, an area of Paris famous for its bohemian lifestyle and for being the haunt of artists, writers, and philosophers. Tucked deep into Montmartre was the garden of Monsieur Pere Foret where Toulouse-Lautrec executed a series of pleasant plein-air paintings of Carmen Gaudin, the same red-head model who appears in The Laundress (1888). When the nearby Moulin Rouge cabaret opened its doors, Toulouse-Lautrec was commissioned to produce a series of posters. Thereafter, the cabaret reserved a seat for him, and displayed his paintings.^[6] Among the well-known works that he painted for the Moulin Rouge and other Parisian nightclubs are depictions of the singer Yvette Guilbert; the dancer Louise Weber, known as the outrageous La Goulue ("The Glutton"), who created the "French Can-Can"; and the much more subtle dancer Jane Avril.

[edit] Tremblement de Terre

The invention of the cocktail "Earthquake" or Tremblement de Terre is attributed to Toulouse-Lautrec, a potent mixture containing half absinthe and half cognac, (in a wine goblet, 3 parts Absinthe and 3 parts Cognac sometimes served with ice cubes or shaken in a cocktail shaker filled with ice).^[7]

[edit] Art

Throughout his career, which spanned less than 20 years, Toulouse-Lautrec created 737 canvases, 275 watercolors, 363 prints and posters, 5,084 drawings, some ceramic and stained glass work, and an unknown number of lost works.^[3] His debt to the Impressionists, in particular the more figurative painters Manet and Degas, is apparent. His style was also influenced by the classical Japanese woodprints which became popular in art circles in Paris. In the works of Toulouse-Lautrec can be seen many parallels to Manet's detached barmaid at A Bar at the Folies-Bergère and the behind-the-scenes ballet dancers of Degas. He excelled at capturing people in their working environment, with the colour and the movement of the gaudy night-life present, but the glamour stripped away. He was masterly at capturing crowd scenes in which the figures are highly individualised. At the time that they were painted, the individual figures in his larger paintings could be identified by silhouette alone, and the names of many of these characters have been recorded. His treatment of his subject matter, whether as portraits, scenes of Parisian night-life, or intimate studies, has been described as both sympathetic and dispassionate.

Toulouse-Lautrec's skilled depiction of people relied on his painterly style which is highly linear and gives great emphasis to contour. He often applied the paint in long, thin brushstrokes which would often leave much of the board on which they are painted showing through. Many of his works may best be described as drawings in coloured paint.

[edit] Early death

An alcoholic for most of his adult life, Toulouse-Lautrec was placed in a sanatorium shortly before his death. He died from complications due to alcoholism and syphilis at the family estate in Malromé at the age of 36. He is buried in Verdelais, Gironde, a few kilometers from the Château of Malromé, where he died.

Toulouse-Lautrec's last words reportedly were: "Le vieux con!" ("The old fool!") This was his goodbye to his father.^[8]

After Toulouse-Lautrec's death, his mother, the Comtesse Adèle Toulouse-Lautrec, and Maurice Joyant, his art dealer, promoted his art. His mother contributed funds for a museum to be built in Albi, his birthplace, to house his works.

[edit] Selected works

Moulin Rouge - La Goulue, poster (1891)	May Belfort (singing Daddy Wouldn't Buy Me a Bow-wow), poster	Avril (Jane Avril), poster	Jane Avril
Ambassadeurs: Aristide Bruant, poster	La reine de joie	La Goulue arriving at the Moulin Rouge (1892).	Portrait of Gabrielle
At the Moulin Rouge: Two Women Waltzing	At the Circus Fernando	The clown Cha-U-Kao at the Moulin Rouge (1895)	Salon at the Rue des Moulins
The Medical Inspection at the Rue des Moulins Brothel	The Two Girlfriends	Laundryman at the brothel	Yvette Guilbert| Le photographe, Place pigeon, 9
Marcelle Lender on stage	In Bed, 1893	Moulin Rouge poster	Alone

[edit] Movies

Toulouse-Lautrec has been the subject of biographical films:

• in the John Huston film Moulin Rouge (1952), he is portrayed by Jose Ferrer
• Lautrec (1998) is a biographical movie directed by Roger Planchon^[9]
• Lautrec (1999) is a musical written by Charles Aznavour
• he is portrayed by John Leguizamo in Moulin Rouge! (2001)

[edit] References

[edit] External links

- Le Château du Bosc, the castle where Henri spent a lot of time with his family. Nicole Tapié de Celeyran, one of his descendants, still lives in the castle and welcome you for visits

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

• Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec at Gallery of Art
• Toulouse-Lautrec and Montmartre at the National Gallery of Art
• www.Toulouse-Lautrec-Foundation.org - 352 works by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
• Website dedicated to Lautrec.
• Website about Lautrec with virtual tours.
• Factmonster page about Toulouse-Lautrec, Henri de

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