HENRI de TOULOUSE-LAUTREC
(1864-1901)
Set inside the Moulin Rouge, a young Russian worker is carrying the newspaper, Paris-Sport under his arm. Paris-Sport was the title given to this lithograph when the memory of the Franco-Russian celebration had faded. Cartoons on the subject of the union were popular at the time. This particular version was published in L’Escarmouche, a magazine set up by Lautrec and some of his colleagues in 1893. For all Lautrec’s enthusiasm about the Alliance, the ambivalence of the image and the evidently mismatched couple suggests that he may not have seen it as an entirely natural one.
Lautrec returns in this image to the simple focused design that he used for the poster, Moulin Rouge. It serves as a contrast to the bustle of the Gala image (P.524).
Copyright © Trustees of Cecil Higgins Art Gallery, Bedford.
Extract taken from Prints, Cecil Higgins Art Gallery .