Henri de Toulouse Lautrec years of life. Henri de Toulouse Lautrec, paintings and creativity, the glitz and poverty of Parisian nightlife

Only next to clowns, acrobats, dancers and prostitutes did Henri de Toulouse feel like he belonged. Contemporaries did not accept the artist’s work. Having natural talent and not being constrained by funds, Toulouse-Lautrec could get a brilliant art education. However, having mastered the basics of painting from modern masters, he began to develop his own innovative aesthetics, far from academicism. Refusal of naturalism and detail (no folds on clothes, carefully drawn hairs), an emphasized, caricature-like, grotesque manner of conveying the facial features and plasticity of the characters, an abundance of movement and vivid emotions - these are the main characteristics of his style.

On November 24, 1864, in the city of Albi, in the ancient family castle of the Counts of Toulouse Lautrec, a boy was born, who was named Henri de Toulouse - Lautrec. Lautrec's mother, née Tapier de Seleyrand, Countess Adele, and Count Alphonse de Toulouse - Lautrec - Monfat, the artist's father, belonged to the highest circles of the aristocracy in France. The parents treated little Henri with particular care; in him they saw the successor of the family, the heir to one of the most significant families in the country. Count Alphonse imagined how his son would accompany him on horseback rides around the count's grounds and on falconry trips. WITH early age the father taught the boy horse riding and hunting terminology, introduced him to his favorites - the stallion Usurper and the mare Volga. Henri grew up as a sweet, charming child, bringing joy to his loved ones. With the light hand of one of Lautrec Jr.’s grandmothers, the family called “ Little Treasure" Cheerful, lively, attentive and inquisitive, with lively dark eyes, he delighted everyone who saw him. At three years old, he required a pen to sign his name. They objected to him that he could not write. “Well, let it be,” Henri replied, “I’ll draw a bull.”

Childhood is considered happy times In human life. But this happiness was overshadowed by drama or even tragedy for Henri. Born with poor health, he was often sick, grew slowly, and until the age of five his fontanel did not heal. The Countess was worried about her boy and blamed herself first of all for his illnesses: after all, her husband was her cousin, and children in related marriages are often born unhealthy. When her second son, Richard, born two and a half years after Henri, died at just over eleven months old, Adele was finally convinced that her marriage was a mistake. And it’s not just the children’s illnesses - the pious woman gave her husband a lot, but over time they family life began to be filled with misunderstanding, bitterness and disunity. For a long time, Adele tried to put up with the count’s rudeness and betrayals, with his quirks and whims, but in August 1868 there was a final break - she stopped considering Alphonse her husband. In a letter to her sister, she said that she now intended to treat him only as a cousin. However, they still portrayed spouses and were polite to each other in public - after all, they had a son, and in addition, it was necessary to observe the rules of decency accepted in society. But from then on, all her attention, all her love was given to Henri.

Count Alphonse loved aristocratic entertainment - hunting, horse riding, racing - and passed on to his son a love of horses and dogs.

1881. Wood, oil

1881. Oil on canvas

The count was also interested in art and often came with his little son to the studio of his friend, the artist Rene Princesteau, with whom Henri soon became friends. Princeto was not only an animal painter, he was a dexterous horseman, a lover of hound hunting and racing.

With great knowledge of the matter, he painted horses, dogs, hunting scenes, and from under his brush came real portraits of animals - he could convey their character, habits, grace. Soon the younger Lautrec began to come alone to his father’s friend. He could spend hours admiring how Princeteau created his paintings, and then he himself took a pencil and on a sheet of paper tried to leave a clearly visible and bright trace of everything that caught his eye: dogs, horses, birds. He was good at it, and Princeteau couldn't help but admit that the boy definitely had talent.

In Paris, where the Lautrec family moved in 1872, Henri was assigned to the Lyceum. It grows very slowly; the smallest among his peers, receives the nickname “Baby”. The margins of his notebooks were filled with drawings much faster than the pages with letters and numbers.

Often missing classes due to constant illness, Henri nevertheless studied with honors. After several years of study, Countess Adele was rightfully proud of her boy - he not only drew breathtakingly, but was also recognized as one of the best students of his lyceum. She rejoiced at her son’s success, but was increasingly worried about his health: doctors suspected he had bone tuberculosis - Henri was already ten years old, and he was still very small. The wall, against which all the cousins in their estate noted their height in gradations and which Little Treasure tried to avoid, the servants called among themselves “ wailing wall».

At the end of May 1878, an unforeseen misfortune happened to Henri. He was sitting in the kitchen on a low chair, and when he tried to stand up, leaning awkwardly on his stick, without the help of which he no longer had the strength to move, he fell and broke the femoral neck of his left leg. And having barely recovered from a previous serious injury, a little over a year later, Henri stumbled while walking and broke the neck of his right hip... The parents, full of despair, did not lose hope for Henri’s recovery. But the boy did not allow tears, did not complain - on the contrary, he tried to cheer up those around him. The best and widely known doctors came to Henri, and he was taken to the most expensive resort places. Soon the illness dormant in his body made itself felt in full force. Some doctors classified Lautrec's disease as a group of polyepiphyseal dysplasias. According to others, the reason vertically challenged Henri had mild osteopetrosis (painful thickening of the bone).

His limbs stopped growing completely, only his head and body became disproportionately huge in relation to his short legs and arms.

The figure on “childish legs” with “childish hands” looked very ridiculous. The charming child turned into a real freak. Henri tried to look in the mirror as little as possible - after all, apart from his large, searingly black eyes, there was nothing attractive left in his appearance. The nose became thick, the protruding lower lip hung over the sloping chin, and the hands of the short arms grew disproportionately huge. And the words that the deformed mouth uttered were distorted by a lisp, sounds jumped one after another, he swallowed syllables and, while talking, splashed with saliva. Such tongue-tiedness, coupled with the existing defect of the musculoskeletal system, did not at all contribute to the development of Henri’s spiritual harmony. Fearing the ridicule of others, Lautrec I learned to make fun of myself and my own ugly body, without waiting for others to start making fun and ridicule. This amazing and courageous man used this self-defense technique, and this technique worked. When people met Lautrec for the first time, they laughed not at him, but at his witticisms, and when they got to know Henri better, they certainly fell under his charm.

Lautrec understood that fate, having deprived him of health and external attractiveness, endowed him with extraordinary and original drawing abilities. But to become a worthy artist, you had to study. The painter Leon Bonnat was then very famous in Paris, and Toulouse-Lautrec signed up for courses with him. Lautrec believes all the teacher’s comments and tries to destroy everything original in himself. Only in the first days did his classmates whisper sarcastically and laugh at the clumsy Henri - soon no one attached any importance to his ugliness. He was friendly, witty, cheerful, and incredibly talented. After Bonna dismissed all his students, he moved on to Cormon, who painted large canvases on prehistoric subjects. The students loved him, he was good teacher. From Cormon, Lautrec learned the secrets of painting and graphics, but he did not like his condescension, he was merciless to himself.

Henri's mother completely shared her son's interests and admired him, but his father, Count Alphonse, did not at all like what the heir to the family was doing.

Cardboard, oil

1880 – 1890. Oil on canvas

Canvas, oil

Drawing, he believed, could be one of the hobbies of an aristocrat, but it should not become the main business of his life. The count demanded that his son sign the paintings with a pseudonym. Henri became more and more alien even to the family in which he grew up and was brought up; he called himself a “withered branch” of the family tree. Alphonse de Toulouse - Lautrec Monfat fully confirmed this by giving the birthright, which was to be inherited by his son, to his younger sister Alika. Henri began to sign paintings with an anagram of his last name - Treklo.

In the summer of 1882, on the way to the south, where the Countess was still taking her son for treatment, they stopped at their estate in Albi. There's Henri in last time noted his height at the “Weeping Wall”: one meter and fifty-two centimeters. He was almost eighteen years old - an age when most young men cannot think about anything other than the opposite sex. In this, Lautrec differed little from his peers - in addition to an ugly body, ruthless Nature endowed him with a gentle, sensitive soul and a powerful masculine temperament. He first fell in love as a child - with his cousin Jeanne d'Armagnac. Henri lay with a broken leg and waited for the girl to come to visit him. As he grew older, Lautrec learned the sensual side of love. His first woman was Marie Charlet - a young, thin, youthful model, completely innocent in appearance and depraved in her soul. She was brought to Henri by a friend from the workshop, the Norman Charles - Edouard Lucas, who believed that Lautrec would be cured of his painful complexes when he knew a woman. Marie came to the artist several times, finding the connection with him piquant. But Henri soon refused her services - this “animal passion” was too far from his ideas about love. However, the relationship with the young model showed how strong his temperament was, and memories of sensual pleasures did not allow Lautrec, as before, to spend lonely evenings at work. Realizing that a worthy girl from a decent society was unlikely to reciprocate his feelings, he went to Montmartre - to prostitutes, cafe singers and dancers. Among his new hobby - street life in Montmartre, Henri did not feel like a cripple; life opened up to him from a new side.

Montmartre in the mid-1880s... All of Paris flocked here for entertainment. The halls of cafes and restaurants, cabarets and theaters were quickly filled with a motley audience and the holiday began... Here their kings and queens, their rulers of thoughts, ruled. Among them, the first place was occupied by the coupletist Bruan, the owner of the restaurant " Elise – Montmartre" The recognized queen of Montmartre in those days was La Goulue - “The Glutton” - that’s how sixteen-year-old Alsatian Louise Weber was nicknamed for her crazy passion for food.

He sat down at a table, ordered a drink, and then took out his sketchbook with pencils and, constantly watching the frantic dance of the Alsatian, he drew, trying to catch every movement of her body, every change in the expression of her face. Her fresh, wrinkle-free skin, sparkling eyes, sharp nose, her legs, which she threw high in the dance, foaming the lace of her skirts, the shamelessness with which she twirled her butt, expressing with her whole being a voluptuous outburst of passion - Henri captured all this in his drawings. Next to La Goulue was her indispensable partner Valentin, whom the public nicknamed Boneless. The movements of this couple were so erotic and desirable that they could not help but turn on the audience, and every performance of La Goulue and Valentin Beskostny was accompanied by wild applause.

In 1884, Henri came from Paris to visit his “poor holy mother,” as the artist called her. After a few weeks, which he spent with his parents, Lautrec returned to the capital completely happy - his father agreed to give him money to buy his own workshop in Montmartre. He is a full-fledged inhabitant of Paris. For Lautrec Montmartre became a hospitable home, and its inhabitants - Montmartre actresses and singers, dancers, prostitutes and drunkards became his favorite young models, reinterpreted heroines of the bright, most impressive drawings, lithographs, posters, advertising posters and paintings. It was they, despised by society, who gave him the tenderness, affection and warmth that they so generously gave him and which he so voluptuously craved. Many of Lautrec’s works depict scenes in brothels, their inhabitants, for whom he, a hereditary aristocrat, felt sympathy and understood like no one else. After all, this “hunchbacked Don Juan,” like them, was an outcast.

In 1886, Lautrec met Van Gogh in Cormon's studio and painted his portrait in the manner of a new friend.

A revolt against the teacher is brewing in the workshop. Lautrec joins his friends Anquetin, Bernard and Van Gogh. Now he defends his identity. He organizes an exhibition of his drawings at Mirliton, some of them illustrate Bruant’s songs. Vincent decides to organize an exhibition of friends in a working restaurant. However, ordinary people did not accept innovative painting. And in 1888, Lautrec received an invitation to take part in the G20 exhibition in Brussels. Among the group members are Signac, Whistler, Anquetin. Lautrec is present at the opening day. Defending Van Gogh, he challenges the artist de Groux, who insulted him, to a duel; the duel was averted. Critics took notice of Lautrec's work, noting his harsh drawing and wicked wit.

Gradually, Montmartre invents new things, never ceasing to surprise. New establishments are appearing. In 1889, Joseph Oller announced the opening of the Moulin Rouge cabaret.

On Boulevard Clichy the wings of the red cabaret mill began to spin. In the evenings, the noisy hall of the entertainment establishment, one wall of which was completely mirrored to create the illusion of space, was crowded - all of Paris gathered here to look at the brilliant Valentin and La Goulue, lured away by the director. Moulin rouge" from "Elise". From that evening, Toulouse-Lautrec became a frequent visitor to this place. Everything that was so attractive and attractive in “Eliza” and “Moulin de la Galette” was now concentrated in Oller’s cabaret. Henri spent all his evenings at the Moulin Rouge, surrounded by his friends, drawing and constantly making wisecracks and jokes, so that someone who happened to enter the cabaret could assume that this wonderful freak was one of the local attractions.

Encouraged by his success, Lautrec painted twenty canvases a year. His constant themes are prostitutes, cabaret dancers, portraits of friends. He broke with naturalism, he was not able to embellish reality, in his grotesque and irony there is pain, awareness of the tragic side of life. In the large canvas "Dance in" Moulin rouge“he writes the audience of the famous cabaret, his friends at the table, the famous dancer Valentin Beskostny, performing a square dance together with one of the dancers. They said about the artist that he paints “the sorrow of laughter and the hell of fun.”

In January 1891, before the start of the new season, Oller ordered Toulouse-Lautrec a poster advertising the Moulin Rouge. Of course, it should feature the attention-grabbing cabaret stars - Valentin and La Goulue "in the midst of a sparkling quadrille."

Advertising posters that came out at the end of September and had big success, were posted all over Paris. Fiacres (hire carriages) with posters taped to them drove around the city. This poster is one of classical works French Post-Impressionism. In the center of the poster is La Goulue, depicted in profile and dancing in front of the audience. He glorified both the Moulin Rouge and, even more, the artist.

Montmartre occupied a special, and rather the most important, place in the life of Toulouse - Lautrec. Here he improves and draws subjects for his paintings, here he feels light and free, here he finds respect and love. The inhabitants of the salon simply adored their regular and showered him with their love. After La Goulue, the busty beauty Rose with bright red hair reigned in his heart, then there were other beauties - “little Henri” in Montmartre, no one could resist her love caresses. In Parisian dating houses he is always warmly and friendly received, here he feels calm, paints local models in an intimate setting, not intended for prying eyes: sleeping, half-dressed, changing clothes, at the toilet - with combs and basins, stockings and towels, cooking series of paintings and lithographs " They» (« Elles»).

For some time he even lived in brothels. He did not hide where his home was, and, as if proud of it, he easily gave his address and laughed when it shocked someone. On the Rue Moulin, Lautrec was especially inspired by the exclusive and sophisticated interior. Even quite respectable ladies, mostly foreigners, came here to admire the decoration of the rooms. And everyone in Paris was talking about the incredible beauty of the inhabitants of this “temple of love.”

The owner of the establishment, Madame Baron, made sure that Lautrec's workshop was comfortable, and then persuaded Toulouse-Lautrec to decorate the walls of the brothel with paintings he painted. Her charges, young and not so young, quenched his hunger for passion, and they did it with great willingness and tenderness, and yet “ no money can buy this delicacy", he said. On Sundays, Monsieur Henri played a game of dice, and the winner had the honor of spending time with the artist. And when the wards of Madame Baron's temptresses of love had a weekend, Lautrec followed the tradition, which he himself had invented, of organizing evenings in the brothel, where the girls, dressed in transparent and very lightly woven clothes, waltzed in a noble manner with each other to the music of a mechanical piano. Observing the life of the brothel, Lautrec was amazed at how these weak and unfortunate creatures, caught in the trap of depravity and immoral corruption of everything and everyone, tried to maintain a tense mask on themselves.

In 1892, Lautrec exhibited nine paintings in Brussels with the Group of Twenty. He is appointed a member of the committee for hanging paintings at the Independents. The public calls his art shameless, artists see him as a successor to Degas. Lautrec often turned the superiority of his models into ugliness; he was never noble and condescending towards his models. In 1894, one of his main models was the then famous cafe singer Yvette Guilbert, who once called him a “genius of deformation.” He drew Yvette many times. The artist also depicted the singer on the lid of a ceramic tea table. He tries different techniques, including stained glass. Suddenly he becomes interested in racing cyclists and paints a large canvas "".

Yvette Guilbert simply captivated him. When Lautrec first saw Guilbert on stage, he wanted to write a poster for the singer and, having done so, sent her a drawing. Yvette knew that she had repulsive beauty, but she did not suffer from this at all, she was flirtatious and enjoyed good success with men and the public. Lautrec's poster somewhat discouraged her - she saw herself completely different, not so ugly, but Guilbert understood that the sketch was a tribute to the sympathy and respect of the extraordinary artist. She did not order a poster for Henri, although the artist himself, whom she had never seen before, only heard about him, interested her. “We will return to this topic, but, for God’s sake, don’t make me look so scary!” - she wrote to him. But Lautrec was not used to retreating so easily - he decided to release an album of lithographs dedicated to the singer. One day he paid her a visit - then Yvette saw him for the first time. His ugliness stunned her at first, but when she looked into his expressive black eyes, Guilbert was captivated. Yvette forever remembered that day: she invited him to have lunch together, they talked a lot, and soon she was completely under the power of Henri’s charm... This meeting was followed by others, he came to her and drew, drew... The sessions were stormy, the artist and his model often quarreled - it was as if he took fabulous pleasure in angering her.

Album « Yvette Guilbert"(sixteen lithographs) was published in 1894. The singer, and part-time model of Lautrec, reacted approvingly to him, but then her friends convinced her that she looked disgusting there and that the artist should be punished in court for the offender for humiliated dignity and public insult.

However, numerous laudatory responses began to appear in the newspaper press, and Yvette had to come to terms with her merciless portrait painter. Perhaps now no one would remember that in Paris in Montmartre in late XIX- at the beginning of the 20th century, such a singer sang - Yvette Guilbert, but history has preserved the memory of her thanks to him, a genius freak Henri Toulouse - Lautrec.

He also glorified the dancer Jeanne Avril, whom he met in the restaurant " Jardin de Paris" Unlike the quarrelsome, harsh La Goulue, Zhana was soft, feminine, and “intelligent.” This illegitimate daughter of a demi-monde and an Italian aristocrat suffered as a child from her mother, a rude, perverted and unbalanced woman who took out all her failures on her daughter. One day, unable to bear the humiliation and beatings, Zhana ran away from home. Music and dance became her consolation. She never sold herself and started affairs only with those who could awaken warm feelings in her. Zhana understood art, was distinguished by sophistication of manners, nobility and some kind of spirituality. According to Henri, she was “like a teacher.” In his drawings, Lautrec managed to convey her, as one of his friends put it, “the charm of depraved virginity.” Jeanne, who highly appreciated Lautrec's talent, willingly posed for the artist and sometimes happily played the role of hostess in his workshop.

Gradually, Toulouse-Lautrec's works were printed and sold throughout the country. The artist's works were exhibited at large exhibitions in France, Brussels and London. He became so famous that counterfeits of Lautrec began to appear on the markets, and this meant success.

But fame did not change the artist’s lifestyle in any way: he worked just as hard and had just as much fun, never missing costume balls, theater premieres, or parties with his Montmartre friends. Lautrec lived as if he was afraid of missing something, of not being able to do something in this life - excitedly, feverishly, joyfully. "Life is Beautiful!" was one of his favorite exclamations. And only close friends knew what bitterness was hidden behind these actions and words. He also drank - a lot, but only very good and expensive drinks. He was convinced that alcohol High Quality cannot cause serious harm. Lautrec loved to mix different drinks, creating an extraordinary bouquet. He was the first in France to make cocktails and received incredible pleasure listening to the praise of his guests, who enthusiastically tried the new drinks. Whoever visited him then, and all his guests knew, Lautrec was supposed to drink. His fellow students in Cormon's workshop Anquetin and Bernard, and the young Van Gogh, who introduced him to Japanese art, and the insidious Valadon, artist and model of Renoir, who seemed to be playing some kind of subtle game with Lautrec - she appeared in his life and then disappeared...

After some time, he no longer needed expensive gourmet liqueurs and cognacs - Lautrec learned to make do with simple, cheap wine from a nearby shop. He drank more and more, and worked less and less, and if earlier he made more than a hundred paintings a year, then in 1897 he painted only fifteen canvases. It seemed to friends that heavy drinking was destroying Lautrec as an artist. But he has not yet lost the ability to create masterpieces: these are portrait of Oscar Wilde 1896

Friends tried to distract him from alcohol addiction, were taken to England, Holland, Spain, but he, having had his fill of old art, admiring the paintings of Bruegel and Cranach, Van Eyck and Memling, El Greco, Goya and Velazquez, returned home and returned to his former self. Henri became capricious, intolerant, and sometimes simply unbearable. Inexplicable outbursts of anger, stupid antics, unjustified violence... His already poor health was undermined by alcoholism and syphilis, which Red Rose “awarded” him a long time ago.

Lautrec began to suffer from insomnia, as a result of which - against the backdrop of endless drunkenness - he developed frightening hallucinations and delusions of persecution. His behavior became increasingly inappropriate, and he was increasingly subject to bouts of insanity. In the summer of 1897, he shot at imaginary spiders with a revolver; in the fall of 1898, it seemed to him that police were chasing him on the street, and he hid from them with friends.

In 1899, “with a terrible attack of delirium tremens,” Lautrec’s mother admitted him to Dr. Semelen’s mental hospital in Neuilly. Coming out of there after several months of treatment, he tried his best to work, but something seemed to break in him.

In mid-April, Lautrec returned to Paris. The friends were shocked when they saw Henri. “How he has changed! - they said. “Only a shadow remains of him!” Lautrec barely moved, moving his legs with difficulty. It was clear that he was forcing himself to live. But sometimes it seemed that faith in the future regained hope in him. He was especially pleased with the news that several of his paintings were sold at auction in Drouot, and for a lot of money. Inspired by this event, Henri again felt a strong desire to draw. But - last works as if it wasn’t his... In three months, Lautrec sorted out everything that had accumulated in his studio over the years of work, finished some canvases, put his signature on what seemed to him a success... Before leaving, he was going to spend that summer in Arashon and Tossa, places familiar to him from childhood, on the seashore - Henri brought perfect order to the workshop, as if he knew that he would not be destined to return there again.

At the Orleans station he was seen off by old friends. Both they and Lautrec himself understood that this was probably their last meeting.

The sea air could not heal Henri. The doctors reported that he had consumption, and in mid-August Lautrec suffered a stroke. He was losing weight, deaf, and had difficulty moving due to developing paralysis. Arriving at the seriously ill Lautrec, Countess Adele transported her son to the family castle in Malrome. In this mansion, surrounded by the care and love of his mother, Henri seemed to have returned to huge world childhood, joys, hopes. He even tried to start drawing again, but his fingers no longer obeyed the call of his heart and could not hold the brush. Over time, paralysis shackled his entire unfortunate body; Lautrec could no longer even eat by himself. There was always someone at his bedside: friends, mother or old nanny. His father, Count Alphonse, also visited, but never recognized his son as an artist. When he entered the room, Henri 1901

Natural growing pains - “hopeless confusion in narcissism” - successfully developed in Toulouse-Lautrec into strong confidence in his success on the foundation of his talent as a draftsman. He was not afraid of any topic, any order, any size and any speed. Matisse's expression and kinematics of the body turned out to be the main arguments in the artist's paintings. The courage of genetic talents was confirmed by the artistic discoveries that followed one after another of more and more new possibilities for shocking the public, which was easier and more successful to organize by leading the public to a dead end and using vulgarities. The French made vice a delicacy. High society, who bought creativity, accepted the artistic riotousness of bohemia as the norm of playfulness, affirming status real life. Lautrec, on the other hand, expresses the organic freedom of pose, bringing its expressiveness to the point of shocking. The curtain fell. Life Henri de Toulouse – Lautrec – Monfat ended on the morning of September 9, 1901, at the age of thirty-seven, like Van Gogh. He was buried near Malrome in the cemetery of Saint André du Bois. Later, the Countess ordered the remains of her son to be transferred to Werdle.

Gradually, the largest museums in the world began to acquire the works of Toulouse-Lautrec - Toulouse-Lautrec became a classic. Despite this, Count Alphonse still did not want to admit that his son was talented artist. He wrote to Henri’s childhood friend, Maurice Juayan, who was working on creating a house - the Lautrec Museum in Albi: “Only because the artist is no longer alive, even if it is my son, I cannot admire his clumsy work.” And only in his suicide letter, in December 1912, the count admitted to Maurice: “You believed in his talent more than I did, and you turned out to be right...”.

TOULOUSE-LAUTREC Henri Marie Raymond de (1864-1901) - French painter, one of the brightest representatives post-impressionism.

Born into an old noble family. As a child, he fell from a horse twice, broke both legs and remained crippled for the rest of his life. This physical defect left its mark on later life artist. Interest in drawing arose under the influence of the artist R. Princeto. He studied with L. Bonn (1883) and F. Cormon (1884-1885). Big influence The art of E. Degas and Japanese engraving influenced the formation of his creative style.

The artist's mother at breakfast, 1882

The artist's early works, which depict mainly his close friends and relatives ("Countess Toulouse-Lautrec at breakfast in Malrome", 1883; "Countess Adele de Toulouse-Lautrec", 1887 - both in the Toulouse-Lautrec Museum, Albi), were painted using impressionistic techniques, but the master’s desire to convey the individual characteristics of each of his models as truthfully as possible, sometimes even mercilessly, speaks of a fundamentally new understanding of the human image (“Young Woman Sitting at a Table”, 1889, Van Gogh Collection, Laren; “The Laundress” , 1889, Dortu Collection, Paris).

Laundress, 1889

Subsequently, A. de Toulouse-Lautrec improved the ways and means of conveying the psychological state of models, while maintaining an interest in reproducing their unique appearance (“In the Cafe”, 1891, Museum fine arts, Boston; "La Goulue entering the Moulin Rouge", 1891-1892, Museum contemporary art, NY).

La Goulue entering the Moulin Rouge, 1891

The artist’s satirical view of the world of the theater, night cafes, the artistic bohemia of Paris and the degenerate patrons of brothels is expressed in the grotesque exaggeration that he uses when painting such paintings as “Dance at the Moulin Rouge” (1890, private collection), “Valentin’s Classes” with new girls at the Moulin Rouge" (1889-1890, Art Museum, Philadelphia) and others.

Dance at the Moulin Rouge, 1890

For his contemporaries, A. de Toulouse-Lautrec was first and foremost a master psychological portrait and creator of theater posters.

Poster Jeanne Avril, 1893

All of his portraits can be divided into two groups: in the first, the model is, as it were, opposed to the viewer and looks him straight in the eyes ("Justine Diel", 1889, Musée d'Orsay, Paris; "Portrait of Monsieur Boileau", c. 1893, Cleveland Museum of Art ), in the second she is presented in a familiar setting, reflecting her daily activities, profession or habits ("Living room at the Château de Malromé", 1886-1887; "Désiré Diau (Reading a newspaper in the garden)", 1890 - both in the Toulouse Museum -Lautrec, Albie; "Portrait of Madame de Gortzicoff, 1893, private collection). In order for the viewer's attention to be concentrated on inner world his models, he makes her external features less sharp, blurry, uses an abstract background, and in more later paintings- landscape or some household items and furnishings that reveal true essence their characters.

Justine Diel in Forest's garden, 1890

Reading a newspaper in the garden, 1890

A. de Toulouse-Lautrec was never interested in the problem of the effect of light on the surface of depicted objects, but gradually his palette became lighter, and a sophisticated combination of several colors, mainly green and purple, would become the hallmark of most of his works.

A. de Toulouse-Lautrec never embellished his models, but in even his most “rough” portraits one can always feel the artist’s sympathy, expressed in a concise form with several energetic strokes (“Toilet (Redhead)”, 1889, Orsay Museum, Paris; “Rue de Moulins", 1894, National Gallery Arts, Washington).

Toilet, 1889

Rue de Moulin: medical examination, 1894

A. de Toulouse-Lautrec made a great contribution to the development of the poster genre; his work was highly appreciated by his contemporaries. In total, during his life he painted about 30 posters ("Jane Avril at the Jardin de Paris", 1893; "Divan japonais", 1893 - both in the Toulouse-Lautrec Museum, Albi), in which his magnificent talent as a draftsman was most clearly expressed. The artist has a brilliant command of the line, makes it whimsically twist along the contour of the model and at the dictates of the moment, creating works that are distinguished by their exquisite decorativeness. The large single-color fields of his paintings are especially expressive.

Chronology of life

1864
Born on November 24 in Albi, in southwestern France, in the family of Count Alphonse and Countess Adele de Toulouse-Lautrec

1878
Two accidents occur, resulting in both legs being broken. The boy's growth stops after this.

1882
He moves with his mother to Paris, where he enters the studio of the artist Leon Bonn. Later he moves to the workshop of Fernand Cormon.

1884
He opens his own studio in Montmartre, where he plunges headlong into the life of bohemia.

1891
Becomes famous throughout Paris thanks to his poster made for the Moulin Rouge cabaret.

1892
Visits London for the first time. This and subsequent trips to the banks of the Thames are organized by the artist’s friends, trying to return him to normal life.

1899
The artist is diagnosed with alcoholism. Sick with syphilis. At the insistence of his mother, he is treated for three months in a psychiatric clinic near Paris.

1900
Spends the winter in Bordeaux. In the spring of next year he returns to Paris completely ill.

1901
In July he leaves Paris to spend the summer on the Atlantic coast. In August, after a stroke, Lautrec becomes paralyzed. On September 9 he died at his family estate near Bordeaux.

1 - Girl in a corset

2 - Two friends

3 - Two friends

4 - A la mie

5 - Femme tirant sur son bas

6 - In bed

7 - Clown Woman

8 - Jeanne Avril

9 - Loneliness

10 - Woman with a pelvis

11 - Scantily clad woman

12 - Portrait of a cousin

13 - Beginning of the quadrille at the Moulin Rouge

14 - Hanged Man

15 - Washing woman

16 - Yvette Guilbert

17 - Jockeys

18 - Cabaret Japanese sofa

19 - What does the rain say

20 - Examination at the Faculty of Medicine in Paris

21 - Reading room at Melroom Castle

22 - Portrait of Louis Pascal

23 - Portrait of Oscar Wilde

24 - Seated Sha-Yu-Kao

Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfat (November 24, 1864, Albi - September 9, 1901, Malromet Castle, Gironde) - French post-impressionist artist from the count family of Toulouse-Lautrec, master of graphics and advertising posters.

Biography of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was born on November 24, 1864 into an aristocratic family. The first years of the artist’s life were spent on the family estate in the city of Albi. His parents, Count Alphonse Charles de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfat and Countess Adèle Tapier de Seleyrand, separated shortly after their death youngest son Richard in 1868. After his parents' divorce, Henri lived on the Cháteau du Bosc estate and on the Cháteau du Céleyran estate near Narbonne, where he studied horse riding, Latin and Greek language. After the end of the Franco-Prussian War in 1871, Toulouse-Lautrec moved to Paris - a city that would change his life, become an inspiration and greatly influence the artist’s work.

Throughout his life, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was close to his mother, who became the main person in his life, especially after tragic incidents that undermined the artist’s health. His father was known in society as an eccentric person; he often changed his place of residence, which caused Henri’s education to suffer.

Toulouse-Lautrec said about his father: “If you met my father, then be sure that you will have to remain in the shadows.” However, it was thanks to his father, who loved entertainment, that Henri and early years got acquainted with the annual fair and circus. Subsequently, the theme of the circus and entertainment venues became the main one in the artist’s work.

The works of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

The artist's early works, which depict mainly his close friends and relatives ("Countess Toulouse-Lautrec at breakfast in Malrome", 1883; "Countess Adele de Toulouse-Lautrec", 1887 - both in the Toulouse-Lautrec Museum, Albi), were painted using impressionistic techniques, but the master’s desire to convey the individual characteristics of each of his models as truthfully as possible, sometimes even mercilessly, speaks of a fundamentally new understanding of the human image (“Young woman sitting at a table”, 1889, Van Gogh Collection, Laren; “The Laundress” , 1889, Dortu Collection, Paris).

For his contemporaries, A. de Toulouse-Lautrec was primarily a master of psychological portraiture and a creator of theater posters.

All his portraits can be divided into two groups: in the first, the model is, as it were, opposed to the viewer and looks him straight in the eyes (“Justine Diel”, 1889, Musée d’Orsay, Paris; “Portrait of Monsieur Boileau”, ca. 1893, Cleveland Museum of Art ), in the second she is presented in a familiar environment, reflecting her daily activities, profession or habits

A. de Toulouse-Lautrec made a great contribution to the development of the poster genre; his work was highly appreciated by his contemporaries.

5 interesting facts from the biography of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.

1. Noble origin

The artist, who lived and painted the inhabitants of Montmartre brothels for months, was simply “Monsieur Henri” for them. They did not know that he came from the ancient and noble count family of Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfat, whose history stretched back for many centuries.

Henri was the only child in the family and was supposed to continue the family. “Little treasure” - that’s what his relatives called him, prophesying a noble future for him.

2. Physical defect

To glorious history little prince Henri intervened cruel fate. At the age of 13, while unsuccessfully rising from a chair, he broke the femoral neck of his left leg, and slightly more than a year Later, the teenager fell into a ditch and suffered a fracture in his right leg.

The bones did not want to heal properly, which led to the most terrible young man consequences. His legs stopped growing, remaining about 70 centimeters long throughout the artist’s life, while his body continued to develop.

By the age of 20 he had become a dwarf and a freak: disproportionately big head and the body, attached to the thin and frail legs of the child. His height did not exceed 150 centimeters.

We must pay tribute to how courageously the young man endured his illness, compensating for it with his amazing sense of humor, self-irony and education.

3. Family disappointment

Henri's family had a hard time coming to terms with their son's illness: the defect deprived him of the opportunity to attend balls, go hunting, and engage in military affairs. For a representative of an ancient aristocratic family, this was extremely important. Moreover, physical unattractiveness reduced the chances of finding a mate and continuing the family line. Henri’s father, Count Alphonse Charles de Toulouse-Lautrec, lost all interest in him.

Henri received support and warmth from his mother, who remained close to the artist throughout his life. But she did not influence the fate of her son as much as Count Alphonse: back in 1868, the boy’s parents separated after the death of their first-born Richard. Thus, all hopes were pinned on Henri, but he could not fulfill them.

At the age of 18, not wanting to meet his father’s disappointed glances and trying to prove to him that his life was not over, Henri went to Paris. Throughout his subsequent life, relations with his father were strained: Count Alphonse did not want his son to dishonor the family by putting his signature on the paintings.

4. From early impressionism to Montmartre

The direction in which Henri de Toulez-Lautrec worked is known in art as post-impressionism, and it also gave roots to modernism, or art nouveau. However, the artist came to this style gradually. Young Henri's first teacher in 1878 was an acquaintance of his father, the artist Rene Princeteau, deaf from birth, a specialist in depicting horses and hunting scenes. Every day the young man’s skill improved, but the depiction of scenes of glorious aristocratic life disgusted him.

At first, he painted in an impressionistic manner: he was admired by Edgar Degas and Paul Cezanne. In addition, Japanese prints served as a source of inspiration.

In 1882, after moving to Paris, Lautrec visited the studios of academic painters Bonn and Cormon for several years, but the classical precision of their paintings was alien to him.

But in 1885, he settled in Montmartre, which was then still a semi-rural suburb with windmills, around which the famous cabarets, including the Moulin Rouge, would open a little later. The family was horrified by their son’s decision to settle and open his own studio in the very center of the area, which was then just beginning to gain fame as a haven for bohemia.

It was Montmartre that became the main inspiration in the life of young Lautrec and opened up new creative sides in him, which became the features of his corporate identity. Moreover, he became one of the pioneers of the art of lithography, or printed poster, in which his flamboyant decorative style could be applied in the best possible light.

And in 1888 and 1890, Lautrec took part in exhibitions of the Brussels "Group of Twenty", an active association of new art, and received the highest reviews from the idol of his youth - Edgar Degas himself.

5. A wild lifestyle: two sides of the coin

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec is often portrayed as a perverted dwarf who did nothing but drink and visit brothels, which led him to a psychiatric hospital and death from alcoholism and syphilis at the age of 37, lonely and pitiful, in the family castle in the arms of his mother .

Only next to clowns, acrobats, dancers and prostitutes did Henri de Toulouse feel like he belonged. Contemporaries did not accept the artist’s work. Having natural talent and not being constrained by funds, Toulouse-Lautrec could receive an excellent artistic education. However, having mastered the basics of painting from modern masters, he began to develop his own innovative aesthetics, far from academicism. Refusal of naturalism and detail (no folds on clothes, carefully drawn hairs), an emphasized, caricature-like, grotesque manner of conveying the facial features and plasticity of the characters, an abundance of movement and vivid emotions - these are the main characteristics of his style.

On November 24, 1864, in the city of Albi, in the ancient family castle of the Counts of Toulouse Lautrec, a boy was born, who was named Henri de Toulouse - Lautrec. Lautrec's mother, née Tapier de Seleyrand, Countess Adele, and Count Alphonse de Toulouse - Lautrec - Monfat, the artist's father, belonged to the highest circles of the aristocracy in France. The parents treated little Henri with particular care; in him they saw the successor of the family, the heir to one of the most significant families in the country. Count Alphonse imagined how his son would accompany him on horseback rides around the count's grounds and on falconry trips. From an early age, the father taught the boy horse riding and hunting terminology, and introduced him to his favorites - the stallion Usurper and the mare Volga. Henri grew up as a sweet, charming child, bringing joy to his loved ones. With the light hand of one of Lautrec Jr.’s grandmothers, the family called “ Little Treasure" Cheerful, lively, attentive and inquisitive, with lively dark eyes, he delighted everyone who saw him. At three years old, he required a pen to sign his name. They objected to him that he could not write. “Well, let it be,” Henri replied, “I’ll draw a bull.”

Childhood is considered to be the happiest time in a person’s life. But this happiness was overshadowed by drama or even tragedy for Henri. Born with poor health, he was often sick, grew slowly, and until the age of five his fontanel did not heal. The Countess was worried about her boy and blamed herself first of all for his illnesses: after all, her husband was her cousin, and children in related marriages are often born unhealthy. When her second son, Richard, born two and a half years after Henri, died at just over eleven months old, Adele was finally convinced that her marriage was a mistake. And it’s not just the children’s illnesses - the pious woman gave her husband a lot, but over time, their family life began to be filled with misunderstanding, bitterness and disunity. For a long time, Adele tried to put up with the count’s rudeness and betrayals, with his quirks and whims, but in August 1868 there was a final break - she stopped considering Alphonse her husband. In a letter to her sister, she said that she now intended to treat him only as a cousin. However, they still portrayed spouses and were polite to each other in public - after all, they had a son, and in addition, it was necessary to observe the rules of decency accepted in society. But from then on, all her attention, all her love was given to Henri.

Count Alphonse loved aristocratic entertainment - hunting, horse riding, racing - and passed on to his son a love of horses and dogs.

1881. Wood, oil

1881. Oil on canvas

The count was also interested in art and often came with his little son to the studio of his friend, the artist Rene Princesteau, with whom Henri soon became friends. Princeto was not only an animal painter, he was a dexterous horseman, a lover of hound hunting and racing.

In Paris, where the Lautrec family moved in 1872, Henri was assigned to the Lyceum. It grows very slowly; the smallest among his peers, receives the nickname “Baby”. The margins of his notebooks were filled with drawings much faster than the pages with letters and numbers.

At the end of May 1878, an unforeseen misfortune happened to Henri. He was sitting in the kitchen on a low chair, and when he tried to stand up, leaning awkwardly on his stick, without the help of which he no longer had the strength to move, he fell and broke the femoral neck of his left leg. And having barely recovered from a previous serious injury, a little over a year later, Henri stumbled while walking and broke the neck of his right hip... The parents, full of despair, did not lose hope for Henri’s recovery. But the boy did not allow tears, did not complain - on the contrary, he tried to cheer up those around him. The best and widely known doctors came to Henri, and he was taken to the most expensive resort places. Soon the disease dormant in his body made itself felt in full force. Some doctors classified Lautrec's disease as a group of polyepiphyseal dysplasias. According to others, the reason for Henri's short stature was osteopetrosis (painful thickening of the bone), which occurs in a mild form.

His limbs stopped growing completely, only his head and body became disproportionately huge in relation to his short legs and arms.

Lautrec understood that fate, having deprived him of health and external attractiveness, endowed him with extraordinary and original drawing abilities. But to become a worthy artist, you had to study. The painter Leon Bonnat was then very famous in Paris, and Toulouse-Lautrec signed up for courses with him. Lautrec believes all the teacher’s comments and tries to destroy everything original in himself. Only in the first days did his classmates whisper sarcastically and laugh at the clumsy Henri - soon no one attached any importance to his ugliness. He was friendly, witty, cheerful, and incredibly talented. After Bonna dismissed all his students, he moved on to Cormon, who painted large canvases on prehistoric subjects. The students loved him, he was a good teacher. From Cormon, Lautrec learned the secrets of painting and graphics, but he did not like his condescension, he was merciless to himself.

Henri's mother completely shared her son's interests and admired him, but his father, Count Alphonse, did not at all like what the heir to the family was doing.

Cardboard, oil

1880 – 1890. Oil on canvas

Canvas, oil

In the summer of 1882, on the way to the south, where the Countess was still taking her son for treatment, they stopped at their estate in Albi. There, Henri noted his height for the last time at the “Weeping Wall”: one meter and fifty-two centimeters. He was almost eighteen years old - an age when most young men cannot think about anything other than the opposite sex. In this, Lautrec differed little from his peers - in addition to an ugly body, ruthless Nature endowed him with a gentle, sensitive soul and a powerful masculine temperament. He first fell in love as a child - with his cousin Jeanne d'Armagnac. Henri lay with a broken leg and waited for the girl to come to visit him. As he grew older, Lautrec learned the sensual side of love. His first woman was Marie Charlet - a young, thin, youthful model, completely innocent in appearance and depraved in her soul. She was brought to Henri by a friend from the workshop, the Norman Charles - Edouard Lucas, who believed that Lautrec would be cured of his painful complexes when he knew a woman. Marie came to the artist several times, finding the connection with him piquant. But Henri soon refused her services - this “animal passion” was too far from his ideas about love. However, the relationship with the young model showed how strong his temperament was, and memories of sensual pleasures did not allow Lautrec, as before, to spend lonely evenings at work. Realizing that a worthy girl from a decent society was unlikely to reciprocate his feelings, he went to Montmartre - to prostitutes, cafe singers and dancers. Among his new hobby - street life in Montmartre, Henri did not feel like a cripple; life opened up to him from a new side.

In 1886, Lautrec met Van Gogh in Cormon's studio and painted his portrait in the manner of a new friend.

Gradually, Montmartre invents new things, never ceasing to surprise. New establishments are appearing. In 1889, Joseph Oller announced the opening of the Moulin Rouge cabaret.

In January 1891, before the start of the new season, Oller ordered Toulouse-Lautrec a poster advertising the Moulin Rouge. Of course, it should feature the attention-grabbing cabaret stars - Valentin and La Goulue "in the midst of a sparkling quadrille."

The advertising posters, which came out at the end of September and were a great success, were posted all over Paris. Fiacres (hire carriages) with posters taped to them drove around the city. This poster is one of the classic works of French Post-Impressionism. In the center of the poster is La Goulue, depicted in profile and dancing in front of the audience. He glorified both the Moulin Rouge and, even more, the artist.

Album « Yvette Guilbert"(sixteen lithographs) was published in 1894. The singer, and part-time model of Lautrec, reacted approvingly to him, but then her friends convinced her that she looked disgusting there and that the artist should be punished in court for the offender for humiliated dignity and public insult.

However, numerous laudatory responses began to appear in the newspaper press, and Yvette had to come to terms with her merciless portrait painter. Perhaps now no one would remember that such a singer, Yvette Guilbert, sang in Montmartre in Paris at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th century, but history has preserved the memory of her thanks to him, a genius freak Henri Toulouse - Lautrec.

Gradually, Toulouse-Lautrec's works were printed and sold throughout the country. The artist's works were exhibited at large exhibitions in France, Brussels and London. He became so famous that counterfeits of Lautrec began to appear on the markets, and this meant success.

But fame did not change the artist’s lifestyle in any way: he worked just as hard and had just as much fun, never missing costume balls, theater premieres, or parties with his Montmartre friends. Lautrec lived as if he was afraid of missing something, of not being able to do something in this life - excitedly, feverishly, joyfully. "Life is Beautiful!" was one of his favorite exclamations. And only close friends knew what bitterness was hidden behind these actions and words. He also drank - a lot, but only very good and expensive drinks. He was convinced that high quality alcohol could not cause serious harm. Lautrec loved to mix different drinks, creating an extraordinary bouquet. He was the first in France to make cocktails and received incredible pleasure listening to the praise of his guests, who enthusiastically tried the new drinks. Whoever visited him then, and all his guests knew, Lautrec was supposed to drink. His fellow students in Cormon's workshop Anquetin and Bernard, and the young Van Gogh, who introduced him to Japanese art, and the insidious Valadon, an artist and model of Renoir, who seemed to be playing some kind of subtle game with Lautrec - she appeared in his life and then disappeared. ... 1888

Friends tried to distract him from his alcohol addiction, taking him to England, Holland, Spain, but he, having had his fill of old art, admiring the paintings of Bruegel and Cranach, Van Eyck and Memling, El Greco, Goya and Velazquez, returned home and resumed his former life. Henri became capricious, intolerant, and sometimes simply unbearable. Inexplicable outbursts of anger, stupid antics, unjustified violence... His already poor health was undermined by alcoholism and syphilis, which Red Rose “awarded” him a long time ago.

In 1899, “with a terrible attack of delirium tremens,” Lautrec’s mother admitted him to Dr. Semelen’s mental hospital in Neuilly. Coming out of there after several months of treatment, he tried his best to work, but something seemed to break in him.

In mid-April, Lautrec returned to Paris. The friends were shocked when they saw Henri. “How he has changed! - they said. “Only a shadow remains of him!” Lautrec barely moved, moving his legs with difficulty. It was clear that he was forcing himself to live. But sometimes it seemed that faith in the future regained hope in him. He was especially pleased with the news that several of his paintings were sold at auction in Drouot, and for a lot of money. Inspired by this event, Henri again felt a strong desire to draw. But - the last works seemed not to be his... In three months, Lautrec dismantled everything that had accumulated in his workshop over the years of work, finished some canvases, put his signatures on what seemed to him a success... Before leaving, he was going to carry out that summer in Arashon and Tossa, places familiar to him from childhood, on the seashore - Henri brought perfect order to the workshop, as if he knew that he would not be destined to return there again.

At the Orleans station he was seen off by old friends. Both they and Lautrec himself understood that this was probably their last meeting.

The sea air could not heal Henri. The doctors reported that he had consumption, and in mid-August Lautrec suffered a stroke. He was losing weight, deaf, and had difficulty moving due to developing paralysis. Arriving at the seriously ill Lautrec, Countess Adele transported her son to the family castle in Malrome. In this mansion, surrounded by the care and love of his mother, Henri seemed to have returned to the vast world of childhood, joys, and hopes. He even tried to start drawing again, but his fingers no longer obeyed the call of his heart and could not hold the brush. Over time, paralysis shackled his entire unfortunate body; Lautrec could no longer even eat by himself. There was always someone at his bedside: friends, mother or old nanny. His father, Count Alphonse, also visited, but never recognized his son as an artist. When he entered the room, Henri 1901

Natural growing pains - “hopeless confusion in narcissism” - successfully developed in Toulouse-Lautrec into strong confidence in his success on the foundation of his talent as a draftsman. He was not afraid of any topic, any order, any size and any speed. Matisse's expression and kinematics of the body turned out to be the main arguments in the artist's paintings. The courage of genetic talents was confirmed by the artistic discoveries that followed one after another of more and more new possibilities for shocking the public, which was easier and more successful to organize by leading the public to a dead end and using vulgarities. The French made vice a delicacy. High society, who bought creativity, accepted the artistic riotousness of bohemia as the norm of playfulness, affirming the status of real life. Lautrec, on the other hand, expresses the organic freedom of pose, bringing its expressiveness to the point of shocking. The curtain fell. Life Henri de Toulouse – Lautrec – Monfat ended on the morning of September 9, 1901, at the age of thirty-seven, like Van Gogh. He was buried near Malrome in the cemetery of Saint André du Bois. Later, the Countess ordered the remains of her son to be transferred to Werdle.

Gradually, the largest museums in the world began to acquire the works of Toulouse-Lautrec - Toulouse-Lautrec became a classic. Despite this, Count Alphonse still did not want to admit that his son was a talented artist. He wrote to Henri’s childhood friend, Maurice Juayan, who was working on creating a house - the Lautrec Museum in Albi: “Only because the artist is no longer alive, even if it is my son, I cannot admire his clumsy work.” And only in his suicide letter, in December 1912, the count admitted to Maurice: “You believed in his talent more than I did, and you turned out to be right...”.

His ancestors - wealthy French aristocrats - filled their endless leisure time with hunts, duels and affairs with beautiful ladies from the royal court. For centuries, idleness and idleness ruled the roost in their luxurious lands. The same fate was in store for little Henri, or more precisely, Henri-Marie-Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfat, the son of Countess Adele and Count Alphonse. But he preferred another...

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec was born on November 24, 1864 in the family castle of Albi in the south of France. The first 14 years of life are pure happiness! As befits a child born with a silver spoon in his mouth, Henri, or Little Treasure (as one of his adoring grandmothers nicknamed him), loved horses and hunting dogs, dreamed, like his father, of participating in hunts and betting on races.

Everything changed suddenly, in an instant, when a 14-year-old boy suddenly fell, breaking his hip. A little later - a second unexpected fall, almost out of the blue - and a fracture of the second leg! Gypsum. Disabled carriage. And the doctors’ terrible verdict: it is impossible to change anything, to stop the course of the disease. The too fragile bones were restored slowly, the legs partially atrophied, Henri stopped growing (according to doctors, the cause of this disaster was the relationship between Toulouse-Lautrec’s father and mother, they were cousins). The boy's familiar world collapsed. The disease developed rapidly - in just a year and a half, the charming, nimble teenager turned into a short-legged dwarf, about fifty meters tall, with an irregular, thick-lipped face. Wasn't it then that he first looked around - and saw real life, in which there are so many tears and pain?.. In any case, there is no doubt: it was the terrible transformation into a dwarf that made Toulouse-Lautrec an artist.

Unhappy Henri understood: painting - the only world, where you can hide from your own painful experiences. Knowing his undoubted, early-discovered abilities as a draftsman, he decided to seriously devote himself to painting. To begin with, he became a student of the animal artist Prensto. The thirty-seven-year-old deaf-mute artist sincerely became attached to the crippled teenager, and not only because the child’s talent was overflowing. Two people deprived of nature understood each other. They communicated without words. It was Princeto who taught Henri how to masterfully convey movement (a feature of Lautrec’s work, praised by everyone without exception).

Self-portrait in front of a mirror. 1882-83

After two years of working with Princeto, Lautrec entered the studio of the then famous painter and adherent of academicism, Leon Bonn. The master also praised his pupil, and for good reason - Henri put his whole soul into his work, his canvases “caught” any, even casual, viewer...

Laborer in Celeirane. 1882

The next teacher was Fernand Cormon, who initially charmed Henri with his cheerfulness and simplicity of character. But Cormon, like Bonna, was one of the academicians whose mossy postulates were already tired of young artists...

Lautrec was in love with the bold lines of Edgar Degas' paintings and admired the first Impressionist paintings. Are they scolded by academics? So what, so be it!.. Oh, how he wanted to create his own, individual style, his own technique! To paint pictures, in each of which there will be something unique, special - allowing you to recognize at first glance: “This is Lautrec.”

“Just think, if my legs were a little longer, I would never have taken up painting!” - the artist once exclaimed. And so it was.

Creativity became a real refuge for Lautrec. He painted constantly, obsessively, like a madman, trying to depict the movements of people and animals, the fleeting expression of someone's eyes, someone's tired grimace. He eagerly observed life around him - and sought to capture its moments. In addition, in all Lautrec’s paintings there is a desire to convey the individual characteristics of the model as truthfully as possible, sometimes mercilessly.

Nude. 1883

He grew up, although outwardly he remained the same short freak. “Pray for him,” Countess Adele wrote to her mother. “Being in the workshop gives him a lot from a professional point of view, but it is a difficult test for a young man.”

Day after day, month after month, year after year... Lautrec studied life and painting, more and more boldly transferring to canvas the features and emotions of the people around him. And certainly in each picture there was a piece of his own pain, his unfulfilled hopes.

Artilleryman saddling a horse. 1879

18, 19, 20 years old... Like everyone else at that age, he dreamed of love. But what can you hope for when you're an ugly little guy? The first companies - and the first “science”: it is better to hide your own complexes and experiences deep in your soul, remaining for your many friends and acquaintances an eternally cheerful, laughing (including at yourself) dwarf.

“I would like to see a woman who has a lover even uglier than me!” - shouting these “carefree” words, he laughed first, followed by everyone else.

Perhaps the only woman who sincerely loved Lautrec all his life was his mother, Countess Adele.
It is her portraits, painted by her son, that amaze with their warmth. The sad, sweet face of a woman sitting at a table with a cup of coffee in her hands - wise eyes, pain hidden in the corners of a tired mouth...

The mother was ready to become her son’s shadow in order to invisibly protect him everywhere.

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. Portrait of Countess A. de Toulouse-Lautrec. 1881-82

But she could not give him what a 20-year-old boy so needed - sensual love, a passion that makes you dizzy and wants to embrace the whole world.

One day one of Henri's friends decided to help him with this difficult issue. It was he who brought Lautrec together with a public wench who was drawn to all sorts of perversions. Outwardly she was an angel in the flesh, but in essence she was a devil. Having experienced the world of carnal love with her, Lautrec simultaneously experienced severe disappointment. He understood: passion, lust is not love. And even if love lives in his soul, it will certainly never find a way out. Except on canvases.

At the age of 20, Lautrec left home, settling with a friend in Montmartre. A new life began for him.

Montmartre!.. The birth of this bohemian place - a district of artists and poets - occurred simultaneously with the birth of Lautrec - the artist. Once a quiet corner of Paris, Montmartre gradually turned into a bohemian world, where cafes opened endlessly - one more original than the other - cabarets, restaurants, salons... It was here that future great artists and writers, poets and actors rented cheap studios and apartments, it was here , in inexpensive cafes, they organized debates and presentations of their own, not yet recognized masterpieces.

Here, in Montmartre, Lautrec learned the saving joy of friendship. He was almost never alone - together with his peers, who, like him, dreamed of fame, Henri sat all night long in cabarets and circuses, and became a regular at horse races. He ruled, entertained, made people laugh - and his friends simply adored him, forgetting even about his ugliness.

In the image of the Japanese emperor. Photo 1892

Meanwhile, Lautrec worked a lot. He carried paper and pencils with him and constantly made sketches wherever he went. For example, horse racing is an exciting world of jockeys and horses, screaming fans and nosy bookmakers...

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. At the races. 1899

The theater is a beautiful, but treacherous temple of art, where everyone - both actors and spectators - plays their roles... The house of tolerance - tired priestesses of love, hardened, seasoned girls, with despair suddenly flashing somewhere in the squint of their tinted eyes. .. “Suddenly”... He was always interested in this “suddenly”. It was a crazy life without sleep and sadness. His life!

Incredibly - and yet, in the tiny, distorted body of Toulouse - Lautrec, gigantic energy was hidden. He hardly slept. In the evening, in the company of friends, I hurried to the theater. He didn't care about the content of the plays - he looked at the faces of the actors. He was interested in unusual angles, eyes, looks... Sometimes he went to the same very mediocre performance dozens of times - only to admire the marvelous profile of the heroine each time in a certain scene. He looked and drew, recording his impressions on paper.

The performance is over - it's time to go to the cafe! Drink glass after glass - liqueurs and wine, cocktails and liqueurs, so that the world around you becomes warmer and more smiling, so that witticisms roll off your tongue...

In the image of a cocotte from Montmartre. Photo 1895

He became the true “singer of Montmartre” - the Parisian bohemia recognized this “title” for him - with all the number of artists who worked in Montmartre! “Cha Noir”, “Moulin de la Galette”, “Elise-Montmartre”, and a little later - “Moulin Rouge” - in all these cabarets Lautrec quickly became his own.

At the poster of the Moulin Rouge cabaret, 1892.

In L'Elise-Montmartre, 1888

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. At the Moulin de la Galette. 1889

With a pencil in his hands, he sat at a table, always in a noisy company of friends, quietly getting drunk and - drawing, drawing. He was in a hurry to capture his world. He drank and drew, painted and drank... And looked around. And when the night slowly rolled towards dawn, he came to the brothel, where he knew every cocotte by name. Had dinner. Sometimes I cooked it myself to surprise my girlfriends. And he drew again, fortunately the women did not seem to notice him.

Salon on Rue Moulins. 1894

In bed. Kiss. 1892

Alone. 1896

Here is a beauty pulling on a stocking, two girlfriends falling asleep hugging each other in the same bed, a girl washing something in a basin... And all this is life! When the sun rose above the horizon, Lautrec fell asleep for a couple of hours. And then life began again, in all its violence and splendor.

At the Moulin Rouge. Dance. 1890

Two friends. 1895.

The heroes of Lautrec's paintings were actors and singers, prostitutes and alcoholics, artists and beggars. Dancer La Goulue and her magnificent partner Valentin Beskostny, singer Yvette Guilbert, circus performer Sha-Yu-Kao and brothel owner Mademoiselle Blanche...

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. Jeanne Avril. Poster. 1893

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. Bruant in Eldorado. Poster. 1892

Moreover, in every face, even the youngest and most beautiful, he found something painful, some kind of wormhole - this was the peculiarity of his drawings. A dream came true: people looked and recognized from the first second: “This is Lautrec!”

Not everyone - oh, not everyone - was delighted with his paintings. He captured the essence, character, individuality, but did not embellish, did not flatter, and sometimes even emphasized the external unattractiveness of the models. The only thing that no one could argue with was that his paintings contained energy, the power of life!

Over time, he began to take part in exhibitions - the annual opening days of the G20 in Brussels, exhibitions of the Salon of Independents in the Parisian gallery of Busso and Valadon. His name gradually gained weight - Lautrec was commissioned for paintings and drawings for magazines.

Giovanni Boldini. Portrait of A. Toulouse-Lautrec.

In addition, he was literally inundated with orders for posters - he found himself in this genre consummate master. Henri enthusiastically painted posters for circuses and performances, for cafes and singers. He elevated the poster to the rank of true art.

I also became interested in lithography - the new fashion of the time. He worked tirelessly. Without thinking about health. Without thinking about the future. And his mother’s reproaches died on her lips when she saw her son. A short-legged freak hobbling with a stick, he remained for her the same child with a wounded soul, whom only she could understand. And she forgave him his crazy life, his love for the vicious Montmartre.

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. Portrait of Countess A. de Toulouse-Lautrec. 1883

Moreover, it was she who insisted that the family allocate funds for Henri to have his own studio. It was a huge victory for the artist! At the age of 22, Lautrec received his own roof over his head - a studio on Tourlak Street.

Around the same time, another one appeared among Lautrec's friends, in whom he immediately recognized the gift of God - Van Gogh. “What an artist, what power!” - Lautrec exclaimed, looking at his canvases.

He instantly fell in love not only with Vincent, but also with the Japanese prints with which his friend’s room was hung. From now on, he had a dream - to see magical Japan with his own eyes. True, this dream will remain among the unfulfilled.

Perhaps it is worth noting another of Lautrec's talents - gastronomic. Brilliant artist was a wonderful cook, who expertly and easily prepared the most exquisite dishes and cocktails. The family's wealth allowed Henri to live for his own pleasure, not counting the measly centimes. And he lived! He received game and homemade preparations, wines and cognacs from family estates. He arranged magnificent feasts for his friends, mixed wonderful cocktails, after which few people remained on their feet. “Dear mother! - he wrote to Countess Adele. “I can only sing hosannas to the digestibility of the capon, which turned out to be incomparable.” Send another barrel of wine; According to my calculations, I will need one and a half barrels a year.”

Beautiful paintings and sumptuous feasts - oh, how friends loved to pop into Henri’s studio! Here, among the colors and colorful canvases, there were always, at any time, lying around roasted chestnuts and pickled gherkins from the Bojek family castle, bottles of fine wine and bags of quince marmalade. Well, on Fridays Lautrec even arranged traditional dinner parties for his friends - artists and jockeys, artists and girls without specific occupations. “To appreciate a picture, you must first overturn good cocktail“, he declared, offering the guests the fruit of his own imagination - a drink called “Trembling”, after which many immediately passed out...

And he was happy to demonstrate his culinary art. Picturesquely, he stood behind the counter, pouring different liqueurs into a glass, spoon by spoon, “laying” them in layers, making sure they didn’t mix: maraschino and curaço, “chartreuse” and “cherry”... He liked to sprinkle the finished cocktails with grated nutmeg. We must use life! In alcohol and food - only the best! Baked leg of lamb, Saint-Jacques scallops with garlic puree, pickled onions, stuffed with cloves...

And one day Lautrec staged a demonstration cooking “American-style lobster in white wine with tomatoes, cayenne pepper and spices” right in the middle of the living room of one of his rich friends. While the servants were hiding expensive furniture under the covers, the living room was filled with a divine aroma that made everyone's mouth water...
We must enjoy life! He rejoiced and taught this joy to others.

Sleepless nights, crazy work and a lot of alcohol...

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. Hangover. 1889

But someday everything comes to an end, you have to pay for everything. This was the case in short fate Toulouse-Lautrec.
One morning he left the house in red trousers, with a blue umbrella in his hands and a porcelain dog under his arm. Looking around with unseeing eyes, he unzipped his fly and urinated on his own picture. Delirium tremens! On the same day, friends took him to the Chateau Saint-Jame, a home for the insane. For rich crazy people.

One can imagine the horror that the artist felt when he came to his senses and realized where he was. Relatives and friends visited him, but everyone averted their eyes so as not to meet Henri’s gaze. After all, in his beautiful black eyes one could easily read: “Save me!”

He plunged headlong into work again, drawing all day long - just to prove that he was normal, absolutely normal. His clothes hung like a bag on him, blue-black circles did not pass under his eyes, but the artist achieved his goal - a consultation of doctors granted him freedom.

And again - Montmartre, a cafe, the aroma of roasted chestnuts, the music of street singers... A person cannot change overnight. Of course, Lautrec took up his old ways - not immediately, but gradually - he began to drink again, more and more, without interruption, as if he was in a hurry to put an end to his short brilliant life. He drank and drew, painted and drank...

The 37-year-old artist died on a suffocating night, close to dawn. In the arms of the mother.

The last exhalation - and in the east, where the sun rises, lightning flashed, and rain began to patter on the roof, breaking through the canvas of long unbearable stuffiness. Nature released her sufferer. He died - and there was nothing more beautiful than his exhausted face with closed eyes.

Valentina Gutchina

From the magazine "Times"