.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
*This lot may be exempt from sales tax as set forth in the Sales Tax Notice in the back of the catalogue.
In February 1899, Toulouse-Lautrec's alcoholism had become so injurious to his health and mental stability that his despairing mother had him committed against his will to the Château Saint-James, a clinic run by Dr. Réne Sémelaigne in Neuilly, near Paris. At the beginning of his confinement, Lautrec sketched on whatever came to hand, but in late March he received from his friend Maurice Joyant some supplies he had requested: a box of watercolors and brushes, lithographic crayons, sepia and India ink, and a ream of quality paper. He decided to undertake a series of drawings which would display such discipline and mastery that they would demonstrate to Dr. Sémelaigne he had regained control of his life and could be discharged from the clinic.
Lautrec chose the circus as his theme, a subject that evoked memories from his childhood. The spectacle of the circus was all the rage in Paris during the 1890s, and he could look to the prestigious precedents by Degas, Renoir and Seurat on this subject. Lautrec's finest circus painting, Au Cirque Fernando, L'écuyère, 1888 (Dortu, No. P.312), hung in the large corridor at the popular Moulin Rouge in Montmartre. Lautrec had first studied under the equestrian painter René Princeteau, and was an expert at drawing horses and figures in tandem. Indeed, the long years of practice had he had put into this subject proved crucial to the success of his project, for he had no access to models at the clinic or nearby--the local circus troupe was away on tour. He drew his circus scenes entirely from memory and as he visualized them in his imagination.
The amazone or female equestrian in this drawing is a recurring character in the circus series. Joyant later described her: "Mounted on a large horse with a hooked nose and rat-tail, an Haute-Ecole equestrian, dressed in a riding habit and cap, works her horse; they go toward the right. In the right background, a trainer in a sweater and cap, whip in hand, relates it to the milieu of the circus" (in op. cit., 1927, pp. 237-38). In this drawing, the grim facial expressions of the equestrian and trainer, and the exaggeratedly large and looming silhouette of the horse harbor a sinister sentiment; the enveloping rim of the circus ring and tiers of seats, empty of any spectators, appears to reflect Lautrec's own state of confinement, and the performers' travail de répétition (rehearsal) parallels the strict working routine the artist had adopted to prove his mental competency. Richard Thomson has observed:
"If Lautrec's great 1899 circus series is about training and discipline, about forcing animals to act against their nature to suit their human masters, to sublimate their physical instincts to his or her command, then it is also about the artist's plight. Lautrec may well have seen his own situation at the clinic in this light In the end the whole series is about order--at one level the discipline of circus performances, and at another the artist's psychological order. Both involve restraint and a degree of pain; both require mastering nature. The circus served as an ideal metaphor for the disordered Lautrec to articulate pictorially his inner struggles and traumas" (in Toulouse-Lautrec and Montmartre, exh. cat., National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 2005, p. 241).
Many of the 39 drawings that Lautrec created in the Au cirque series (Dortu nos. D.4.522-560) are among his finest works on paper, and the series is one of the final, crowning achievements of his career. Not least of all they served their immediate purpose; Lautrec declared as he departed the clinic, "I've bought my release with my drawings" (quoted in M. Joyant, op, cit., 1926, p. 222). He desired that the group be published in book form. Indeed, in 1905, four years after the artist's untimely death, Joyant issued a volume of 22 Au cirque drawings in facsimile, and complete editions later followed which have made these drawings some of the best-known in all Lautrec's oeuvre.
(fig. 1) Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Au Cirque Fernando, l'ecuyère, 1888. The Art Institute of Chicago. BARCODE 24410359
In February 1899, Toulouse-Lautrec's alcoholism had become so injurious to his health and mental stability that his despairing mother had him committed against his will to the Château Saint-James, a clinic run by Dr. Réne Sémelaigne in Neuilly, near Paris. At the beginning of his confinement, Lautrec sketched on whatever came to hand, but in late March he received from his friend Maurice Joyant some supplies he had requested: a box of watercolors and brushes, lithographic crayons, sepia and India ink, and a ream of quality paper. He decided to undertake a series of drawings which would display such discipline and mastery that they would demonstrate to Dr. Sémelaigne he had regained control of his life and could be discharged from the clinic.
Lautrec chose the circus as his theme, a subject that evoked memories from his childhood. The spectacle of the circus was all the rage in Paris during the 1890s, and he could look to the prestigious precedents by Degas, Renoir and Seurat on this subject. Lautrec's finest circus painting, Au Cirque Fernando, L'écuyère, 1888 (Dortu, No. P.312), hung in the large corridor at the popular Moulin Rouge in Montmartre. Lautrec had first studied under the equestrian painter René Princeteau, and was an expert at drawing horses and figures in tandem. Indeed, the long years of practice had he had put into this subject proved crucial to the success of his project, for he had no access to models at the clinic or nearby--the local circus troupe was away on tour. He drew his circus scenes entirely from memory and as he visualized them in his imagination.
The amazone or female equestrian in this drawing is a recurring character in the circus series. Joyant later described her: "Mounted on a large horse with a hooked nose and rat-tail, an Haute-Ecole equestrian, dressed in a riding habit and cap, works her horse; they go toward the right. In the right background, a trainer in a sweater and cap, whip in hand, relates it to the milieu of the circus" (in op. cit., 1927, pp. 237-38). In this drawing, the grim facial expressions of the equestrian and trainer, and the exaggeratedly large and looming silhouette of the horse harbor a sinister sentiment; the enveloping rim of the circus ring and tiers of seats, empty of any spectators, appears to reflect Lautrec's own state of confinement, and the performers' travail de répétition (rehearsal) parallels the strict working routine the artist had adopted to prove his mental competency. Richard Thomson has observed:
"If Lautrec's great 1899 circus series is about training and discipline, about forcing animals to act against their nature to suit their human masters, to sublimate their physical instincts to his or her command, then it is also about the artist's plight. Lautrec may well have seen his own situation at the clinic in this light In the end the whole series is about order--at one level the discipline of circus performances, and at another the artist's psychological order. Both involve restraint and a degree of pain; both require mastering nature. The circus served as an ideal metaphor for the disordered Lautrec to articulate pictorially his inner struggles and traumas" (in Toulouse-Lautrec and Montmartre, exh. cat., National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 2005, p. 241).
Many of the 39 drawings that Lautrec created in the Au cirque series (Dortu nos. D.4.522-560) are among his finest works on paper, and the series is one of the final, crowning achievements of his career. Not least of all they served their immediate purpose; Lautrec declared as he departed the clinic, "I've bought my release with my drawings" (quoted in M. Joyant, op, cit., 1926, p. 222). He desired that the group be published in book form. Indeed, in 1905, four years after the artist's untimely death, Joyant issued a volume of 22 Au cirque drawings in facsimile, and complete editions later followed which have made these drawings some of the best-known in all Lautrec's oeuvre.
(fig. 1) Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Au Cirque Fernando, l'ecuyère, 1888. The Art Institute of Chicago. BARCODE 24410359