La Goulue - 1891

VINTAGE FRENCH POSTER - GICLÉE PRINT

This vintage French poster is an example of "Affiche Artistique", advertising famous Parisian Cancan dancer Louise Weber, known as "La Goulue" at the Mouline Rouge music hall.   The artist is Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec published in 1891.

Dimensions:  16.5" x 24"

Artists in the late 1800s found opportunities to present their work to the masses through advertising art that began to appear as billboards and posters, plastering the streets of Paris.  “Affiche Artistique” was the term that the French used to describe a poster that contained artistic expression.  The art was so impressive to the public, people began to collect the posters as soon as they went up, which is why they are so scarce today.  Artists such as Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, Alphonse Mucha, Jules Chéret, Théophile-Alexandre Steinlen, Pierre Bonnard and Eugène Grasset contributed to the creative body of work that became what some called  “a free museum for the masses”.  The craze for collecting these examples of modern art was even given the name, "affichomanie", meaning “artistic poster mania”.  Collectors today pay hundreds, if not thousands for original prints of these rare posters. 

We offer these exceptional vintage poster reproductions in the highest possible print quality.  Superior to most reproductions currently available on the market, our gallery quality prints are suitable for display in an art gallery or museum.  We begin with an ultra high resolution scan of the original artifact which we leave untouched, leaving intact the slightly distressed vintage character desirable in a collectible piece of this era.  Our state of the art, giclée reproduction process uses the latest technology: microscopic droplets of ink that render such a high resolution, that every minute detail of the original is intact.  Every pen line and brush stroke is visible.  Even very faint pencil lines are also visible due to the incredibly high quality of the reproduction process.  Our 8 color, archival quality inks and giclée printing process provide the most accurate color reproduction & are proven to last over a hundred years. Posters are available printed on museum quality archival paper or on repositionable media that allow you to plaster your walls with the “Affiche Artistique”, just as they were originally intended to be displayed. 

About the artist:

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
French, 1864 – 1901 

Creating an overnight sensation with his first poster, a depiction of the Moulin Rouge dance hall in 1891, Henri Toulouse-Lautrec became synonymous with the Post-Impressionist style.  Born at the Chateau de Malromé near Albi, he father was the Comte Alphonse de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa, descendant of the Counts of Toulouse and Lautrec and the “Viscounts of Monfa”.  His early life was privileged and included informal art lessons while living in Paris with his mother.  Henri suffered some genetic problems that resulted in his legs failing to grow to normal size, leaving him only 5’1”, with normal torso but child-size legs.  His mother took Henri back to Albi and pursued treatments trying to restore his health and growth, but to no avail.  Returning to Paris in 1882, Lautrec settled in Montemarte, the center of the bohemian artistic culture in Paris, where he studied painting under Léon Bonnat and Fernand Cormon.  Lautrec rarely left Montemarte for the next twenty years, becoming a friend to both Vincent and Theo Van Gogh and many other artists of the era.  Lautrec died in 1901 at the young age of thirty-six.

Considered one of the great Post-Impressionist painters, “La blanchisseuse”, an early painting by Toulouse-Lautrec, sold for $22.4 million at a Christie’s auction in 2005.

Louise Weber
French, (1866-1929)

 It is believed that Louise Weber was born into a Jewish family in the Alsace region of France, and that at a very young age she moved to Paris with her mother who worked in a laundry.  From the age of 16, Louise began dancing at small clubs, while working with her mother in the laundry during the day.  She would find the opportunity to “borrow” clothing from the laundry to be a benefit to her early career.  She developed a style of dancing that audiences loved, teasing the males present with a flash of embroidered underwear or flicking their hats off with her foot.  She was given the nickname “The Glutton”, or “La Goulue” for her habit of quickly drinking the contents of a customer’s glass as she danced by.

“La Goulue” became a headliner act at the Moulin Rouge with her early version of Cancan called “chahut”.  As the Cancan grew in popularity at the Moulin Rouge, so did Louise’s reputation as a major Parisian star, becoming known as the “Queen of Montemartre”.  She became on of the favorite models for Toulouse-Lautrec.

Sadly, Louise Weber’s fortunes declined when she attempted to start her own touring dance troupe and she soon found herself destitute.  The woman who had once been the highest paid star in Paris spent the last year of her life in Montmartre, selling matches and peanuts on a street corner, unrecognized by her former public.  She died in Paris and was originally buried in the suburb of Pantin.  Her remains were later transferred to the Cimetière de Montmartre.