Au Mouline Rouge, la Goulue et sa Soeur
1892
46.1 x 34.8 cm
Brush and spatter lithograph printed in six colors. Left side of central figure erased and redrawn on key stone and upper balustrade and monogram erased from key stone and redrawn on colour stone printed in red.
This was the first limited edition of a print by Lautrec. The image depicts one of the mots famous quadrille dancers at the Moulin Rouge, La Goulue. La Goulue danced very well, with provocative gestures, not hesitating to end a number, for example, by turning her back to the audience and flipping her skirts over her head to show her bottom, clad in lacy bloomers.
Her name, meaning 'The Glutton,' was given to her as a descriptive term by the regulars at the dance hall, who said she was willing to try anything and showed a voracious appetite for all life's pleasures, particularly food and drink. On occasion she was known to wander around the room emptying customers' glasses.
La Goulue's real name was Louise Weber, and she had arrived fresh from the farm to make her way in Paris, where she had started out as a dancer in the Cirque Fernando aged about sixteen. A stocky strawberry blonde with a reputation for audacity, she was described variously as ‘a strange girl, with a vampire's face, the profile of a bird of prey, a tortured mouth, and metallic eyes, who danced always with definite gestures' and as having ‘the face of a strong-willed, dirty-minded baby and a brash provocative stare'. Yvette Guilbert, a cabaret singer who later became even more famous than La Goulue, remembered seeing her when she herself was not yet performing:
"La Goulue was pretty and amusing to watch in spite of a certain vulgarity-blonde with bangs hanging down to her eyebrows. Her chignon, piled high in the top of her head like a helmet, ended in a single coil firmly twisted at the nape of her neck to ensure that it would not fall down while she danced. The classic rouflaquette, or ringlet, dangled from her temples over her ears, and from Paris to New York, by way of the dives of London's Whitechapel, all the wenches of the period imitated the style of her hair and the coloured ribbon around her neck."
After the publication of this print, Lautrec claimed to be so far highly satisfied with the results of his experiments in the field of colour lithography: "My little efforts have turned out perfectly and I've caught onto something which can lead me quite far-so I hope." (Frey, p. 189-191)
References: Wittrock 1, Adriani 6
