Bruant au Mirliton

1893

82.0 X 60.0 cm

Crayon, brush and spatter lithograph.Printed in two colors. Artist's monogram lower right. Key stone printed in black, stones with text in orange-red. Commissioned by Aristide Bruant. Second state.  With red on the collar and the right sleeve, and new lettering not designed by Lautrec on the right in red: ‘TOUS LES SOIRS/BRUANT/AU/MIRLITON/-/BOCK/13 SOUS'. Address of the printer added on the stone, on left edge of picture: ‘IMP. Chaix. 20. Rue Bergere, Paris-174-94 (ENCRES CH. LORILLEUX & Cie.)'.  

Size of edition not known (c. 100).

Delteil dated the poster to 1894 from the fact that it appeared in Aristide Bruant's magazine Le Mirliton on 15 November 1894.  But he overlooked the fact that the poster, which also advertised the second volume of Bruant's songs (illustrated with 148 drawings by Theophile Alexandre Steinlen), had also been reproduced, on a smaller scale, as the cover illustration for Oscar Metenier's brochure Le Chansonnier populaire ARISTIDE BRUANT/Dessins de Steinlen, which appeared in 1893.  Adhemar follows Delteil's dating, although he reproduces an impression without the lettering dedicated to Lautrec's friend, the painter Maurice Guibert, which was signed by the artist in pencil lower left and dated 1893 (Cat. Toulouse-Lautrec, A 12). 

The following notice appeared in L'Escarmouche, No. 8 on 31 December 1893: ‘M. de Toulouse-Lautrec, a frequent contributor to L'Escarmouche [see Nos. 45-56], is putting the last touches to a poster of the chansonnier Bruant that will attract great attention'.

The old post office which had formerly been Le Chat Noir was taken over by Aristide Bruant, who had already made his reputation at the cabaret singing songs he wrote himself.  Bruant renamed the cabaret Le Mirliton (toy whistle or doggerel verse).  Although in style it was the polar opposite of the fashionable Club Mirliton whose annual art shows Henry had criticized at length as an eighteen-year-old, in the Mirliton, too, artists' works hung on the walls.  Hanging on the cabaret walls, these portraits, often of prostitutes, were quite unlike the family portraits in bourgeois drawing rooms, and were one of Brunat's ways of thumbing his nose at the middle class. 

Bruant wanted Le Mirliton to be totally different from Le Chat Noir.  Its general tone was rough benches and greasy tables, resolutely working-class.  Inside, the cabaret no longer had the cluttered décor of Le Chat Noir, with its Louis XIII furniture.  The space was set with a clearing in the centre for the musicians and performers

Reference: Wittrock P10, Adriani 57, Delteil 349, Adhemar 71, Frey 182-183