Cover for the first album of L'Estampe originale

Description

New developments in printing techniques resulted in an explosion of color lithography in the 1890s, and lithogra- phers like Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec regularly collaborated with professional printing workshops to improve consistency and efficiency in their production. Color lithography was used both for posters and for smaller prints or portfolios that could be purchased by a growing market of middle-class private collectors. Toulouse-Lautrec designed this cover for the first issue of L’Estampe originale, a quarterly portfolio that included prints by the era’s leading artists. The cover depicts the fashionable Jane Avril examining a print at the Ancourt printing workshop, where the older Père Cotelle, Toulouse-Lautrec’s trusted printer, operates the press.

Cover for the first album of L'Estampe originale

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

1893

Accession Number

13620

Medium

Color lithograph on ivory wove paper

Dimensions

Image: 56.6 × 65 cm (22 5/16 × 25 5/8 in.); Sheet: 58.5 × 83.5 cm (23 1/16 × 32 7/8 in.)

Classification

lithograph

Museum

The Art Institute of Chicago

Chicago, United States

Credit Line

The Charles F. Glore Collection