Seated Female Clown (Mlle Cha-U-Kao)

The style of Toulouse−Lautrec’s graphic works was inspired by Japanese woodblock printing that stylistically determined the Art Nouveau idiom. The artist first employed the principle of the decoratively elaborated harmony of line and space in a lithograph poster (1891). In his series “Elles” (title page and ten sheets), Lautrec depicted episodes from the everyday life in a brothel. He sketched its inhabitants without unnecessary eroticism, but with a deep sense of solidarity and empathy with this world he knew so well. The clowness Mlle Cha−U−Kao performed in the Moulin Rouge cabaret, wearing the typical black trousers and yellow ruffles, and was one of Lautrec’s favourite models. Contrary to the brightly coloured Seated Clown, the other sheets of the series evoke the intimate atmosphere of the “closed house” only in their delicate monochrome tonality.