Laguna Fine Art - Toulouse-Lautrec & The Masters of La Belle Epoque

Title: La Musique
Artist: Jules Chéret
Category: Belle Epoque
Medium: Pastel
Framed: Yes
Height: 55"
Width: 28 1/2"

c. 1892
Original pastel drawing on paper. In excellent condition. Accompanied by an authenticating photocertificate from Jean-Marc Frossard, Membre de la Chambre Nationale des Experts Spécialistés, signed and dated June 12, 2002, Paris. Signed lower right Chéret.

Artist Bio: Jules Chéret is regarded as the father of modern lithography. He created not only a new art form but a new industry as well. His training as a lithographer, superb draftsman, and his innate sense of color enable him to raise the technical and esthetic levels of the poster to new heights of artistic sophistication.

Large outdoor posters appeared for the first time in the last half of the 19th century. The street had become the common man's art gallery. This changed life in the streets of Paris forever. Jules Chéret was born in Paris May 31, 1836 the son of a poor typographer. At age 13 he began a three year apprenticeship for a lithographer for whom he did lettering writing backwards to prepare the brochures, flyers, and small posters for production. For the next five years he worked for various printers enduring hours of mundane work. He attended the Ecole National de Dessin (the National School of Drawing) which later became the Ecole Des Arts Decoratifs. He spent his Sundays sketching and studying paintings in the Louvre. Visits to the museum were the greatest influence on Chéret's work. At the Louvre he discovered Rubens, Watteaus, and Fragonards. While visiting the Victoria and Albert Museum he discovered Turner and later in Venice he became interested in Tiepolos.

While in his twenties Chéret made two trips to London to seek work. He was designing book covers and doing posters for operas, circuses, and music halls. At that time a friend who was impressed with Chéret's work introduced him to Eugene Rimmel, a famous perfume manufacturer and philanthropist. It was a turning point in Chéret's life. Rimmel, over a period of time, became Chéret's patron and together they traveled through Europe and North Africa. When Chéret was thirty years old Rimmel financed the setting up of a printing firm in Paris. Chéret purchased the latest machine from England and had large lithographic stones made especially for him.

The illustrated poster was virtually unknown in Paris as an outdoor advertising medium. La Biche Au Bois (The Doe in the Woods) 1866, the first effort of Imprimerie Jules Chéret, was an enormous success. Chéret's career was launched and a new art had come of age. Between 1866 and 1881 Chéret perfected his style and technique. He used successive stones of red, yellow, and blue followed by a fourth stone for an overlay of transparent tints. It is said that ìhis miracleî was in adapting the former heavy, cold, and somber lithography to the delicate, powdery, and fluid grace of pastels. By the turn of the century he had produced over a 1000 posters.

Chéret's first official recognition was when he won a silver medal at the 1878 international Exposition and a gold medal in 1889. The same year an exhibition of approximately 100 of his posters, lithographs, drawings, and paintings were shown at the Theatre d'Application. The most eminent critics set their seal of approval on his popular success. In 1890 he was made a chevalier of the Legion of d'Honour with a citation which called him ìcreator of an art industry science 1866, by the application of art to commercial and industrial printing.î He was later promoted in varying levels up to the highest rank, a Grand Prix, at the Universal Exhibition in 1900. Chéret's success as a poster artist over shadowed his work in drawing, pastels, and oils. Since he neither showed at salons nor placed his fine art with a gallery, his paintings and drawings were bought mostly by friends and patrons.

In 1912 Chéret was honored by the Louvre Museum with a retrospective exhibition at the Pavillion de Maison. The Musee Jules Chéret was founded in Nice in 1928. A large collection of Chéret's work also hangs in The Hermitage Museum in Russia. Chéret spent his winter in Nice and towards the end of his life he lived there exclusively. He lost his sight by 1925 but he lived with his inner vision recalling the fullness of his life. From his humble beginnings he had reached the pinnacle of fame in art and in an industry he created himself. The greatest artists of his time were his friends and admirers. Monet, Degas, Seurat, and Bracquiremond as well as the Montmarte group; Steinlen, Willette, and Legrand who admired and excepted his as a leader in the field of advertising art. Chéret died in September 1932 at the age of 96. In 1933 the Autumn Salon in Paris paid homage to him.

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