Ernest 1902 - 1911

Jean-Émile Laboureur made this print called Ernest. It's got this great yellow background that feels like a stage, or a spotlight on a performer. You can almost feel him at the cafe, right? I imagine the artist seeing Ernest, sketching him quickly, then later, back in the studio, the carving, the inking, the pressure of the press, the reveal... I bet Laboureur was thinking about Toulouse-Lautrec at the Moulin Rouge, but wanted something calmer, more still. Look at the flatness of the figure and the way the dark black ink defines the contours and fills in blocks of colour. It's so decisive, but still, there's a warmth, a humanity in the way it's been made. The man is waiting to serve, he is present but also thinking about other things maybe. This guy Ernest is a character, someone Laboureur saw in his daily life and wanted to capture with ink and colour. That act of looking and representing is part of what it means to be a painter.