Yvette Guilbert, dans Colombine à Pierrot 1894

This is Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s poster print for Yvette Guilbert’s song, employing lithography, a newly commercialized printing technique. The image shows the singer in costume. Lithography allowed for relatively quick reproduction, crucial for advertising and sheet music in rapidly industrializing Paris. Look closely, and you’ll see the layering of colors and the grainy texture, a direct result of the lithographic process, where an image is drawn on stone or metal and then printed. The choice of this medium, a distinctly commercial one, places the artwork firmly within the burgeoning culture of mass production and consumption. By embracing these modern methods, Toulouse-Lautrec blurred the lines between high art and popular culture. He understood that materials, making, and context are essential to an artwork’s meaning, challenging traditional hierarchies of art and craft.