Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, La Blanchisseuse, 1888

La Blanchisseuse orThe Laundress (1888) created by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864 –1901) measures approximately 76 × 63 cm and is owned by the Cleveland Museum of Art in Ohio, USA [1]. A year earlier he completed an oil painting of the same name; this depicted a laundress gazing thoughtfully out of a window. In 2005, that painting achieved a record auction price for a work by the artist when it was sold for $22.4 million by Christies, New York [2]. At first glance, the work featured in this article might appear to be a pencil or a charcoal drawing, especially when considering that it was produced, along with other works, as an illustration for an article about the Parisian summer for the magazineParis Illustr è [3]. Some of those drawings were created inmani ère noire, where the paper is first coated with black paint; the drawing being produced by scratching away the paint to create white lines and spaces. This technique was suited to producing strongly contrasted illustrations for reproduction on the poor-quality paper used for magazines of the period [3]. However,La Blanchisseuse is described as ‘a black and grey wash with white paint scratched away in places’ [1]. This involved covering grey cardboard with white paint, scraping away areas of paint and using black ink to develop tones and to create images [1]. Additionally, one can see the use ofmani ère noire particularly in the hair and the right side of the laundress ’ face.
Source: Occupational Medicine - Category: Respiratory Medicine Source Type: research