Maurice Guibert
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| + | [[Image:Toulouse Lautrec in drag.jpg |thumb|right|200px|''[[Toulouse-Lautrec wearing Jane Avril's Feathered Hat and Boa]]'' (ca. 1892), photo Maurice Guibert.]] | ||
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| - | [[Maurice Guibert]][http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Maurice_Guibert] (1856 - 1913) was a French photographer, remembered for his small oeuvre of photos, mostly of [[Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec]]. | + | [[Maurice Guibert]][http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Maurice_Guibert] (1856 - 1913) was a [[French photographer]], remembered for his small oeuvre of photos, mostly of [[Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec]]. |
| - | [[Toulouse-Lautrec wearing Jane Avril's Feathered Hat and Boa]] (ca. 1892). Photograph. Musee de Toulouse- Lautrec, Albi | + | He was an agent for the champagne company [[Moët and Chandon]] and a member of the [[Société française de photographie]]. Little else is known of him other than his self-portraits and photos of Toulouse-Latrec that often led to collaborations such as in the painting ''[[A La Mie]]''. |
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| - | [[Musée Toulouse-Lautrec]] | + | |
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| - | He is the author of the famous ''[[Henri in women's hat and boa]]'' (1892)[http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Guibert_3.jpg%20] | + | |
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| - | :The relevant lexicons remain silent on the photographer Maurice Guibert. And without a doubt he and his small ceuvre would have been forgotten, if the playboy and boon companion of Toulouse-Lautrec had not in the course of the years become something of a 'family and court photographer' to the painter. Lautrec himself seems to have taken an interest in photography from early on, although it must be said that his relation to photography on the whole still awaits a proper analysis. What is certain is that Toulouse-Lautrec, like many contemporary painters - one needs only to think of Degas or Bonnard - used photographs as patterns for his painting; in contrast to these other artists, however, Lautrec was himself not an ambitious photographer. In a photograph depicting the tipsy Maurice Guibert at the side of an unknown woman - the pictorial basis of A la Mie - Lautrec may have released the shutter of the camera. But basically he seems to have left the medium to Paul Sescau or precisely to Maurice Guibert, who seems to have advanced around 1890 to becoming the private and unofficial pictorial chronicler of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. What have survived are photographs of Lautrec swimming naked during a sailing meet on the sea by Arcachon (1896). In a letter to his mother from November 1891, the artist speaks of 'wonderfully beautiful photographs of Malrome' that Guibert will send to her. It was above all Guibert who urged his friend to have his portrait taken repeatedly - and in the most ridiculous clothing: Lautrec dressed as a woman, wearing Jane Avril's famous hat decorated with boa on his head (1892); Lautrec as a squinting Japanese in a traditional kimono (also 1892); or as Pierrot (1894) - a sad clown who apparently needed little by way of costuming to create a convincing image. Jean Adhemar has subjected this portfolio to searching analysis: 'Thanks to Guibert,' writes the former curator of the Bibliotheque nationale, 'we accompany Lautrec from 1890 to his death. One sees him in the most various surroundings and in all possible poses. It is particularly striking, however, that we meet a natural Lautrec at most only two or three times. The artist always poses himself; aware that he is being photographed, he places himself in a scene, he never seeks to hide his deformities. On the contrary, he presents them openly, expressly emphasizing his ugliness and his dwarfish stature.' Why does he engage in these travesties? Adhemar finds a logical explanation: 'When Lautrec underlines his infirmity to such an extent, then it is very simply because he was suffering from it - more than we realize. In this sense, his form of masochism becomes a distracting maneuver. He would like to laugh about himself before others do so, or rather: to give his audience occasion to make jokes about something that in fact has nothing to do with his physical defects.' It would have been very simple for Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec to have visited one of the prominent Paris photography studios to ensure, with the help of a practiced portraitist exploiting the photographic means at his command - lighting, pose, framing, perspective, retouching of the negative and positive - a pleasing half- or three-quarters portrait. Instead, the artist left in the hands of a friend and amateur the task of creating the photographic witness that still today defines our image of the tragic genius: Toulouse-Lautrec in his studio. Not at work. Not painting before an easel, but in visual dialogue with a naked prostitute(?). In other words, the loner of Montmartre pursued his own course also in his dealings with photography. | + | |
| + | He is the author of the famous ''[[Toulouse-Lautrec Wearing Jane Avril's Feathered Hat and Boa]]'' (ca. 1892). | ||
| + | ==See also== | ||
| + | *[[Toulouse-Lautrec in his workshop with a nude model]] | ||
| + | *[[Modern Times: Photography in the 20th Century]] | ||
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Revision as of 15:47, 5 February 2015
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Maurice Guibert[1] (1856 - 1913) was a French photographer, remembered for his small oeuvre of photos, mostly of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
He was an agent for the champagne company Moët and Chandon and a member of the Société française de photographie. Little else is known of him other than his self-portraits and photos of Toulouse-Latrec that often led to collaborations such as in the painting A La Mie.
He is the author of the famous Toulouse-Lautrec Wearing Jane Avril's Feathered Hat and Boa (ca. 1892).
See also
Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Maurice Guibert" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.
