Monsieur Boileau at the cafe - Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1893) Oil and tempera with charcoal on millboard ( archive.org )
Cleveland’s 1925 purchase of this work by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec marked the first acquisition of one of the artist’s drawings by a museum in the United States. Its subject, Monsieur Boileau, was a gossip columnist known to drink heavily at Le Mirliton, a nightclub. Here, saturated, acidic tones evoke the room’s gas...