The year 2022 marks the centenary of the Toulouse-Lautrec donation to the Albi museum. This donation transformed the modest provincial museum into an internationally renowned museum. On this occasion, a tribute exhibition to the Albigensian artist is presented from May 17 to September 4, 2022. Inspired by a mention in his correspondence, the exhibition proposes to highlight the look of the young Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901) on the work of Edgar Degas (1834-1917).
The exhibition offers a new approach to the work of Toulouse-Lautrec, questioning his sources of inspiration. Important loans, from major national institutions, such as the Musée d'Orsay, and European institutions as well as from private collections, illustrate the course of the exhibition and interact with the collection of the Toulouse-Lautrec museum, i.e. more than 80 works brought together. .
Older by a generation, thirty years separate them, Degas is one of the main and lasting influences of the art of Toulouse-Lautrec. The two painters settled in Paris, in the same district, and found their inspiration there, walking along the main boulevards, frequenting cafés and brothels, sitting on the bleachers of circuses or racetracks, attending the shows of the Opera and café-concerts.
Drawing their roots from naturalism, they immortalized their contemporaries encountered in these places of entertainment and made them the subject of their works, illustrations of modern life. The human or animal figure is captured in all the diversity of its attitudes and expressions.
Palais de la Berbie
Place Sainte-Cécile BP 100
81003 Albi cedex