Bartet and Mounet-Sully, in Antigone

Bartet and Mounet-Sully, in Antigone is a sophisticated print created by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec in 1893. This lithograph captures two renowned performers of the Parisian stage, Julia Bartet and Jean Mounet-Sully, in their roles for the French production of Sophocles’s classical tragedy. The work exemplifies Lautrec’s dedicated focus on documenting the vibrant world of theater and performance in fin-de-siècle Paris, distinguishing it from his more famous depictions of cabaret life in Montmartre.

The piece is technically classified as a crayon and brush lithograph, printed in two colors on wove paper and carefully trimmed to the plate edge. Cataloged as the second state of two, the combination of crayon and brushwork allowed Toulouse-Lautrec to achieve a unique range of textures and tonal depth, capturing the dramatic energy and interaction between the leading man and woman of the production.

Lautrec, a prolific master of the medium, often used his prints to capture fleeting moments of human expression. The composition highlights the intense dramatic relationship between the two figures, reinforcing the tension inherent in the moment they portray. This significant print, illustrating a unique historical intersection of classical tragedy and modern French acting, resides in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. As an important example of 19th-century graphic arts, the demand for prints and study materials related to Toulouse-Lautrec remains high, ensuring that works like this continue to influence artists and scholars, especially as older materials sometimes enter the public domain.