pitilessly before its scythe whatsoever would hinder its course. The
delicious little plays appealing to the ready appreciation of the
Faubourg Montmartrois, as well as to the keenest critics,--pantomimes of
ephemeral beauty, extraordinary shows and shadow dances,--find no longer
this stage waiting to extend its hospitality for their interpretation.
It has no successor. A multitude of little people--feeble flames--were
snuffed out as the Chat Noir closed its doors for ever. But there were
those to whom the Café was only an ante-chamber to larger rooms; and
among these men Steinlen is conspicuous.
The various quarters of Paris are magnets, drawing inevitably unto them
those spirits who shall understand, who shall find their ways
sympathetic, who shall become their poets, historians, painters.
The sensitive Boutet de Monvel reveals the Champs-Elysées, the Bois de
Boulogne, the parks, the communal schools, and the gardens; for this
painter of children seeks only the reposeful ways where children go,
where they study, are led, carried, or wander safely alone.
In Belleville, Geoffroy has been responsive to benevolence and charity
from man to man. He presents the Foundling Schools, the Asylums. The
[Illustration: STREET CHILDREN]
soothing atmosphere of charity envelops his work--he has seen the poor
through the medium of philanthropic faith. Daumier, the father of
personal caricature, sixty years ago regarded Paris with the
philosopher’s eyes. Gavarni looked through the single eyeglass of the
man of fashion, as it were, on the petty vanities of the gay social
world.
And Steinlen?
He is “a lover of life,” “an adorer of truth.” In his youth, even,
surrounded by the wild _jeunesse_ of the student quarter, his spirit was
calmer, profounder than the others. Montmartre became the magnet drawing
to its centre this ardent soul; in Montmartre, then, as to-day, he saw
the Giant Need, imperfectly met by the vast charity of the world. It is
from this district that his eternal plea resounds for the poor whose
necessities are eternal. He finds his quarter tragic in its commonplace
moods; to him the passions of the people have spoken. There is vibrant
and touching pathos in his rendering of the love-story of the grisettes,
the love-story of the workman and workwoman of the people, an infinite
tenderness in his pictures of humble family life--the gathering of the
sad little bands enveloped by the fervour of maternity, when the frail
mother, bending over her children, has more love to give than bread.
And if, as we study and consider his work, we are shocked at times, and
claim that the truth is unpleasing--is this not because his subjects are
sought among those phases of life to which too often we willingly close
our eyes?
Steinlen is a Swiss Protestant of simple parentage. He was born in
Lausanne, and is Parisian by adoption only. His grandfather was a
painter of talent. Save for the fact that Steinlen married at twenty and
came to Paris to earn his bread with his brush and pencil, his history
has no special interest. He had no time or chance to follow the academic
course of study in the _ateliers_ of Paris. In order to meet his
responsibilities, he had to make money, and at once. He therefore turned
his talent to every use.
“I made designs for wall-paper,” he says, “for cotton stuffs, even,--to
say nothing of illustrations for booksellers and book-writers, and for
song-writers.”
Some of his most important work has been done through the medium of a
newspaper. During the years 1891-92 _Gil Blas_ printed all the drawings
Steinlen could finish. He laboured with energy almost ferocious, under
the pressing need of means for daily existence. The result was the
finest. It is not too much to state
[Illustration: MOTHER’S LOVE]
that this work of Steinlen’s in _Gil Blas_ helped to revolutionise
illustrative art in the periodicals of France.
He gave to the accomplishment of his editor’s orders his best effort,
and filled during nearly two years the weekly pages, not for the
amusement of his public, but for their awakening to the interest in the
life of Paris as seen in the Faubourgs. Awaken and instruct he did. He
made a call upon sympathy, and stirred and stimulated charity; but also
his art was an epoch in illustrative journalism.
Public and editors demanded thenceforth more than the inadequate
drawings of mediocrity, and solicited sketches from the best pencils.
The modern French weeklies exhibit the cleverest possible illustrations,
forming in their class the highest grade.
Frontispiece and other drawings in _Le Rire_ and _Gil Blas_ to-day by
Jean Veber, Léandre, Willette, are delights to the collector, and any
one possessing the years containing Steinlen’s contributions to these
papers is considered fortunate.
For the most part the illustrations in _Gil Blas_ are coloured. They are
satires on life drawn to accompany some “_Saut d’esprit_” or to portray
simply street scenes as Steinlen knows them, or are political cartoons.
In his street studies he has been relentless in his realism, careless of
how unpleasant may be the impression of these frankly told horrors. No
detail of sordid existence has been neglected in his bold depicting of
the city’s misery.
Needless to say how admirable is the technique in these sketches, the
fresh vigorous work of a man whose spirit alone was in the subject,
whose ambition chafed for the leisure to create in what to him was the
great province of art, the picture, the oil-painting.
It was in the early part of his career that he added to the glory of the
modern poster. Artists of distinction in London and Paris have not
hesitated to employ their talent in street-wall decoration. In France,
Steinlen has many rivals amongst favourite painters of the day, most
notably Léandre, Willette, Cheret. But the Steinlen posters have not
been surpassed nor superseded. They are immensely popular, peculiarly
happy.
It is scarcely necessary to recall “_Lait Pur Sterilisé_,” the enormous
poster of world-wide popularity; it is universally known--there was a
craze for it in Paris and in New York--of its type it is perfection. The
subject is a dear little girl, red-haired, red-robed, seated before
[Illustration: A STEINLEN POSTER]
a table drinking a bowl of milk, under the jealous eyes of three great
cats. The child is Steinlen’s little daughter, and the drawing of child
and cats is as skilful and clever as it well can be.
There are several charming _affiches_ especially designed for Sarah
Bernhardt--others for Yvette Guilbert. Chiefest of these is the famous
Café des Ambassadeurs. Steinlen made in this a striking portrait of the
original _café chanteuse_; and Yvette,--slender, lithe, enchanting, as
Paris and the world has found her,--boasts no more characteristic
portrait of herself than the Steinlen poster.
Advertisements for Vernet les Bains, Trouville, the posters Mothu,
Doria, and lastly Le Rêve--may be mentioned as important. They are all
difficult to obtain.
These studies, for a purpose of necessity transient, destined to be
transmitted to paper and pasted along street walls by a bill-poster’s
brush, constructed to catch the crowd’s attention in order that their
mission should be fulfilled--are neither vulgar nor sensational.
Vigorous, strong, they are worthy the word Steinlen applies to his other
work--“_Serious_.” They are done with his characteristic splendid
stroke. Their colouring is brilliant, crude and boldly frank the
drawing. Steinlen’s stroke is celebrated: eminently fearless, rapid,
trenchant. It has been cleverly said that in each of his creations the
_trait marquant_ is so deeply emphasised, the one idea is so imposed,
that it is as though when his work were done he drew below it one dark
black line. In his studio may be seen a wall-decoration destined rather
for a _café_ than for a poster--a study of the streets, a bit of the
passing crowd, taken out, as it were, and held before us. Steinlen has
renounced this branch of popular decoration. His posters are already
rare, and are becoming yearly more valuable.
Steinlen has done an immense amount of illustrating. Many volumes of
François Coppée, Anatole France, and Guy de Maupassant are made doubly
attractive by his collaboration. He has illustrated the songs of Bruant
and Jouy, of Montmartre and student fame. Among some of the publications
valuable chiefly because Steinlen has collaborated with the writers may
be mentioned “Chanson d’Aïeules” (Tellier, Paris); “Chanson des Cabots”
(Guetville); and “Chanson Rouge” (Boukay).
These illustrations number, amongst other subjects, “The Chief of the
Claque,” “The Cabotins of Paris,”
[Illustration: WORK-GIRLS]
“The Souffleurs of the Theatre,” “The Director of the Theatre Himself.”
Each little picture is gay, familiar, intelligent, finely conceived and
finely drawn. For a song dedicated to Alphonse Daudet he has a strong
study of symbolic misery: a nude creature kneeling in the middle of a
deserted street, arms out-spread ready to clutch her prey, who is the
passer-by. In the same book we have “The Knifegrinder,” “The
Needlewoman,” “The Wine-seller.” Paris seems to have given up her
hetacomb of human souls and human bodies for his observation and
portrayal. In the drawing for a book of Coppée’s is “The _Gamin_ of
Paris,” a little half elf creature, half human child. This ghoul, seated
on a mass of refuse, is red-eyed and horrible in his misery. He typifies
Belleville, the Whitechapel of Paris. He is the accrued poverty,
squalor, and criminal tendencies of generations combined with the
frailty of childhood, the slenderness of youth. The subject is powerful,
the workmanship excellent.
The best of his illustrations have been made for Edouard Pelletan, the
publisher in the Boulevard St. Germain. M. Pelletan has conceived the
idea of bringing out a yearly publication called _L’Almanach du
Bibliophile_. Jules Claretie, Anatole France, Gustave Larroumet, and
Sully Prud’homme, have collaborated to write a series of articles. But
Steinlen is the feature of the publication. Monsieur Pelletan asked him
to make a dozen drawings whose headings should be the twelve months of
the year, the general subject to be the glorification of Labour. But
Steinlen grew enthusiastic over his task, and drew many more than the
twelve studies. A collection of the designs was on exhibition in
Monsieur Pelletan’s library during 1901.
These pictures--for they are not studies, but admirably finished
creations--represent the working man and the working woman in the
pursuit of their various occupations. We see the _blanchisseuse_ stagger
home through the drizzling mist, bowed under her huge burden of linen.
On the skeleton scaffolding the builder becomes a speck, infinitely far
from his fellows; the apprentice goes chattering gaily along with her
companions,--again we have the attractive girl of the people, whose
class in France is distinct, and whose personality is so agreeable.
Steinlen touches with his happiest, lightest stroke the gay figure of
youth and charm.
Another drawing portrays the family again around
[Illustration: DRY-POINT ETCHING]
the humble board. But the finest of the suite are four pictures drawn at
Monsieur Pelletan’s suggestion that Steinlen should show the public what
his skill was in careful, minute technique; for the critics have accused
him of too great facility and too rapid production. He has called the
first picture “Le Bois,” where a carpenter, a strong, well-drawn figure,
nude to the waist, bends over the rough planks of wood, yielding in long
curling shavings to his plane. In the second, “La Pierre,” the
stone-polisher crouches over his well-nigh implacable mass of stone,
until he may almost distinguish his image in the smooth surface. In the
third, “Le Fer,” a like half-nude labourer struggles with his contortion
of the mighty mineral. Lastly, Steinlen has depicted the miner, deep in
his cavern’s interior.
These studies demand a first place in the catalogue of modern drawing,
and lack in the perfected workmanship none of Steinlen’s distinctive,
free, untrammelled handling of his subject and expression of his art.
They would not lose, placed side by side with the drawings of Puvis, and
indeed possess the primitive purity of line and reveal the serious
conception which mark the work of masters.
Pelletan has just published Anatole France’s new book “L’Affaire
Crainquebille,” a satire on French law and modes of justice, done in
Anatole France’s most delightful manner, and illustrated by Steinlen.
Crainquebille, a seller of turnips, which he pushes through the streets
in a little hand-cart, is accused of having called out to a policeman
“_Mort aux Vaches!_”--a slang opprobium of the streets. The poor
innocent, unconscious of offending, is haled to the courts, where he
becomes the victim of a most amusing and witty _procès_, withal
tragically pathetic. He is condemned to prison, and when once more at
liberty attempts to resume his ancient, respectable calling. He finds
himself a pariah, shunned because of the stigma of “jail-bird!”
Crainquebille falls into abject poverty and inebriation. In his starving
misery he reflects, “Prison isn’t half a bad place, after all!” and to
partake once more of its peace he sins deliberately. Bearding the
policeman in his den--that is, the street lamp’s shadow--he cries out to
him, “_Mort aux Vaches!_” But the amiable officer, “un bon père de
famille,” laughs at the old man and bids him go about his business. The
poor old Crainquebille finds the justice of the world too intricate to
comprehend. Imprisoned for a fault which when repeated evokes
[Illustration: A STEINLEN POSTER]
mirth! He disappears in the fogs of a winter street.
This collaboration of Anatole France and Steinlen is _spirituel_ and
successful. “Once more Steinlen was quite carried away” (Monsieur
Pelletan says); “I suggested twenty drawings. He has given me
fifty-five!” And each illustration is a little masterpiece, admirable in
execution and full of sympathy with the class the downtrodden
Crainquebille represents.
It is false to suppose that Steinlen does not give to each of his
creations the greatest pains. For the little volume called “Le Chien de
Brisquet”[A] he made eighty drawings for Anatole France before he got
one to his satisfaction, and it was for “Le Chien de Brisquet,” which
volume of drawings it will be difficult to surpass, that Steinlen drew
and re-drew his canine sketches. “Although,” said Monsieur Pelletan, “I
assure you _I_ was quite satisfied with the first drawings!”
A word must be said regarding his feline studies. Cats have been
favourite animals with poets and painters: witness Baudelaire, Poe,
Coppée, Manet; and Steinlen, too, has found these slender, graceful
felines interesting. There is in his representation of this animal a
subtle perceiving of the link and of the difference between the brute
and the human. It suggests the masters whose paintings of animals have
made them famous, Landseer above all. When his book “Le Chat” came out,
it was bought at first for children, but could not long be kept in the
nurseries. Copies were pilfered for drawing-rooms and studios, where
elders claimed these treasures of clever design. Steinlen’s host of
drawings are undoubted indications of a power not to be confined in the
sphere of the illustration for books. Admirers of Steinlen’s look for
great things of him during the next years, claiming that his future is
more brilliant in promise than any of his colleagues, Jean Veber
excepted.
Steinlen himself is a delightful personality, and distinctly a force.
The grasp of his hand, the fire of his eye, his courtesy, charm, and the
pleasure it is to hear him speak, render him an unusual companion. His
friends, naturally, are legion--he is much beloved; but, as they say in
France, he is _très sauvage_--preferring to let the world go its ways,
and to shut himself away with his work in his remote studio.
His intimate contact with the very poor, the very
[Illustration: A STEINLEN POSTER]
suffering, has formed his points of view and left its mark on his
nature. He is a Bohemian, and values slightly luxuries and ways of
modern worldly life. He is familiar with the haunts of the thieves in
the dangerous parts of Paris: he may well take his life in his hands--he
is beloved and known, he is safe. He knows the interiors where
starvation and cold and crime are side by side. He has helped
generously, who can say how many? directly from his own purse and
indirectly through the wide sympathy he has aroused.
No peculiarities of the fluctuating mass which is the very life of the
city, which is the agglomerate expression of pleasure, pain, vice,
crime, good, evil, sadness, joy, are lost upon Steinlen. He seems to be
_en rapport_ with those people whom we call our brothers and treat as
our inferiors and our enemies. The tricks, the attitudes, the
expressions, the behaviour of the passers-by are familiar to him. With a
few clever strokes of brush or pencil he has given us the _piquante
ouvrière_, the modest apprentice, in a graceful, unconscious pose as she
poises on her hip the hat-box she is carrying to a customer. In this
_jeune fille_ representative, in the toss of her head, the curve of her
arm, the swish of her neat skirts high above her well-shod feet, in
this jaunty creature, scrupulous as to tidiness, is a certain phase of
Paris drawn with crystalline distinctness. This girl of the people is
dangerous, charming, and to her the boulevardier is an enemy. Paris is
epitomised by this one flaring street-wall decoration. So much for the
_jeunesse_, gay, laborious, and generally self-respecting. We do not
often see Steinlen so gay.
In his studio in the Rue Caulaincourt, walking to and fro, he converses
delightfully with his friends. He is a workman, his muscular hands are
full of force, his build powerful, although he is compact and small. He
suggests endurance, and the patience that is the result of hand-to-hand
tussle with existence, and tender understanding of the needs of one’s
neighbour. His eyes are keen, penetrating, and kind, his features
strong. He has a golden voice, as the French say, caressing and
indolent. Its measured cadence, its slow, agreeable flow contrasts
strongly with the man himself. He wears the coarse velveteens of the
labourer, cuffs close around his muscular wrists. His trousers are
voluminous, and on his feet flap loose Indian slippers. His appearance,
and the fact that his studio is in one of the poorest quarters of Paris,
his whole attitude and life, suggest, not a
[Illustration: EN ATTENDANT]
scorn of material things, but a perfect ability to forego them.
The studio is a workshop first of all; it is free from would-be artistic
decorations, full of canvases and folios of drawings. He has his own
lithographic stones, and does his own printing, holding this as an art
important, as do many of the moderns; and he, as well as many another
modern, insists on the expediency of making his own colours.
Steinlen thinks unfavourably of academies and salons, “where,” he says,
“in order to exhibit at stated periods the artists paint anything and
everything under rush and stress.” He sends to no public collections.
When a goodly number of studies have accumulated in his studio, he
organises a little _exposition_ of his own, and the admirers of his work
have an opportunity to visit a Steinlen exhibition in the autumn, when
he will delight, charm, and touch the public as he has never hitherto
failed to do.
At this period of his life--and he is still young--he finds the
insistent needs of daily existence are met; and he draws, as it were, a
sigh of relief, and turns toward what is his recreation, because a
beloved labour, and the goal of his career, painting in oil. Steinlen
bemoans the fact that he lacks the prescribed technicalities an
academic education would have given to him; but this fact has left him a
freedom from rules which, in spite of their immense importance, are
often trammels to individuality. At all events the daring boldness of
his stroke, and his perfect originality, have been developed with no
hindrance. Need has been his spur, talent the response to the goad.
Possibly Steinlen is nowhere better displayed than in a certain canvas
at present in his studio in the Rue Caulaincourt. It is a life-size oil
painting, a study of a man and woman in the working class. It is
evidently the end of the day, and the scene a nook or corner in some
room so distant from the rooms we all know that it is hard even to
imagine where it may be. The workman has taken the young creature in his
arms for a long embrace. His head is bent over her, and she looks out
from the picture above the man’s arm. Her face is exquisite, and in
thorough keeping with the type of her class.
The sombre note predominates throughout Steinlen’s work. That inevitable
penalty of sadness which must be paid when the eye dares to look, and
the soul dares to consider how our fellow beings struggle for
existence.
[Illustration: A STUDY]
The work of this man, who is not a caricaturist, but a student and
faithful representer, bears a strong likeness to things in literature
rather than to things in art. He suggests Dickens, Zola, Tolstoi.
Throughout his work is apparent the broad sympathy of a man of the
people who has espoused their cause and made himself their prophet.
Part of the crowd, elbow to elbow with humanity in the very vortex of
the mass, he has felt the multitude, blood and sinew, around him, until
it has become amalgamated fairly with his inspiration. Then withdrawn to
a fortification, possibly, of his city, in semi-retirement, he lets the
turbulent suggestions take form that he may present them to the world.
Thus Steinlen, so closely of the people, is in reality separated from
mankind by virtue of his talent. And if to the eye demanding agreeable
form, beauty seems sometimes lacking in this artist’s strong, original,
profoundly human creations, it may be said that æsthetics do not abound
in the walks of life which this student of humanity portrays.
Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO.
London & Edinburgh
FOOTNOTE:
[A] Chez Pelletan.
End of Project Gutenberg's Modern French Masters, by Marie Van Vorst