Film Moulin Rouge Reflects Cafe Concert Trend

Art Business News, August, 2001 by Laura Meyers

Artists who immortalized the Moulin Rouge and other cabarets include Toulouse-Lautrec, Jules Cheret, whose poster announcing the opening of the Moulin Rouge in 1889 depicted a troupe of young ladies parading on donkeys, wearing low-cut dresses. A year later, Cheret's "Elysee Montmartre/Bal Masque" portrays a couple dancing with wild abandon. Jules-Alexandre Grun also depicted slightly-naughty revelers at local cabarets.

"Toulouse-Lautrec was considered somewhat scandalous because he painted prostitutes and other wild and unsavory characters. But when it came to posters--most of which were used for advertising and widely posted on the streets of Paris--the images were much more conservative. Even his famous poster for the Moulin Rouge reveals nothing more than the dancer's calves--in stockings," commented Patti Schuldenfrei, [S.sub.2] Art's communications director.

"There's a tremendous interest in vintage posters from that period," continued Schuldenfrei. "We began producing our `recreations' of these images about five years ago and have had great response ever since--original vintage posters from that time are extremely rare and often astronomically priced, [and yet] people love the nostalgia of these images and the way they take you back to another time and place."

The company has been fielding increased inquiries for its recreated Cafe-Concert posters, especially the "Moulin Rouge" image, although, Schuldenfrei acknowledged, "I can't say we've felt any sales boost due to Moulin Rouge--it would be hard to make that connection so soon."

Other art publishers and dealers are jumping on the Moulin Rouge pop culture bandwagon. All Posters.com, which bills itself as "the world's largest poster and print store," created a specially merchandised page on its Web site linked to the phrase `Moulin Rouge' and features four different Toulouse Lautrec/Moulin Rouge images. Similarly, MovieGoods.com is marketing film posters from both this year's movie and the 1952 film of the same name. The Global Poster Co. in upstate New York is also attempting to market a poster from the period, "La Boheme," by linking to "Moulin Rouge" in Internet search engines. Thus far, Owner R.A. Downey reported, "It has not made an impact."

But artist Rubin Bore, who in his recent work has combined vintage Cafe-Concert poster imagery with Paris street scenes, is experiencing success with these new works.

"The artist, my father, did these paintings because he knew about the movie," said Eduard Bore, who runs the R. Bore Gallery in Roslyn Heights, N.Y. (another brother runs a family-owned gallery in Milan, Italy). The paintings were exhibited at Artexpo New York in March, and now Bore is publishing editions of giclees on canvas and girlies on velvet paper, slated for release this fall.

"The series has sold very well for us," said Bore. "People walk in the gallery, and as soon as they see [the works] they say, "I've got to have it'."

Whether or not the movie Moulin Rouge has directly affected art sales, it has, in the very least, introduced this period and style into the public's consciousness. "It's always great when people are actually talking about an art period and an artist, and I think the film Moulin Rouge has inspired this," said Solomon.