ALBERT GUILLAUME (1873-1942) A LA SCALA. 1908.

50x35 inches. Minot, Paris.
Condition A-: restoration along vertical and horizontal folds. Framed.
A grand bourgeois, Guillaume began his career working as a caricaturist for many magazines and soon became a prolific poster designer. He transferred his humorist realism to the larger format of posters, using a gallery of characters (bourgeoisie, officers, aristocrats and servants) to advertise drinks and groceries. These caricatures were humorous and well drawn, but tended to lack style and class. Guillaume, however, had an artistic side that reflected his command of light tones and sophisticated nuance. In this poster more than any of his others, one can see the talented, delicate painter he could be when he represented genteel Parisian life. The elegant, atmospheric effect that he creates using light and shadow epitomizes the upper-class fin-de-siecle mood that permeates many of his paintings of scenes inside theaters or at the opera. Maitres 1900 p. 57.