The crippled Lautrec's brief adulthood was spent mostly in the cafés and brothels of Paris, his suffering alleviated by absinthe, 'fun' and hard work. He never flinched at recording what he saw with penetrating insight and compassion. Sweetman does him proud, putting him and his art into the context of the challenge to entrenched attitudes about sex, politics and women's place in a man's world, exemplified by the trials of Oscar Wilde, Dreyfus and the anarchists.
(James Baker - bwl 8 April 2001 ) |
