Vintage Poster Archives
Steinlen Chat Noir 1896 | Art Nouveau Poster
Steinlen Chat Noir 1896 | Art Nouveau Poster
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A dense black cat, outlined in grey to suggest the weight of its fur, sits facing the viewer on a cream ground. Behind its head, a circular filigree rosette in saturated crimson carries the inscription 'Montjoye Montmartre', a parody of the medieval battle cry that Rodolphe Salis used to claim Montmartre as the true capital of bohemian Paris. To the right of the cat, hand-lettered type builds in scale through 'Tournée du' to the large block capitals of 'Chat Noir'. Below, a dark-red band carries 'Rodolphe Salis' in white, with the cat's tail looping deliberately into the 'R'.
Steinen designed this lithograph in 1896 to announce the touring shadow-theatre company of Le Chat Noir, the Montmartre cabaret that Salis had founded in 1881 on Boulevard de Rochechouart, now widely considered the first modern cabaret. The poster was intended as a 'prochainement' notice, posted outside provincial venues before the troupe arrived. By 1896, Steinlen had been part of Le Chat Noir's circle for fifteen years, alongside Toulouse-Lautrec, Adolphe Willette, and Paul Verlaine. Original impressions are held by the Bibliothèque nationale de France and the Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University.
Printed using pigment-based archival inks on 200gsm Enhanced Matte Fine Art Paper. The flat graphic colour of the crimson rosette and the solid black of the cat body reproduce with precision, as does the fine grey outline detail that gives the cat its sculptural weight.
A natural reference point for those interested in Belle Époque Paris, the origins of the modern cabaret, or the graphic language of Art Nouveau lithography.
