In the manner of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
French, 1864–1901
The Rider's Break, 2026
Colour lithograph
120 × 80 cm
Never painted.
Commissioned for the collection, 2026.
PAB 2026.14.3
A delivery rider in a red jacket slumps on a café chair at one in the morning, chin in one hand, phone in the other, his helmet on the little round table like a second head. The bag waits at his feet, red on red. Behind him, a streetlamp and pale Paris façades. Lautrec drew the people who worked the night while others enjoyed it. The rider is working. This is his break.
The brief
A food delivery rider slumped on a café chair at one in the morning, helmet on the table, insulated bag at his feet, scrolling his phone under a red awning. Belle Époque colour lithograph poster, flat bold areas of red, black, mustard and cream, sinuous confident contour lines drawn in crayon, figures cropped sharply at the edges and seen from low tables, spattered tone, faces caricatured with tenderness and fatigue, large empty areas left as paper, gritty printed texture. Flat frontal reproduction of the poster on paper, the sheet fills the frame edge to edge, even lighting, no frame, no wall, no lettering, no text.
Written to the house rules. The painter's name does not appear.
Take it home
The painting on this room's wall, at its own proportions, nothing written on it.
