Toulouse-Lautrec in Marunouchi!

Today was Culture Day in Japan, so Terry and I got our cult-cha on big time at the Mitsubishi Ichigokan Museum, currently showing drawings and lithographs by late 19th-century Parisien painter Toulouse-Lautrec. There are write ups about it in both Tokyo Art Beat and the Japan Times, if you want details. I'll just say I highly recommend it. The exhibition runs through Dec. 25. The museum is located near the JR Tokyo station, address 2-6-2 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 100-0005. (We took the Hibiya metro line from Ebisu to the Hibiya station, exit B7).


A copy of one of T-L's most famous portraits, that of cabaret singer Aristide Bruant, happens to grace a building facade on 18th Street in Adams Morgan, in Washington DC. The Toulouse-Lautrec bar that occupied that building is no longer there -- the space has apparently been vacant for some time -- but the mural remains. Even though my friends and I, I won't say how many years ago, favored Millie & Al's across the street (cheapest pitcher of beer in town, but how did we eat that awful pizza??), Toulouse-Lautrec will always make me think of college.