Pycnodysostosis and the making of an artist
Introduction
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was an artist, a drunk and a self-fashioned bohemian. He is best known for his posters and paintings of cabaret performers in the nightclubs of late 19th century Paris. Picturing dancers of the Moulin Rouge, prostitutes and radicals, his images have come to define our understanding of life on the periphery of French society.
Yet Toulouse-Lautrec is not only renowned for his dissident lifestyle and avant-garde works. Suffering from a rare genetic disorder, he is also known as a medical curiosity. Triggering a debate that has spanned decades and disciplines, his symptoms have been a challenge to identify. However, despite ongoing disagreement and flaws in the evidence, one diagnosis has been in favour. In fact, the acclaimed artist is now so closely associated with a form of dwarfism – pycnodysostosis – that the condition is often described as the ‘Toulouse-Lautrec Syndrome’.
Whatever the diagnosis, the title ‘Toulouse-Lautrec Syndrome’ is apt. For in many ways the artist not only defined the condition, but also the condition defined him. It played a critical role in his life and works. Impacting his character and choices, the disorder shaped the way Toulouse-Lautrec envisioned the world and those around him. The still undiagnosed syndrome was the making of an artist.
Section snippets
The short life of Toulouse-Lautrec
Toulouse-Lautrec was born in 1864 to an aristocratic family in the South West of France. His grandmothers were sisters and his parents, Comte Alphonse-Charles de Toulouse-Lautrec and Comtesse Adèle Zoë Céleyran de Toulouse-Lautrec, were first cousins (Frey, 1995c, Sweetman, 1999). Gaining wealth, status and privilege from his parents, it was also from their consanguineous marriage that Toulouse-Lautrec inherited a genetic disorder that left him short statured and crippled.
From a young age it
The diagnosis of Toulouse-Lautrec
There has been substantial debate over Toulouse-Lautrec's diagnosis. From surviving documents and images, there is little doubt that the artist suffered with disproportionate dwarfism, with short limbs and a normal trunk length (Fig. 1). However what remains unclear is the cause of this condition, as the precise features of his disease and its underlying pathology have proved difficult to decipher.
During his lifetime, initial diagnoses attributed his symptoms to dampness, nerves, poor nutrition
The making of an artist
Toulouse-Lautrec tackled the difficulties of his condition head on. Visibly deformed, physically handicapped and marginalised from the lifestyle of his aristocratic class, the artist made his home among the outsiders of Paris. With a group of loyal friends, from artists and intellectuals, to prostitutes and coachmen, it seemed that he did not wish to hide from public view. Instead, he used his art to satirise his deformities and attack any patronising sentimentality directed towards him.
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2016, Indian Journal of RheumatologyCitation Excerpt :In our case, the diagnosis of pycnodysostosis was made based on clinical and radiographic features. Pycnodysostosis, also known as Toulouse-Lautrec syndrome, is a rare autosomal recessive bone disease.2 It is due to mutations in the cathepsin K gene located on chromosome 1q21.3
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2019, Journal of OrthopaedicsCitation Excerpt :It is named after Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901), a famous French artist of the late 19th century, who suffered from a mysterious disease. Born from consanguineous parents, he inherited a genetic disorder that left him short statured and visibly deformed.4,5 After his death, there was much debate about his underlying disease.