The Artist's Dog Flèche

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

National Gallery of Art

A white dog spotted with caramel-brown and with long, floppy ears sits in a garden setting near a green park bench in this loosely painted vertical portrait. The dog leans slightly onto its right paw, to our left, and looks off to the right, its ears relaxed. A blue bird crouches near the ground in front of the dog’s feet. Painted with tones of peanut brown and earthy green, a bush and tree trunk fill the background to the right, and the back of the bench is to the left. The artist inscribed the bottom right with his initials, HTL, conjoined in a monogram and the dog’s name, “LA FLECHE.”