Vallotton and the way he looks at women

The film is a useful reminder that Vallotton was never only a painter. Drawing, photography and woodcut all shaped his practice, sharpening his sense of structure, contrast and the way a scene can be built from flatness, edges and tension.

For artists and anyone interested in painting or drawing, the documentary is especially engaging because it focuses on how women are made present in the work. It encourages close looking at framing, posture and distance, and at how those choices change the mood and meaning of an image.

Born in 1865 and dead in 1925, Vallotton belonged to the Nabi movement, but his work extends beyond that label. The film also notes that he wrote an autobiographical novel, a reminder that his visual art was part of a broader practice in which images, techniques and writing fed one another.