- Aubrey Beardsley: A BiographyOur PickBy Matthew Sturgis
- Aubrey BeardsleyBy Stephen Calloway
- The Best of Aubrey BeardsleyBy Kenneth Clark
- Beardsley and Victorian Sexual PoliticsOur PickBy Linda Gertner Zatlin
- Aubrey Beardsley's Erotic UniverseBy Derek Stanford
- The Picture of Dorian GrayBy Oscar Wilde
- The Yellow Book - A SelectionOur PickBy Viking Press
- Decadent LondonBy Anthony Clayton
Important Art by Aubrey Beardsley
How Sir Tristram Drank of the Love Drink (1893-4)
Produced for Thomas Malory's Le Morte D'Arthur, this illustration was one of many that helped tell the author's interpretation of the story of King Arthur, so beloved by the Pre-Raphaelites. The image refers to Tristram and Isolde's doomed love story, which predates and likely influenced the romantic tale of Lancelot and Guinevere. Beardsley depicts the couple as androgynous figures separated by a decorative pillar that bifurcates the composition. The flowers within the picture framing and adorning its border seem ready to burst, suggesting fertile ripeness or perhaps foretelling the blossoming of something more sinister.
Although the book was considered only moderately successful at the time, it has since been dubbed Beardsley's first masterpiece and is credited with popularizing his unique early style that blended a simplified interpretation of textile designer William Morris's medieval floral patterns, Pre-Raphaelite romance, and the darker Decadent themes of sex and death. This drawing is not only an early example of the intersection of the Arts and Crafts movement and Art Nouveau; it was also a social critique. Beardsley's androgynous figures challenged established Victorian gender roles and traditional concepts of sexuality. His illustrations for Le Morte D'Arthur were the last created in his early style and were followed by his mature work in which the influence of the Japanese aesthetic is more evident.
The Woman in the Moon, Frontispiece for Salomé (1894)
This work was created for Salomé, Oscar Wilde's book based on his own play. Inspired by the murderous biblical femme fatale who killed John the Baptist, Wilde's Salomé was condemned as blasphemous. Beardsley's illustrations took this offense to a new level, poking fun not only at repressive Victorian society, but also at the posturing of Wilde himself. Here, a naked man (Page of Herodias) stands protectively in front of a robed man (Narraboth) and gazes apprehensively at the moon on the horizon. In Wilde's rendition of Salomé, both characters fall victim to unrequited love. The Page loves Narraboth; while Narraboth loves Salomé. Standing on Narraboth's robe, the Page attempts to shield them both from the gaze of the moon. In the text, Wilde alludes to the magical power of the moon to hold sway over human moods. Beardsley plays with this idea by depicting the (wo)man in the Moon as the author, Oscar Wilde, who indeed literally controls his characters. The cartoon moon-face seems fat and droopy, similar to other mocking portraits Beardsley created of Wilde that poked fun at his pretensions.
Beardsley has been accused of composing drawings for Salomé that were unrelated to the actual text, but this is not the case. Adopting the Symbolist principle of representing rather than showing something, Beardsley worked to convey a distinct mood or progressive idea related to Wilde's text. By inserting the Page and Narraboth into the frontispiece, a space traditionally reserved for representing the general theme of a text, Beardsley highlights the homosexual passions alluded to throughout the book. The moon's association with Wilde, whose sexual preference was well known, and the inclusion of a carnation left of the moon, worn as an indication of homosexuality at the time, further underscores this theme of same-sex passions, abhorred by conservative Victorian society. In true Symbolist form, Beardsley created illustrations that addressed key social issues beyond Wilde's book. In this sense, the artist accomplished more than merely realizing the text through pictures, as other illustrators did. He used this platform to critique repressive Victorian values.
The Peacock Skirt (1893)
Created by Beardsley for Oscar Wilde's Salomé (1894), this illustration shows the protagonist wrapped in a long, flowing garment embroidered with designs reminiscent of peacock feathers. Indeed a peacock hovers at the left while Salomé looms threateningly over the young man so enamoured of her, as though posed to seduce and devour him. Effeminately rendered, the man's legs visible beneath his cloak belie his gender. This image appears in the book alongside seemingly unrelated text: soldiers discuss noise emitting from a banquet hall; while the young man describes Salomé's beauty.
In many of his illustrations for Salomé, Beardsley challenges Victorian concepts of sexuality and gender roles. But the modern notion of the "New Woman" is perhaps most clearly evident in The Peacock Skirt. Contrary to the Victorian notion of the passive and subordinate female, here Beardsley depicts Salomé as self-possessed, sexually charged, and, most appallingly, dominant. The title of the drawing and the peacock decor may be in reference to dialogue in the following pages in which Herod offers Salomé a gift of peacocks. This not withstanding, Beardsley's rendering is most certainly influenced by James Abbott McNeill Whistler's Peacock Room, which the artist so greatly admired. Indicative of Beardsley's mature style, this image speaks to the artist's fascination with the Japanese aesthetic - an interest he shared with Whistler and other late-19th-century painters. This characteristic combined with flowing, arabesque lines, strict two-dimensionality, and decorative patterns, make The Peacock Skirt a superb example of early Art Nouveau.
Influences and Connections
