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Aubrey Beardsley

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Aubrey Beardsley
Portrait by Frederick Hollyer, 1893
Portrait by Frederick Hollyer, 1893
Born Aubrey Vincent Beardsley
21 August 1872
Brighton, Sussex, England
Died 16 March 1898 (aged 25)
Menton, France
Resting place Cimetière du Vieux-Château, Menton, France[1]
Education Westminster School of Art
Known for Illustration, graphics/graphic arts
Notable work The Climax
Movement Art Nouveau, aestheticism

Aubrey Vincent Beardsley (/ˈbɪərdzli/ BEERDZ-lee; 21 August 1872 – 16 March 1898) was an English illustrator and author. His black ink drawings were influenced by Japanese woodcuts, and depicted the grotesque, the decadent, and the erotic. He was a leading figure in the aesthetic movement, which also included Oscar Wilde and James McNeill Whistler. Beardsley's contribution to the development of the Art Nouveau and poster styles was significant despite his early death from tuberculosis. He is one of the important Modern Style figures.

Early life, education, and early career

Beardsley was born in Brighton, Sussex, England, on 21 August 1872 and christened on 24 October 1872.[2] His father, Vincent Paul Beardsley (1839–1909), was the son of a Clerkenwell jeweller;[3][4] Vincent had no trade himself (partly owing to tuberculosis, from which his own father had died aged only 40),[5][6] and relied on a private income from an inheritance that he received from his maternal grandfather, a property developer, when he was 21.[7] Vincent's wife, Ellen Agnus Pitt (1846–1932), was the daughter of Surgeon-Major William Pitt of the Indian Army. The Pitts were a well-established and respected family in Brighton, and Beardsley's mother married a man of lesser social status than might have been expected. Soon after their wedding, Vincent was obliged to sell some of his property in order to settle a claim for his breach of promise of marriage from another woman, the widow of a clergyman,[8] who claimed that he had promised to marry her.[9] At the time of his birth, Beardsley's family, which included his sister Mabel who was one year older, were living in Ellen's familial home at 12 Buckingham Road.[10][8] At the age of seven, Beardsley contracted tuberculosis.[11]

With the loss of Vincent Beardsley's fortune soon after his son's birth, the family settled in London in 1883, where Vincent would work first for the West India & Panama Telegraph Company, then irregularly as a clerk at breweries;[12][4] they would spend the next 20 years in rented accommodation, battling poverty. Ellen took to presenting herself as the "victim of a mésalliance".[13][14] In 1884, Aubrey appeared in public as an "infant musical phenomenon", playing at several concerts with his sister. In January 1885, he began to attend Brighton, Hove and Sussex Grammar School, where he spent the next four years. His first poems, drawings, and cartoons appeared in print in Past and Present, the school's magazine. In 1888, he obtained a post in an architect's office and afterwards one in the Guardian Life and Fire Insurance Company. In 1891, under the advice of Sir Edward Burne-Jones and Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, he took up art as a profession. In 1892, he attended the classes at the Westminster School of Art, then under Professor Fred Brown.[15]

Work

Beardsley travelled to Paris in 1892, where he discovered the poster art of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and the Parisian fashion for Japanese prints. His first commission was Le Morte d'Arthur by Thomas Malory (1893), illustrated for the publishing house J.M. Dent and Company.[16] In 1894, a new translation of Lucian's True History, with illustrations by Beardsley, William Strang, and J. B. Clark, was privately printed in an edition of 251 copies.[17]

Beardsley had six years of creative output, which can be divided into several periods, identified by the form of his signature. In the early period, his work is mostly unsigned. During 1891 and 1892, he progressed to using his initials A.V.B. In mid-1892, the period of Le Morte d'Arthur and The Bon Mots, he used a Japanese-influenced mark that became progressively more graceful, sometimes accompanied by A.B. in block capitals.[18]

He co-founded The Yellow Book with American writer Henry Harland, and for the first four editions, he served as art editor and produced the cover designs and many illustrations for the magazine. He was aligned with Aestheticism, the British counterpart of Decadence and Symbolism. Most of his images are done in ink and feature large dark areas contrasted with large blank ones as well as areas of fine detail contrasted with areas with none at all.

Beardsley was the most controversial artist of the Art Nouveau era, renowned for his dark and perverse images and grotesque erotica, which were the main themes of his later work. He satirized Victorian values regarding sex, which at the time highly valued respectability, and men's fear of female superiority, as the women's movement made gains in economic rights and occupational and educational opportunities by the 1880s.[19][20]

His illustrations were in black and white against a white background. Some of his drawings, inspired by Japanese shunga artwork, featured enormous genitalia. His most famous erotic illustrations concerned themes of history and mythology; these include his illustrations for a privately printed edition of Aristophanes' Lysistrata and his drawings for Oscar Wilde's play Salome, which eventually premiered in Paris in 1896. Other major illustration projects included an 1896 edition of The Rape of the Lock by Alexander Pope.[16]

He also produced extensive illustrations for books and magazines (e.g., for a deluxe edition of Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur) and worked for magazines such as The Studio and The Savoy, of which he was a co-founder. As a co-founder of The Savoy, Beardsley was able to pursue his writing as well as illustration, and a number of his writings, including Under the Hill (a story based on the Tannhäuser legend) and "The Ballad of a Barber" appeared in the magazine.[21]

Beardsley was a caricaturist and did some political cartoons, mirroring Wilde's irreverent wit in art. Beardsley's work reflected the decadence of his era and his influence was enormous, clearly visible in the work of the French Symbolists, the Poster Art Movement of the 1890s and the work of many later-period artists such as Frank C. Papé and Harry Clarke. In 1897 Leonard Smithers published some alleged works of Beardsley's in a book titled Fifty Drawings by Aubrey Beardsley, Selected from the Collection of Mr. H.S. Nicols. They were later discovered to be forgeries, distinguishable by their almost pornographic erotic elements rather than Beardsley's subtler use of sexuality.[22]

Beardsley often hid obscene details in his work; publishers took to examining works with a magnifying glass before publication.[23]

Beardsley's work continued to cause controversy in Britain long after his death. During an exhibition of Beardsley's prints held at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London in 1966, a private gallery in London was raided by the police for exhibiting copies of the same prints on display at the museum and the owner was charged under obscenity laws.[24][25]

Personal life

Beardsley was a public as well as private eccentric. He said "I have one aim—the grotesque. If I am not grotesque, I am nothing." Wilde said Beardsley had "a face like a silver hatchet, and grass green hair".[26] Beardsley was meticulous about his attire: dove-grey suits, hats, ties, and yellow gloves. He appeared at his publisher's in a morning coat and court shoes.[27]

Although Beardsley was associated with the homosexual clique that included Oscar Wilde and other aesthetes, the details of his sexuality remain in question. In his Autobiographies, W. B. Yeats, who knew him well, says that he was not homosexual. Speculation about his sexuality includes rumours of an incestuous relationship with his elder sister, Mabel, who may have become pregnant by her brother and miscarried.[28][29]

During his entire career, Beardsley had recurrent attacks of tuberculosis. He suffered frequent lung haemorrhages and often was unable to work or leave his home.

Beardsley converted to Catholicism in March 1897. The next year, the last letter before his death was to his publisher Leonard Smithers and close friend Herbert Charles Pollitt:

Postmark: March 7, 1898 | Jesus is our Lord and Judge | Dear Friend, I implore you to destroy all copies of Lysistrata and bad drawings … By all that is holy, all obscene drawings. | Aubrey Beardsley | In my death agony.[30]

Both men ignored Beardsley's wishes,[31][32] and Smithers actually continued to sell reproductions as well as forgeries of Beardsley's work.[18]

Death

In December 1896, Beardsley suffered a violent haemorrhage, leaving him in precarious health. By April 1897, a month after his conversion to Catholicism, his deteriorating health prompted a move to the French Riviera. There he died a year later, on 16 March 1898, of tuberculosis at the Cosmopolitan Hotel (now the Résidence Mont Fleuri private apartments) in Menton, Alpes-Maritimes, attended by his mother and sister. He was 25 years old. Following a requiem Mass in Menton Cathedral the following day, his remains were interred in the Cimetière du Trabuquet.[33][34]

Media portrayals

In the 1982 Playhouse drama Aubrey, written by John Selwyn Gilbert, Beardsley was portrayed by actor John Dicks. The drama concerned Beardsley's life from the time of Oscar Wilde's arrest in April 1895, which caused Beardsley to lose his position at The Yellow Book, to his death from tuberculosis in 1898.[35] The BBC documentary Beardsley and His Work was made in 1982.[36] Beardsley is featured on the cover of The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. The 1977 horror film Death Bed: The Bed That Eats is narrated by the entombed spirit of an unnamed artist whose work and manner of death identify him as Beardsley.[37]

In March 2020, BBC Four broadcast the hour-long documentary Scandal & Beauty: Mark Gatiss on Aubrey Beardsley, presented by Mark Gatiss. The programme coincided with the Beardsley exhibition at Tate Britain.[38]

Beardsley's art is mentioned briefly in the 2011 version of the Car Seat Headrest song "Beach Life-in-Death".[39]

Legacy

In 2019 the National Leather Association International established an award named after Beardsley for creators of abstract erotic art.[40]

Works

  • Beardsley, Aubrey, Simon Wilson, and Linda Gertner Zatlin. 1998. Aubrey Beardsley: a centenary tribute. Tokyo: Art Life Ltd. OCLC 42742305

See also

  • Art Nouveau
  • Art Nouveau posters and graphic arts
  • Harry Clarke

General sources

  • Armstrong, Walter (1901). "Beardsley, Aubrey Vincent". In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography (1st supplement). London: Smith, Elder & Co.
  • Beardsley, Aubrey, Simon Wilson, and Linda Gertner Zatlin. 1998. Aubrey Beardsley: a centenary tribute. Tokyo: Art Life Ltd. OCLC 42742305
  • Beerbohm, Max. 1928. 'Aubrey Beardsley' in A Variety of Things. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
  • Benkovitz, Miriam J. 1980. Aubrey Beardsley, an Account of his Life. New York, N.Y.: Putnam. ISBN 0-399-12408-X.
  • Brophy, Brigid (1968). Black and White: A Portrait of Aubrey Beardsley. New York, N.Y.: Stein and Day. OCLC 801979437.
  • Calloway, Stephen. 1998. Aubrey Beardsley. New York, N.Y.: Harry N. Abrams. ISBN 0-8109-4009-4.
  • Dovzhyk, Sasha. 2020. "Aubrey Beardsley in the Russian 'World of Art'". British Art Studies Issue 18. https://doi.org/10.17658/issn.2058-5462/issue-18/sdovzhyk
  • Dowson, Ernest. 1897. The Pierrot of the Minute. Restored edition with Aubrey Beardsley's illustrations, CreateSpace, 2012. Bilingual illustrated edition with French translation by Philippe Baudry, CreateSpace, 2012
  • Fletcher, Ian. 1987. Aubrey Beardsley. Boston, MA: Twayne Publishers. ISBN 0-8057-6958-7.
  • Reade, Brian. 1967. Aubrey Beardsley. New York: Bonanza Books.
  • Ross, Robert. 1909. Aubrey Beardsley London: John Lane.
  • Snodgrass, Chris. 1995. Aubrey Beardsley: Dandy of the Grotesque. New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-509062-4.
  • Symons, Arthur. 1898. Aubrey Beardsley. London: At the Sign of the Unicorn.
  • Sturgis, Matthew (1998). Aubrey Beardsley: A Biography. Harper Collins. ISBN 978-0-00-255789-4.
  • Weintraub, Stanley. 1967. Beardsley: A Biography. New York, N.Y.: Braziller.
  • Zatlin, Linda G. 1997. Beardsley, Japonisme, and the Perversion of the Victorian Ideal. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-58164-8.
  • Zatlin, Linda G. 1990. Aubrey Beardsley and Victorian Sexual Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 019817506X.
  • Zatlin, Linda G. 2007. "Aubrey Beardsley and the Shaping of Art Nouveau." Bound for the 1890s: Essays on Writing and Publishing in Honor of James G. Nelson. Ed. Jonathan Allison. Buckinghamshire: Rivendale Press.
  • Zatlin, Linda G. "Wilde, Beardsley, and the Making of Salome." Scholars Library, 2007; originally published in The Journal of Victorian Culture 5.2 (November 2000): 341–57.
  • Zatlin, Linda G. 2006. "Aubrey Beardsley." Encyclopedia of Europe 1789–1914. Chicago: Gale Research.

From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia

Aubrey Beardsley — English artist, born at Brighton, 1872; died at Mentone, France, 16 March, 1898. It has been cleverly said that Beardsley was "a boy who never grew up", and the statement has a considerable amount of truth in it. He was a wonderfully precocious boy all his life, with the frank merriment, enthusiasm, and exuberance of a lad. He was unable to withstand the desire to do clever, mischievous things and to shock people of narrow opinions, and his ignoble and vicious works were more the result of his Puck-like mischief and eccentricity of habit than of any evil disposition. His earliest published work was a programme for an entertainment in 1888 at Brighton Grammar School, where he was a pupil, and his next in the "Bee Magazine", Blackburn, 1891.

Young Beardsley commenced work as a clerk in the Guardian Fire Office, but at the earnest persuasions of Aymer Vallance and Pennell he entered Fred Brown's studio at Westminster and devoted his attention to illustration. While still a lad he attracted the attention of Sir E. Byrne-Jones and Puvis de Chavannes, and it said much for his genius that it received encouragement from men so different in their aims and practice. When nineteen he accepted the tremendous task of illustrating the "Morte D'Arthur", and carried it through. The famous article upon him in the "Studio" appeared in April, 1893, and from that moment his work was in great demand. In April, 1894, he became art editor of the "Yellow Book", the first numbers of which caused a great sensation. He was responsible for the first four volumes and then, with Arthur Symons, started the "Savoy", to which he contributed a series of drawings. During his short life he carried the art of black and white further than any man since Albrecht Dürer. His special qualities were described by Hammerton as of "extreme economy of means, the perfection of discipline, of self-control, and of thoughtful deliberation at the very moment of invention".

Beardsley had a marvellous knowledge of the quality of line, a real and powerful sense of beauty, coupled with a constant desire to be quaint, fanciful, or bizarre. He possessed a vigour, inventiveness, and daintiness almost unapproachable in the work of any other man. Hammerton speaks of the "serene surety of his drawing", of his "superb sense of style"' but Beardsley's love of mischief, which he deeply regretted, led him into serious faults and caused him to be often misunderstood. By those who knew him he was regarded as the most original, brilliant, witty, and lovable man they ever met. His illustrations of "Salome", "The Rape of the Lock", "Mademoiselle de Maupin" and "Volpone" are amongst his greatest works. From boyhood he had bad health and suffered from frequent attacks of haemorrhage. He was always a man of deep religious feeling and became a Catholic at the close of his life (31 March, 1895).

References

  1. Back to citation Bertrand Beyern. Guide des tombes d'hommes célèbres. Paris: Le Cherche Midi, 2008. ISBN 978-2-7491-2169-7
  2. Back to citation "England, Births and Christenings, 1538–1975," index, FamilySearch, accessed 4 April 2012), Aubrey Vincent Beardsley (1872).
  3. Back to citation Brophy 1968, p. 85
  4. Back to citation occurrence 4.0 Back to citation occurrence 4.1 "Beardsley, Aubrey, Artist, Part 1 – The Formative Years". Epsom & Ewell History Explorer.
  5. Back to citation Brophy, Brigid (1976). Beardsley and His World, Harmony Books, p. 12.
  6. Back to citation Aubrey Beardsley: Exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum, 1966 [20 May – 18 September] Catalogue of the Original Drawings, Letters, Manuscripts, Paintings, and of Books, Posters, Photographs, Documents, Etc, H.M. Stationery Office, 1966
  7. Back to citation Sturgis 1998, p. 8
  8. Back to citation occurrence 8.0 Back to citation occurrence 8.1 Sturgis 1998, p. 3
  9. Back to citation Sturgis 1998, p. 10
  10. Back to citation The house numbers in Buckingham Road were later changed, and the old 12 is now 31.
  11. Back to citation Farren, Jen; McCain, Sandy. "Aubrey Beardsley Art, Bio, Ideas". The Art Story. Retrieved 26 July 2022.
  12. Back to citation Sturgis 1998, p. 11
  13. Back to citation Crawford, Alan (2004). "Beardsley, Aubrey Vincent (1872–1898)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/1821. (Subscription, Wikipedia Library access or UK public library membership required.)
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  15. Back to citation Armstrong 1901.
  16. Back to citation occurrence 16.0 Back to citation occurrence 16.1 Souter, Nick; Souter, Tessa (2012). The Illustration Handbook: A Guide to the World's Greatest Illustrators. Oceana. p. 41. ISBN 978-1-84573-473-2.
  17. Back to citation “Beardsley (Aubrey Vincent)” in T. Bose, Paul Tiessen, eds., Bookman's Catalogue Vol. 1 A-L: The Norman Colbeck Collection (UBC Press, 1987), p. 41
  18. Back to citation occurrence 18.0 Back to citation occurrence 18.1 Harris, Bruce S., ed. (1967). The Collected Drawings of Aubrey Beardsley. Crown Publishers, Inc.
  19. Back to citation Eric Smith (1992). "The Art of Aubrey Beardsley". Loyola University. Archived from the original on 25 November 2017. Retrieved 24 October 2015.
  20. Back to citation "A Mirror for Salome: Beardsley's The Climax". Victorian Web. 22 April 2009. Retrieved 24 October 2015.
  21. Back to citation "The Life of Aubrey Beardsley" (PDF). Victorian Web. Retrieved 8 May 2012.
  22. Back to citation Symons, Aurthus (1967). The Collected Drawings of Aubrey Beardsley. New York: Crescent Books Inc. pp. v.
  23. Back to citation Jackson, Linda, Beardsley, Aubrey – Artist, Epsom & Ewell History Explorer, retrieved 2 October 2025
  24. Back to citation "Beardsley prints seized". The Times. London. 10 August 1966. p. 1.
  25. Back to citation "No Beardsley drawings will be removed from exhibition". The Times. London. 11 August 1966. p. 8.
  26. Back to citation Kingston, Angela. Oscar Wilde as a Character in Victorian Fiction. Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. ISBN 9780230600232
  27. Back to citation Weintraub, Stanley (1976). Aubrey Beardsley, Imp of the Perverse. Pennsylvania State University Press. p. 85.
  28. Back to citation Beardsley and the art of decadence by Matthew Sturgis", reviewed by Richard Edmonds in The Birmingham Post (England), 21 March 1998. At thefreelibrary.com, retrieved 5 April 2012.
  29. Back to citation Latham, David, ed. (2003). Haunted texts: studies in Pre-Raphaelitism in honour of William E. Fredeman. University of Toronto Press. p. 194. ISBN 978-0-8020-3662-9.
  30. Back to citation Beardsley, Aubrey (1970). The Letters of Aubrey Beardsley. Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. ISBN 978-0-8386-6884-9.
  31. Back to citation Kooistra, Lorraine Janzen (2003). "Sartorial Obsessions: Beardsley and Masquerade". In Fredeman, William Evan; Latham, David (eds.). Haunted Texts: Studies in Pre-Raphaelitism in Honour of William E. Fredeman. University of Toronto Press. pp. 178–183. ISBN 978-0-8020-3662-9.
  32. Back to citation Kaczynski, Richard (2012). Perdurabo, Revised and Expanded Edition: The Life of Aleister Crowley. North Atlantic Books. pp. 37–45. ISBN 978-1-58394-576-6.
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  35. Back to citation Gilbert, John Selwyn (22 June 2008), Aubrey
  36. Back to citation "BBC – Beardsley and his Work". BBC. Retrieved 28 November 2018.
  37. Back to citation DEATH BED - The Bedlam Files
  38. Back to citation Scandal & Beauty: Mark Gatiss on Aubrey Beardsely - BBC Four website
  39. Back to citation Car Seat Headrest – Beach Life-in-Death [2011], retrieved 4 September 2022
  40. Back to citation NLA-I. Web. "Award Nominations - NLA International". www.nla-international.com.

Further reading

  • Colvin, David (1998). Aubrey Beardsley: A Slave to Beauty. London: Orion Media; New York: Welcome Rain. ISBN 1-56649-013-8
  • Stead, Evanghelia (2024). Grotesque and Performance in the Art of Aubrey Beardsley. Open Book Publishers. doi:10.11647/obp.0413. ISBN 978-1-80511-348-5.
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