Stephen Calloway

Enjoyed the newer end of the collections on display and the groups that fall under the banner of "lowbrow" and "kitsch", such as the poodles and slot machines. Could've done without the profiles of rich people, which came off as kind of distasteful (although I appreciate I am reading this at a very different point in time).

Placing the influence of Aubrey Beardsley's five short years on the art scene is an almost easy task, since his inspirations nad affectations are so stylistically unique. Colloway's detailed depiction of his life gives us a clear picture and explores examples of Beardsley's art by giving the context of the time period and the world-wide artistic and literary styles that Beardsley drew upon. Even the captions are great, which is what I usually complain about the most from art books!

This review is to offset the one and half star gloss that fails to do either the book or anyone who might be interested in it any service. Charles Ricketts:Subtle and Fantastic Decorator has 24 pages of biographical material that is quite informative, particularly if the reader comes to it knowing nothing more of the artist that a few of his book illustrations. Ricketts is primarily known as an illustrator, and of the illustrations here, pulled from the books he illustrated (there are more show more than 70 pages of them), are in black and white. The book is an excellent resource for anyone interested in Ricketts or the art of book illustration and the literature of the late 19th century. It is also quite cheap. If you want more depth, there is Charles Ricketts: Everything for Art: Selected Writings, published by Rivendale Press. show less

Stephen Calloway’s book on the life, art and times of English illustrator and author Aubrey Beardsley makes for captivating reading and also viewing since there are nearly 200 illustrations and photos included in its pages. Friend of Oscar Wilde, James McNeal Whistler and Max Beerbohm, Aubrey Beardsley was one immensely gifted artist and refine aesthete. Most of his artwork is black ink on white paper and picks up on decadent themes of the grotesque and erotic, drawings that must been seen show more to be believed and appreciated. To give readers a sense of Calloway’s writing and everything Aubrey Beardsley, here are several illustrations and quotes along with my brief comments:

“From 1893 to 1896 he made hundreds of drawings to illustrate celebrated texts, such as Oscar Wilde’s banned masterpiece ‘Salome’ and his own brilliant, bizarre, unfinished erotic tale ‘Under the Hill’.” ---------- Young Aubrey was quite the imaginative writer. If he didn’t have his extraordinary gift for drawing and only penned fiction, I suspect he could have been, particularly if he lived longer, a formidable author. Here is an excerpt from his one and only unfinished novel:

“Priapusa’s voice was full of salacious unction; she had terrible little gestures with the hands, strange movements with the shoulders, a short respiration that made surprising wrinkles in her bodice, a corrupt skin, large horny eyes, a parrot’s nose, a small loose mouth, great flaccid cheeks, and chin after chin. She was a wise person, and Venus loved her more than any of her other servants, and had a hundred pet names for her, such as, Dear Toad, Pretty Pol, Cock-robin, Dearest Lip, Touchstone, Little Cough-drop, Bijou, Buttons, Dear Heart, Dick-dock, Mrs. Manly, Little Nipper, Cochon-de-lait, Naughty-naughty, Blessed Thing, and Trump.”

“Beardsley created the scandalous imagery of, and was in a more general sense the driving force behind the pictorial side of the great decadent periodicals of the period, ‘The Yellow Book’ and ‘The Savoy’. Moving amid the most intriguing artists, writers and publishers of the 1890s, Beardsley designed or embellished a number of the most significant books of the period.” ---------- Since a picture is worth a 1000 words, many of the books Beardsley illustrated became both famous and infamous.


“Just as the singular nature of Beardsley’s genius as a draughtsman was quickly realized, so too was the recognition of his status as a key figure in the creation of a new sensibility in English and, indeed European art remarkably rapid.” --------- Now that’s a fresh vision – to not only create singular art but also to prompt an entirely new sensibility, that is, unique and heretofore unexplored avenues to experience life itself.

“Passing rapidly from style to style, he was always totally original, always shocking. Like all artists he was open to other influences, and indeed often beguiled by their possibilities, but all that he borrowed he made inalienably his own.” --------- Aubrey could not only take lessons from other styles and other cultures but once he assimilated what they had to offer artistically, he could then add his own unique visual signature. Darn it all! Tuberculosis took his life when he was only 26.


“Already steeped in surprisingly adult and demanding reading as a young child, Beardsley’s great love of books had been instantly discovered and assiduously cultivated by his kindly and imaginative Brighton schoolmaster A. W. King. By the time he left school Aubrey already had a precociously sophisticated taste of literature.” --------- Ah! What friends here on Goodreads can most definitely appreciate – an artist who fired his imagination by being a booklover. I never tire of the observation that by the power of imagination a reader of books, especially fiction, lives through many lives.

“Printed by the then still novel means of the photo line-block, most people who saw his work examined it on the printed page alone, his extraordinary images rendered starker by the mechanical means of reproduction.” ---------- Usually reproductions are a great limitation, however, as it turned out, his illustrations reproduced in books worked to the advantage of Aubrey Beardsly. Incidentally, viewing his illustrations on a computer screen is also a great enhancement. What a treat! I highly recommend this book and the art of Aubrey Beardsly to anybody who has an artistic bone in their body.



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