George Barbier’s Falbalas et Fanfreluches

barbier01.jpg

George Barbier’s work has been a regular visitor to these pages. Falbalas et Fanfreluches was a series of pochoir print portfolios published from 1922–1926, a catalogue of various liaisons and amours with a mildly erotic tone. There’s also some sly humour in the examples below, such as the tiny dogs menacing a dandy in L’Agression, and the eyes of the woman in Romance sans paroles wandering to the trim backside of the posing sailor (who doesn’t seem so interested in her).

In addition to being beautiful drawings, Barbier’s title has solved for me a minor conundrum: Falbalas et Fanfreluches means “Ruffles and Frills”, and the Abbé Fanfreluche is a suitably ruffled and frilled character in Aubrey Beardsley’s unfinished erotic novel Under the Hill.

barbier02.jpg

barbier03.jpg

barbier04.jpg

barbier05.jpg

barbier06.jpg

barbier07.jpg

barbier08.jpg

barbier09.jpg

barbier10.jpg

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
The illustrators archive

Previously on { feuilleton }
Vaslav Nijinsky by Paul Iribe
The art of George Barbier, 1882–1932
The Decorative Age
Images of Nijinsky

One thought on “George Barbier’s Falbalas et Fanfreluches”

  1. Fantastic stuff. I saw an exhibition of Barbier’s work in the Fortuny Museum in Venice a few years ago – the only time I’ve seen his stuff ‘in the flesh’, as it were, rather than online or in books and postcards. It was stunning. I’d love to see a similar show of Gerda Wegener’s stuff.

Comments are closed.

Discover more from { feuilleton }

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading