The Savoy – Page 3 – { feuilleton }

Gockinga’s Bacchanal and an unknown portrait of Fritz Klein

Bacchanal by René Gockinga.

A guest post today by Sander Bink who generously translated his latest piece of research into the Dutch artists of the early 20th century who took the Beardsley style as a foundation for their own black-and-white delineations. As with this earlier post on the subject, many of these drawings are very good but the artists are less well-known than the Beardsley followers in other countries who were their contemporaries. Here’s Sander.

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Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of ‘Droomkunst’. This time we’ll discuss our cult hero Joseph René Gockinga who has a drawing exhibited at the Singer Museum Droomkunst exhibition. An obvious choice, because how often do you see his work—which I wrote about more in detail here—in a museum? Almost never. In 1976, two works by Gockinga were shown in the Kunstenaren der Idee exhibition but unfortunately I was only just born that year. The current locations of these works by the way is still unknown to me.

Salomé by René Gockinga.

One of them, however, Gockinga’s version of Salomé, resurfaced in 1995 but I don’t know the current location either. And the acclaimed Louis Couperus Museum last year showed an unknown Couperus illustration of Gockinga from a private collection (no, not mine). In Droomkunst now hangs a small but fine work in a similar style: the Bacchanal already mentioned here. The Droomkunst catalogue dates the work about 1915. I would dare to date is somewhat earlier, I think 1913.

In his opening speech Singer director de Lorm compared Gockinga’s Bacchanal with the work of Erwin Olaf because of the hedonistic, decadent parallels between the two works. If I remember correctly, de Lorm also talked about certain places preferred by these artists, in addition to the perverse, decadent, decayed Amsterdam also Indonesia and especially Java, which was known as a kind of international gay colony.

Now, our Gockinga has also dwelled there; I do not know exactly where and when, but—and this is information that surfaced after my earlier mentioned article was published—he lived in the late thirties in Bali for a while in the home of the renowned painter W.G. Hofker. And in a recent study Imagining Gay Paradise: Bali, Bangkok, Singapore and cyber-Singapore we read that Gockinga was one of the victims of a scandal; he was arrested because of his homosexuality in December 1938 in Denpasar. Here, the comparison with the 2000 generation of artists limp, which, after all, in Amsterdam and elsewhere were partying without having fears of being arrested for lewd behaviour.

Fritz Klein by René Gockinga.

Where several generations of artists do come together is in the following, in our humble opinion a very nice item that was sent us last year. The majority of Gockinga’s Beardsley and the Nérée-like drawings from around 1917 are still unfortunately lost. Probably the “immoral” nature of his work is the main reason. So the item presented here is, as far as we know for the first time, is a new discovery.

It is a Beardsley-like portrait from 1917 or thereafter and it portrays none other than the painter Fred (Fritz) Klein (1898–1990), father of the famous and important Yves Klein.

Huh? What? How can that be? Well, that is of course very well possible. They were more or less contemporaries (Klein was born in 1898, Gockinga in 1893), were both born in the Dutch East Indies and were back in The Netherlands in 1913. They shared a great interest in art. In 1920, Klein moved to France, where he would make his sunny canvases that he became known for. Before that, he was apparently also in The Hague, where he visited his friend Gockinga. That friend has now made a special and somewhat decadent portrait of Klein: a kind of mythological half-man, surrounded by masks and, as I said, in a nice Beardsley-style. You could interpret the masks and the mix of male/female characteristics in a certain way but I leave that to the viewer. In any case, a special drawing can be added to the mysterious oeuvre of the Dutch Symbolist. Big thanks to the Klein relatives that allowed me to write about and portray it, of course.

Sander Bink

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Antony Little’s echoes of Aubrey
• Aubrey in LIFE
• Beardsley reviewed
• Aubrey Beardsley in The Studio
• Ads for The Yellow Book
• Beardsley and His Work
• Further echoes of Aubrey
• A Wilde Night
• Echoes of Aubrey
• After Beardsley by Chris James
• Illustrating Poe #1: Aubrey Beardsley
• Beardsley’s Rape of the Lock
• The Savoy magazine
• Beardsley at the V&A
• Merely fanciful or grotesque
• Aubrey Beardsley’s musical afterlife
• Aubrey by John Selwyn Gilbert
• “Weirdsley Daubery”: Beardsley and Punch
• Alla Nazimova’s Salomé

Antony Little’s echoes of Aubrey

The Dancer (1967) by Antony Little.

My thanks to Sweet Jane this time for alerting me to her post about a series of Beardsley-inspired illustrations from 1967 by Biba designer Antony Little. The Wandering Jew and Other Stories was the first translation in English of Apollinaire’s 1910 collection L’Hérèsiarque et Cie. I’ve known about this book for a while but few of the illustrations have been on view anywhere until this post. There are eight in all, each of them very adeptly capturing different phases of Beardsley’s drawing style, from the spare black-and-whites to the more detailed renderings seen in his later work. The drawing below is another in the series from a post of Callum’s which also includes a favourite of mine by Beresford Egan.

Little’s designs, and the prominence of the Biba stores, did much to make Art Nouveau in general, and Beardsley in particular, a crucial component of London fashion in the late 1960s. For more on that subject see this Sweet Jane post featuring yet more Beardsley borrowings and monochrome design, plus Osborne & Little’s fantastic Chinese Dragon wallpaper which made a memorable appearance last year in Only God Forgives.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The Aubrey Beardsley archive
• The illustrators archive

Aubrey in LIFE

Turned out for a big night at the opera like Beardsley’s Wagnerites, girls wear bare-backed blacks by Trigère. Coiffed heads are by Hugh Harrison and Halston of Bergdorf Goodman’s; Halston also made the pouf-skirted dress. (Photo session by Milton Green & Joe Eula.)

Being determined to catalogue every last piece of Beardsley trivia from the 1960s, I’m compelled to note this post which I’d missed at Sweet Jane’s Pop Boutique a couple of years ago. An earlier post here showed one of the photos from a LIFE fashion feature using Aubrey’s drawings but the Sweet Jane post has scans of all the photos, plus accompanying text. This was published in February 1967, a few months after the summer exhibition at the V&A in London which introduced Beardsley’s work to a new generation, an exhibition which set in motion a wave of popular interest in his work.

I’m intrigued by the way the colour of the women’s bodies emerges from the drawings given the date when the magazine appeared. I’ve long seen 1966 as a very black-and-white year in graphic and aesthetic terms, whereas 1967 is obviously full-colour; the difference between the sleeves of the Beatles’ (Beardsley-derived) Revolver and Sgt Pepper albums are only two of the more prominent examples. These fashion photos could be regarded as being caught mid-way between the shift from one state to another. There are more shots of the Wagnerites above on this page. Thanks to Ian for drawing my attention to the Sweet Jane post.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The Aubrey Beardsley archive

Beardsley reviewed

More Aubrey Beardsley ephemera. These pages are from the bound edition of The Studio for 1894, reviews of two of Beardsley’s earliest publications: the first editions of Le Morte d’Arthur (which was published in multiple volumes), and the illustrated edition of Oscar Wilde’s Salomé which sealed Beardsley’s reputation as a major force in the art of the 1890s. The reviews lavish praise on both works, unsurprisingly since Beardsley had received the magazine’s support from the very first issue. It’s interesting to note even at this early stage mention of the rumblings of discontent which would grow increasingly loud in the following years. Also that The Peacock Skirt is here given the name The Peacock Girl.

NEW PUBLICATIONS. Le Morte d’Arthur. By Sir Thomas Mallory. Illustrated by Aubrey Beardsley. (London: J. M. Dent & Co.)—Salome. By Oscar Wilde. English version. Illustrated by Aubrey Beardsley. (London: Elkin Mathews & John Lane.)—It is no use, for the sake of maintaining the dignity of Sir Thomas Mallory, to deny that for this portly quarto, with its gold emblazoned cover, the interest centres in the designs which decorate rather than illustrate its text. Even Professor Rhys’ able introduction on the famous romances fails to detain one long from going on to the wealth of “black and white” in the volume. Since Mr. Joseph Pennell introduced Mr. Aubrey Beardsley in the first number of The Studio, barely ten months have passed, yet already (as the designs we receive in the Prize would alone suffice to prove) he has his disciples, imitators, and even (in a clever menu of a Glasgow dinner) his parodist. France and America have praised or attacked him, and to a following of younger men he is the latest and strongest force in decorative art. Here analytical criticism would be obviously out of place, but the volume before us may be cordially praised as a whole, and the four illustrations here reproduced (by the publishers’ kind permission) advanced as proof of the fancy and invention of the artist, and of his powerful handling of masses of black.

While Mr. Pennell, in his criticism—with reference more especially to certain separate drawings each complete in itself—laid the greatest stress upon “the use of the single line with which he weaves his drawings into a harmonious whole, joining extremes and reconciling oppositions,” here it is rather the balances of masses and the simplifying of forms to their most naive presentation that are so fascinating. Ornament for its own sake is plentiful and composition of figures, some individual to an almost dangerous degree, others perhaps slightly reminiscent of earlier work; but all these are most impressive from their bold use of white upon black. It is curious to see how often the design seems dug out of the wood, rather than drawn upon paper and reproduced by a mechanical process. A more perilous style to imitate could hardly be found, for its faults are easier copied than the astounding fertility and freshness of invention which more than redeem them. Only very rash or very foolish draughtsmen would attempt to do so; yet the suggestive influences of this book will probably affect modern design for some time to come.

As a feast of fantastic and eerie conceptions, some of rare beauty and not a few wrought with grotesque diablerie, it will delight (or exasperate as the case may be) all who take an interest in the applied arts. As the work of an artist who has not long been out of his teens, it is peculiarly noteworthy; for if one joined Mr. Beardsley’s few detractors and set aside all they failed to appreciate, the residue would offer enough motives for the stock-in-trade of a dozen less prodigal pattern-makers for years to come. To the publishers, whose enterprise made such a luxurious edition possible, to the artist, who has put so much of himself into it, the public should be grateful. For, like or dislike it, it will be long before a book so interesting and unconventional issues from the press, and one is left eagerly awaiting the remaining portion of the work.

In the new edition of Salome we find the irrepressible personality of the artist dominating everything—whether the compositions do or do not illustrate the text—what may be their exact purpose or the meaning of their symbolism, is happily not necessary to consider here. Nor is it expedient to bring conventional criticism to bear upon them for nothing in ancient or modern art is so akin that you could place it side by side for comparison. Audacious and extravagant, with a grim purpose and power of achieving the unexpected—we had almost written the impossible—one takes it for itself, as a piquant maddening potion, not so much a tonic as a stimulant to fancy. Those who dislike Mr. Beardsley’s work will be happy in the possession of the documentary evidence to support their opinion, while those who find it the very essence of the decadent fin de siècle will rank Salome as the typical volume of a period too recent to estimate its actual value, and too near to judge of its ultimate influence on decorative art. All collectors of rare and esoteric literature will rank this book as one of the most remarkable productions of the modern press. We have to thank the publishers for allowing us to reproduce The Peacock Girl, a full-page design that is typical of the work, The binding, a coarse pale blue canvas, with decorations in gold, Mr. Beardsley’s chosen device, being on the back cover, is entirely admirable.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The Aubrey Beardsley archive

Aubrey Beardsley in The Studio

Aubrey Beardsley in the year 1893 was 21, and on the threshold of being catapulted to fame (and notoriety) via his illustrations for Oscar Wilde’s Salomé. Some of Beardsley’s drawings in the distinctive style he called “Japanesque” had already appeared in The Pall Mall Magazine, and he was hard at work on some 600 illustrations and embellishments for Dent’s Le Morte D’Arthur which began publication in 1894. Some of those illustrations are featured in the glowing introduction by Joseph Pennell which appeared in the first issue of The Studio magazine in April 1893 (when Beardsley was still only 20), a title that became the leading showcase for the British end of the Art Nouveau movement in the 1890s. Pennell’s appreciation also included Beardsley’s Joan of Arc’s Entry into Orleans, a piece which showed how much the artist’s early work owed to Mantegna, and the first drawing of Salomé which later helped secure the Wilde commission. The Joan of Arc picture was reproduced as a fold-out supplement in the magazine’s second issue.

All the major Beardsley books refer to Pennell’s article but I’ve never had the opportunity to see it in full until now, thanks to the excellent online archives at the University of Heidelberg. There are many volumes of the international editions of The Studio at the Internet Archive but for some reason these don’t include the early numbers; at Heidelberg we can now browse the missing issues. In the first volume in addition to Beardsley there’s a piece about Frederic Leighton’s clay studies for paintings and sculptures, illustrations by Walter Crane and Robert Anning Bell, and an article on whether nude photography can be considered art. In this last piece several of the examples happen to be provided by Frederick Rolfe aka Baron Corvo, and Wilhelm von Gloeden, two men who we now know had other things on their mind when they were photographing Italian youths.

The collected volumes of The Studio from 1893 to 1898 may be browsed or downloaded here. I’ve not had time to go through the rest of these so I’m looking forward to discovering what else they may contain.

Detail from Joan of Arc’s Entry into Orleans.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The Aubrey Beardsley archive