Page 50 - Studio International - June 1966

The toilette of Salome I 1893 The Stomach Dance 1893

apparently published openly and aroused no comment. a distance, however, they appeared very dainty, clear
It's a drawing of a belly dancer which, in deference to and harmless.'
Victorian sensibilities, was called The Stomach Dance. The It was perhaps fortunate for Beardsley's short but
curve of the girl's belly is defined with the same fastidious dazzling career, that he looked upon Woman primarily
economy as that of the very fat Ali Baba in his famous as a decorative object, an idol most fit for worship when
drawing for The Forty Thieves, but she is not one of his hidden from view, so to speak, by her finery, for it was
successes. She conveys no sense of movement and looks in the sweeping, figure-effacing gowns he devised for
absurdly like a model displaying a new line in Victorian her that he displayed to the full his mastery of curvilinear
drawers. There is, however, a superbly ornamentalized Art Nouveau. It is a reflection of his Dandyism, of his
old man in the foreground, playing a stringed instru- desire to be his own immaculate conception. No one could
ment and bearing a strong resemblance to a Japanese have been more in tune with Baudelaire's notions about
devil. His hair stands up like flames and the lascivious- Dandyism. I quote Peter Quennell's translation: 'It is a
ness of his grin is emphasized by a lolling tongue, but sort of cult of oneself, which may outlast the search for
no one at the time— that is to say, no one who might have happiness in others, in women for example, which may
caused trouble—noticed that he was indecently exposing outlast, indeed, the entirety of what are called illusions.
himself, an oversight which may have been due to the It is the pleasure of astonishing and the proud satisfac-
fact that the penis could easily be mistaken for one of the tion of remaining always unastonished.'
pleats on the old man's costume. One is reminded of The most remarkable outcome of Beardsley's profound
Meier-Graefe's account of his call on Beardsley, quoted self-regard is the illustration for The Lysistrata called 'The
in Schmutzler's book : 'Beardsley owned the most beau- Examination of the Herald,' where a beautiful and ele-
tiful Japanese woodcuts one could see in London, all of gant young man is displaying his monstrously enlarged
them of the most detailed eroticism. They were hung in genitalia. After the initial shock, it is evident that
simple frames on delicately shaded wallpaper—all of Beardsley sees the male genitals as a curious and barbaric
them indecent, the wildest visions of Utamaro. Seen from jewel, a magnificent adornment to be admired like a