IN SEARCH OF IDEALS

A good painter cannot be separated from his time. Getting acquainted with his pieces of work one acquires the flavour of the artist’s epoch.

Aubrey Vincent Beardsley adds with his drawings to the perception of the New Renaissance or the Decay. Like many of his great contemporaries he was well aware of the vicious luxury of his time; many of drawing are conceived as a protest against bourgeois bigotry, hypocrisy and narrowness as impeding the development of a personality.

Oscar Wilde, the apostle of the decadent doctrine of “Art for Art’s sake” proclaimed the cult of Beauty, worshipped by many people of art in the eighties and the early nineties. Their protest was, however ineffectual, as they turned their backs on all social and ethical values.

Like them in search of his ideal Aubrey Beardsley remained the slave of his feelings. It was the time which added its hue, flavour, intonation to Beardsley’s creative activity. It was the time when he had no equals. The paradox of this artist lies in the fact that he wasn’t a strong adherent of any school or trend. He seemed to have summed up all the esthetical achievements – Greek vases, China, Japanese drawings, as if he had borrowed his experience from different times and different nations.

Having lived a short life of twenty-five. Beardsley became a founder of modernism in Europe.

In 1892 Oscar Wilde, who had already gained the reputation of a popular writer, created a play “Salome” which was supplied with the drawings of Aubrey Beardsley.

For ages people of art have been resorting to the Bible as the source for their images. In Mathew (Chapter 14) it is narrated about beheading of John the Baptist (Iokanaan in the play). The play is entitled after the girl through whose fault the tragic event took place. It is natural to expect the writer to inquest: “Why do people betray the ones they love? Why do they push them to the untimely grave?” Beardsley in his drawings seems to be curious of the character’s feelings. The drawings do cover the plot of the play but in many of them the accents are shifted.

The setting of the play takes place at Herod’s court where he gives the banquet in honour of Caesar’s ambassadors. Herod’s page and a young Syrian discuss the beauty of Salome, Herod’s step-daughter who is as pretty as the moon in the sky. Wilde depicts Salome with all the peculiarities of aestheticism. She is as pale as the reflection of a white rose in the silver mirror; she is compared to a narcissus shivering in the wind. Here she appears having escaped the banquet where Herod stared at her from under his heavy eye-lids.

The drawing The Eyes of Herod is divided vertically into three parts, two of which are as dark as Herod’s thoughts. The lewd stare of Herod directed at the butterfly symbolizing Salome speaks volumes to his wife, startled in the unexpected understanding. Is it the price for her agreement to her first husband’s murder? The burning candles metaphorically point out this understanding as well as they clear out Herod’s lust.

Outside the palace Jews make noise discussing religion. Iokanaan imprisoned in a cistern is engaged in prophesying. Salome longs to see him despite Herod’s prohibition and his servant’s warning. In Iokanaan and Salome they are facing each other. Iokanaan strikes Salome. It is his eyes that above all are terrible. They are like black holes burnt by torches, like black lakes troubled by fantastic moons. He is like a thin ivory statue, like an image of silver, as chaste as the moon. Iokanaan dislikes Salome, the daughter of Babylon because her mother filled the earth with the wine of iniquities and the cry of her sins reaches the ears of God. He tells her to cover the face with a veil and seek out the Son of man in the desert. The dialogue between Salome and Iokanaan is the result of the playwright’s and the artist’s imagination. Wilde’s Salome is a capricious young girl who likes her whims ministered. Beardsley’s Salome is a lonely creature, having nobody to understand her soul, craving for understanding, for having an interlocutor different from the flattering and low people of the court. Not knowing how to do it, she tries to tempt and seduce Iokanaan, but he rejects her and retires to prison.

The Eyes of Herod

Iokanaan and Salome

Enter Herodias

In Enter Herodias Herod and Herodias come searching for Salome. The world of Iokanaan in the previous drawing is set in contrast to the world of Herod. The candles symbolize impudence, the monsters stand for low instincts and vicious desires. Herod wants Salome to dance for his guests, swearing by his crown, life and gods to do whatever she likes for it.

The Stomach Dance

The Peacock Skirt

The Black Cape

The Stomach Dance is a refined drawing. It is the dance of Seven Veils. The drawing reflects the dancer’s exquisite skill and her childish offence – for that dance she demands the head of Iokanaan on a silver charger as a punishment for rejecting Salome. Herod is astonished. He offers her the largest emerald in the world instead, smart dresses, a hundred of exceedingly beautiful peacocks with gilded beaks. The moon appears in the sky at day time to have a look at them when they spread their tails like big fans. Beardsley couldn’t resist the temptation to dress his Salome in those garments. The drawings The Peacock Skirt, The Black Cape and The Toilette of Salome without doubt stand apart from the plot of the play and reveal Beardsley’s interest to Japanese drawing. By making his Salome wear modern dresses Beardsley probably meant to say that both in Salome’s and his times people had the same strivings, committees they same sins and looked forward to meeting someone to save them.

The Dancer’s Reward represents Iokanaan’s head on the silver charger in front of Salome. But the dripping blood immediately changes her cynical curiosity into disgust. In The Climax Salome resembles a child whose whim has finally been ministered. Now that Iokanaan’s head is in her possession, she can do whatever she would think of, and the dead man won’t be able to protest.

The Toilette of Salome

The Dancer’s Reward

The Climax

But Salome’s evil joy gradually gives way to A Platonic Lament. Now she looks like a common woman. The lack of clothes conveys her sincerity and absence of any concealed thoughts. But Herod is frightened of this new Salome and orders his servants to put out the torches, to hide the moon and to kill Salome in the darkness. Beardsley buries her in a beautiful silver box in his drawing The Funeral of Salome.

There is no doubt that the play is about love and beauty. Oscar Wilde reveals the topic in a pessimistic way. Aubrey Beardsley depicts the strivings of a lonely young soul longing for love and understanding. Both artists make us realize the ugliness of Salome’s crime and feel compassion to the girl for her loneliness.

A Platonic Lament

The Funeral of Salome