Mademoiselle Auretti. Engraving by G Scotin. Engraving second half 18th century.

A dancer stands with weight on her right leg, her left leg raised off the ground to the side; her arms are outstretched at shoulder height and she looks directly at the viewer. Around her neck is a frilled choker. Her 18th century dress has a very low square neckline and frilled elbow-length sleeves; the bodice is cut into a very sharp point at centre front, with a stomacher decorated with rosettes and edged with a frill. The widely panniered skirt reaches to above the ankle; the overskirt is decorated with rosettes and its scalloped lower edge is trimmed with a frill and rosettes; the underskirt is similarly decorated. On her feet are heeled, buckled shoes. Behind her are trees and a small gazebo and at her feet is a single rose. The print is surrounded by an elaborate frame with scrolls and, at the top, a collage of musical instruments and a mask, and at the bottom a cherub in either corner with a central cartouche inscribed 'Mademoiselle Auretti.'

Given by Dame Marie Rambert

Mlle Auretti was an Italian dancer who appeared in London in the 1760s.
The print is part of the collection of dance prints amassed by Marie Rambert and her husband, Ashley Dukes in the first half of the 20th century. Eventually numbering 145 items, some of which had belonged to the ballerina Anna Pavlova, it was one of the first and most important specialist collections in private hands.
Rambert bought the first print as a wedding present but could not bear to give it away. As the collection grew, it was displayed in the bar of the Mercury Theatre, the headquarters of Ballet Rambert, but in 1968, Rambert gave the collection to the Victoria and Albert Museum; seven duplicates were returned to Rambert, but these are catalogued in Ivor Guest’s A Gallery of Romantic Ballet, which was published before the collection came to the V&A. Although often referred to as a collection of Romantic Ballet prints, there are also important engravings of 17th and 18th century performers, as well as lithographs from the later 19th century, by which time the great days of the ballet in London and Paris were over.

Mlle Auretti was an Italian dancer who appeared in London in the 1760s. Dancers wore variations on fashionable dress, and at this period the round hooped skirts had developed into ovals, which became very wide. This meant that the arms could not be dropped to the sides of the body and were usually held out above waist height, rather like wearing a ballet tutu,. The panniers and stiffened bodice certainly restricted movement, but there was still considerable scope for fast, neat footwork, elegant carriage of the upper body and graceful arms.

E.4963-1968