Jeanne Paquin. Été 1902. Evening dress for Maud D'Orby of the Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens. Pale blue pekin trimmed with embroidery, lace and red ribbons with gilt tassels.

Evening dress for Maud D'Orby of the Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens. Pale blue pekin trimmed with embroidery, lace and red ribbons with gilt tassels. One of a group of 58 fashion designs bound in a volume of Paquin designs for Summer 1902. Most in pencil with some ink and watercolour, some with names, details, and fabric swatches attached.

Given by the House of Worth

This dress was designed for Maud D'Orby, an opera singer and actress at the Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries. Although the name on the sketch appears closer to "Maud Arny", the theatre name is given as well, and given the inscrutability of the handwriting on the Paquin sketches sometimes, Maud D'Orby (sometimes published D'Arby) is probably the client for whom this dress was created.

Surviving publicity images of Maud D'Orby give the impression of an uninibited performer who did not hesitate to present herself in provocative poses, often wearing little more than a pair of black stockings and a corset, or other racy outfits. One postcard shows her wearing a short dress slit to the waist revealing one leg and a tightly corseted bodice with one breast exposed, the nipple concealed by a sparkly pasty held in position by strings of beads. She also posed for a number of photographs taken by Jean Agélou in about 1910 which show her in varying states of undress, striking provocative poses. The elegant and ladylike dresses which Jeanne Paquin designed for perfomers such as D'Orby, Juanita de Frezia and Carolina Otero show a very different side to these ladies who are now mainly remembered, if at all, through highly stylized publicity images showing them "in character".

- Daniel Milford-Cottam (June 2012)

E.468-1957