Louise Fiocre as Cupid in Pierre de Médicis (Les Danseuses de l'Opéra, No. 7). Lithograph coloured by hand by Alophe, ca.1860

A female dancer stands half turned to her left, her head turned to look at the viewer; she stands on her left leg, the right crossed in front with the toe pointed on the ground; her hands rest on the top of a bow, the bottom touching the floor. Her short hair is centrally parted and loosely dressed at the sides. Her off-the-shoulder pale blue bodice has small bands over the upper arm fixed with a 'gold' stud; from right arm to left waist is fixed a white sash and from left shoulder to right waist is a gold band holding a quiver on her back. Fixed at the back are 'angel' wings. The knee-length bell-shaped skirt is pale blue with gold spots and gold bands around the hem.

Given by Dame Marie Rambert

The print is No. 7 in the series, Les Danseuses de l'Opera, published ca. 1860. There were 14 in total, all the work of Alophe. Fiocre danced Cupid in a ballet in the opera Pierre de Médicis at the Paris Opera in 1860.
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 over 130 items, 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. Although it is often referred to as the Rambert-Dukes collection of Romantic Ballet prints, it includes 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.

Louise Fiocre sprouts wings and carries a bow and quiver, which identify her as Cupid, the god of love. Her ballet dress is the conventional fitted bodice and bell-shaped short skirt, but with touches that hint at 'Grecian'. She danced the role in a ballet in the opera Pierre de Médicis at the Paris Opera in 1860.
In 19th century Paris, every opera had to include a ballet. This had to be performed at the start of the third act so that gentlemen who were more iterested in looking at the ballet girls than listening to the opera, could dine before going to the theatre. Wagner's Tannhauser caused uproar because the ballet was in Act I and most men missed it.
By 1860, photography had become a viable commercial medium, and several of the prints in the series Les Danseuses de l'Opera seem to be copies of photographs. Maybe this was because most photographs were quite small and, of course, sepia toned; translated into lithographs, they could be larger and then hand coloured, making them more suitable for display.

E.5009-1968