Louise Fleury in The Beauty of Ghent (Les Gloires de l'Opéra, No. 10). Lithograph coloured by hand by Haguental and Fagonde, ca.1845.

In a garden with a 'summerhouse' left and flowers and shrubs in the foreground, a dancer stands on her right point, her left leg in arabesque behind; her body faces to her left and her head is turned towards the viewer. Her left arm is outstretched with pointing index finger; in her right hand she carries a bow. On her severely dressed hair is a fine gold band supporting a crescent moon with stars to the back. Her off-the shoulder, skin-tight white bodice is edged with ribbon; on her upper arms are 'gold' bands; at her back is a quiver of arrows. Around her waist is a narrow blue belt and her bell-shaped white skirt is knee-length, with bands of ribbon around the hem; the overskirt is scattered with stars and caught up at the side with a floral rosette.

Given by Dame Marie Rambert

This lithograph is No 10 in a series of twelve titled Les Gloires de l'Opera, published in Paris in 1845/6. They are all taken from English lithographs, and transformed into the style of French costume plates, usually supplying new backgrounds.
Albert's ballet La Jolie fille de Gand was first seen in Paris in 1842 and Louise Fleury appeared as Beatrix in La Jolie fille de Gand in London in 1844.
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.

Albert’s ballet La Jolie fille de Gand was first seen in Paris in 1842 and Louise Fleury appeared as Beatrix in the ballet when it was first seen in London in 1844.
The crescent moon, bow and quiver of arrows identify the character as Diana, Greek goddess of the moon and the hunt. In the ballet the highspot was the pas de Diane, danced by the heroine, Beatrix, at a masked ball.
Fleury stands on pointe (on the tips of her toes). This is first recorded as an acrobatic trick in the 1820s, but by the early 1830s it was an essential part of the ballerina's technique and choreographers were using it expressively to suggest character and mood. The shoes gave little support, the only stiffening being a little darning at the back of the toes; the modern pointe shoe, with its flat, blocked toe, did not develop until much later in the 19th century

E.5012-1968