Marie Taglioni in La Sylphide (Souvenir d'adieu, No. 1). Lithograph coloured by hand by R J Lane after a drawing by A E Chalon, 1845.

A sketchy figure of a young man is asleep in a chair, his left arm resting on the chair arm, with his hand propping up his head; the body sits diagonally across the chair, with his right wrist resting on the right arm; below the waist is a suggestion of a skilt with sporran. Behind the round-backed chair stands a woman, her left arm bent across her body, her right hand resting on the chair; she looks down on the sleeper with a delicate smile. Her hair is severely dressed into coils over her ears and on her head is a coronet of palest yellow flowers. Her low-necked fitted bodice is coloured palest pink, with diaphanous sleeves and, at the front, a corsage of palest yellow flowers; at her back are wings with peacock 'eyes' and around her neck and wrists are rows of pearls. Her diaphanous skirt and raised back foot fade away to the right.

Given by Dame Marie Rambert

The Souvenir d'adieu (Farewell Souvenir) was a series of six lithographs from drawings by A E Chalon marking Marie Taglioni's last performances in London in 1845. This image is number 1. It shows the moment when the Sylph appears to the sleeping James, the young Scotsman with whom she has become fascinated.
A complete Album d'Adieu + titlepage, was on offer in 1990 for $17,500 US.
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.

Historical significance: The print shows Marie Taglioni, greatest ballerina of her day, as the Sylph in La Sylphide. The ballet was choreographed by her father, Filippo Taglioni in 1832, to display her exquisite lightness and delicacy, which he expressed in the newly-developed technique of dancing on the tips of the toes (pointe work). Previously, this had been merely an acrobatic trick, but La Sylphide was the first ballet to use it expressively to show the ethereal nature of the Sylph.

The large souvenir prints of the Romantic ballet, issued in the 1830s and 1840s, are among the most evocative images of dance in the 19th century. Lithography, with its soft quality, enhanced by the delicate yet rich hand-colouring, was ideally suited to the subject - the ballerinas who dominated ballet in the mid-century and the romanticised settings in which they performed; style and subject were perfectly matched. The lithographs produced in London are notable for capturing the personality and style of individual performers in a theatrical setting. They are a fitting tribute to one of ballet's richest periods.
Before the development of colour printing, the basic black and white prints were hand coloured. There is often considerable variation from one print to another, both in colour and quality of the work. The most important souvenir prints, such as this one, would only have been sent out to the best colourists, and it is often very difficult to tell the best hand colouring from early colour printing. In the days before photography, such lithographs were expensive souvenirs, bought by the individual dancer's admirers.

Attribution note: The word 'Proof'printed on the lithograph does not indicate a test copy made for revisions. Because lithography allowed such large runs of a print, it was argued that they were of no worth as an art-print, unlike engravings, which had much smaller print runs. Printing early pulls in a run with 'Proof' was a way of making them more attactive to print collectors, although they have no extra merit over any other pull in the run.

The print shows Marie Taglioni, greatest ballerina of her day, as the Sylph in La Sylphide. The ballet was choreographed by her father, Filippo Taglioni in 1832, to display her exquisite lightness and delicacy, which he expressed in the newly-developed technique of dancing on the tips of the toes (pointe work). Previously, this had been merely an acrobatic trick, but La Sylphide was the first ballet to use it expressively to show the ethereal nature of the Sylph. At a time when many men idealised women, her performance as the Sylph became a symbol of ideal womanhood - feminine, spiritual, ethereal and unattainable.
The print shows the moment when the Sylph appears to the sleeping James, the young Scotsman with whom she has become fascinated.

E.5048-1968