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Lysistrata Haranguing the Athenian Women

Print
ca. 1929 (printed and published)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

Aubrey Beardsley's distinctive black and white drawings for Oscar Wilde's Salomé, published in 1894, brought him an extraordinary notoriety whilst still in his early twenties. His work for the periodical The Yellow Book confirmed his position as the most innovative illustrator of the day, but as a result of the hostile moralistic outcry that followed the arrest and trial of Oscar Wilde in early 1895, John Lane and other publishers panicked and dropped Beardsley. Thereafter, almost the only publisher who would use his drawings was Leonard Smithers. Smithers was a brilliant but shady character who operated on the fringes of the rare book trade, issuing small, clandestine editions of risqué books. Smithers encouraged Beardsley's already growing interest in French, Latin and Greek texts of this kind and commissioned drawings to illustrate the Satires of the late Roman poet Juvenal and, most famously, Aristophanes's bawdy satirical play Lysistrata.

The illustration depicts the key moment in the play at which Lysistrata exhorts the Athenian women to abstain from all sexual congress with their husbands until peace is declared between the Athenian men and the Lacedaemonians. The prospect of a sustained period of abstinence leads one of the women to make an overt sexual advance on another.

This print comes from the folio of reproductions made from Beardsley's original drawings and published in about 1929. Utilising the expensive collotype process, these prints are much closer to the originals than the earlier line-block prints of the 1896 edition of the book or the various, mostly very poor reproductions included in subsequent pirated printings.

Object details

Categories
Object type
TitleLysistrata Haranguing the Athenian Women (assigned by artist)
Materials and techniques
Collotype print on paper
Brief description
Collotype print after Aubrey Beardsley (1872-98). 'Lysistrata Haranguing the Athenian Women', from The Lysistrata of Aristophanes, 1896.
Physical description
Black and white print depicting Lysistrata from behind, dressed in floor-length flounced gown, bloomers and slippers, addressing three naked Athenian women facing the viewer.
Dimensions
  • Image height: 245mm (image inside border)
  • Image width: 168mm (image inside border)
  • Image height: 256mm (image to edge of border)
  • Image width: 179mm (image to edge of border)
  • Sheet height: 343mm
  • Sheet width: 250mm
Marks and inscriptions
signed: AUBREY BEARDSLEY
Credit line
Given by Mr Vyvyan Holland
Object history
One of eight plates by Beardsley for The Lysistrata of Aristophanes London: Leonard Smithers, 1896.
Production
The collotype reproductions made from the original drawings in about 1929 can be recognised by the distinctive watermark in the paper comprising the initials AB in a circle.
Subjects depicted
Summary
Aubrey Beardsley's distinctive black and white drawings for Oscar Wilde's Salomé, published in 1894, brought him an extraordinary notoriety whilst still in his early twenties. His work for the periodical The Yellow Book confirmed his position as the most innovative illustrator of the day, but as a result of the hostile moralistic outcry that followed the arrest and trial of Oscar Wilde in early 1895, John Lane and other publishers panicked and dropped Beardsley. Thereafter, almost the only publisher who would use his drawings was Leonard Smithers. Smithers was a brilliant but shady character who operated on the fringes of the rare book trade, issuing small, clandestine editions of risqué books. Smithers encouraged Beardsley's already growing interest in French, Latin and Greek texts of this kind and commissioned drawings to illustrate the Satires of the late Roman poet Juvenal and, most famously, Aristophanes's bawdy satirical play Lysistrata.

The illustration depicts the key moment in the play at which Lysistrata exhorts the Athenian women to abstain from all sexual congress with their husbands until peace is declared between the Athenian men and the Lacedaemonians. The prospect of a sustained period of abstinence leads one of the women to make an overt sexual advance on another.

This print comes from the folio of reproductions made from Beardsley's original drawings and published in about 1929. Utilising the expensive collotype process, these prints are much closer to the originals than the earlier line-block prints of the 1896 edition of the book or the various, mostly very poor reproductions included in subsequent pirated printings.
Associated object
E.296-1972 (Original)
Bibliographic references
  • Aristophanes. The Lysistrata of Aristophanes: now first wholly translated into English and illustrated with eight full page drawings by Aubrey Beardsley. London: L Smithers, 1896. 61p 8 plates. Brian Reade, Aubrey Beardsley, 1969, Cat. 462. Mark Samuels Lasner, A Selective Checklist of the Published Work of Aubery Beardsley, 1995, pp 67-8, cat 107 D.
  • Victoria and Albert Museum, Department of Engraving, Illustration and Design and Department of Paintings, Accessions 1945, London: HMSO, 1956.
Collection
Accession number
E.749-1945

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Record createdFebruary 27, 2007
Record URL
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