Costume design by Andrée Howard for Tulip in Act I scene 1 of the ballet The Sailor's Return, choreographed by Andrée Howard, produced by Ballet Rambert, Sadler's Wells Theatre, 1947.

Full length negro figure standing on sketched-in quayside, wearing pale blue blouse with wide revers at v-neck, blue trousers turned up to calf, broad black buckled belt, red scarf spotted pale blue and carrying in her left hand a bundle in dull red purple with dark carmine 'squiggles' . Pencil, watercolour and gouache.

Cyril W. Beaumont Bequest

NB: The term "negro" was used historically to describe people of black African heritage but, since the 1960s, has fallen from usage and, increasingly, is considered offensive. The term is repeated here in its original historical context.

The design is for Tulip, danced by Sally Gilmour, in Act I scene 1 of the ballet "The Sailor's Return", where Tulip arrives in the English village. "The Sailor's Return" choreographed and designed by Andrée Howard to a score by Arthur Oldham and premiered by Ballet Rambert at Sadler's Wells Theatre in 1947.
Howard devised the scenario from the novel of the same name by David Garnett, producing a ballet in six scenes. The ballet traces the events set in train when the sailor, William Targett, returns to his home village with Tulip, a negro girl he married in a native ceremony; the prejudice he encounters leads to his death and Tulip sends their child away to be brought up in Africa.
The design came to the Museum as part of the Cyril Beaumont Bequest.

Historical significance: "The Sailor's Return" was an example of drance drama, rather than pure ballet, and the second time that Howard had turned to David Garnett's novels as source, the first being for one of her finest works, "Lady into Fox". The role of Tulip provided Sally Gilmour with one of her finest dramatic roles.
Howard was one of a very few choreographers who also designed their own ballets.

S.266-2000