ion: D'ALBERT IN SEARCH OF IDEALS
_From "Mademoiselle de Maupin." Reproduced from the original in the
possession of Mrs. Bealby Wright_]

Applying the epithet "original" to an art so intensely reminiscent, so
ingeniously retrospective, might seem paradoxical to those unacquainted
with Beardsley's more elegant achievements. His is not the originality
of Corot and Whistler, with a new interpretation of nature, another
scheme of art and decoration, but rather the scholarly originality
of the Carracci--a scholarship grounded on a thousand traditions and
yet striking an entirely new note in art. In his imagination, his
choice of motive, his love for inanimate nature, his sentiment for
accessory,--rejected by many modern artists, still so necessary to the
modern temper,--his curious type, which quite overshadowed that of
the pre-Raphaelites, the singular technical qualities at his command,
Beardsley has no predecessors, no rivals. Who has ever managed to
suggest such colour in masses of black deftly composed? Reference to the
text is unnecessary to learn that the hair of Herodias was purple. His
style was mobile, dominating over, or subordinate to the subject, as his
genius dictated. He twisted human forms, some will think, into fantastic
peculiar shapes, becoming more than romantic--antinomian. He does not
appeal to experience but to expression. The tranquil trivialities of
what is usually understood by the illustration of books had no meaning
for him; and before any attempt is made to discriminate and interpret
the spirit, the poetical sequence, the literary inspiration which
undoubtedly existed throughout his work, side by side with technical
experiments, his exemption from the parallels of criticism must be
remembered duly.

LIST OF DRAWINGS BY AUBREY BEARDSLEY

COMPILED BY AYMER VALLANCE

LIST OF DRAWINGS BY AUBREY BEARDSLEY

JUVENILIA

1. A CARNIVAL. Long procession of many figures in fifteenth
and sixteenth century costume. Water-colour drawing. Unpublished.
Given by the artist to his grandfather, the late Surgeon-Major
William Pitt. _c._ 1880.

2. THE JACKDAW OF RHEIMS, set of illustrations to the poem.
Unpublished. _c._ 1884.

3. VIRGIL'S "AENEID," nine comic illustrations to Book II.
The title-page, written in rough imitation of printing, with the
Artist's naif and inaccurate spelling, is as follows:--ILLUSTRATIONES
DE | LIBER SECUNDUS | AENEIDOS | PUBLIUS WIR