Aubrey Beardsley

Viking Press, New York, first US edition, 1967. Cloth, folio,. 372 pp, 502 ills. With an introduction by John Rothenstein. From the blurb - "-The great revival of interest in the art of Aubrey Beardsley and the success of recent retrospective exhibitions of his work have demonstrated the need for a single volume presenting all his better-known prints and drawings as well as many of his less familiar but equally important ones. Brian Reade, who was responsible for the exhibition at the Gallery of Modern Art in New York in 1967 and for the one a year earlier at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, is recognized as the leading authority on Beardsley today. Among the 500 examples on these pages, some have never been published before. An important feature of the book is the excellence of the reproductions. Special arrangements were made with museums and private collectors to work directly, from originals wherever these could be traced; in the other cases plates were made from rare early editions. Thus Beardsley admirers are offered not only the fullest coverage of the artist's work, but also the best quality of reproduction. In his brief lifetime of twenty-five years Beardsley developed a distinctive style that spread throughout Europe and the United States and continued to influence book illustration, poster design, and architectural decoration long after his death in 1898. Brian Reade contributes an illuminating biography and an engrossing analysis of Beardsley's aims and achievements as an artist. The introduction by Sir John Rothenstein, recently director of the Tate Galiery, London, and son of Sir William Rothenstein, who was a close friend of Beardsley, also throws new light on the artist and the taste of his times. Top edge duststained, otherwise Good in slightly torn dustwrapper.