Two strange-looking demons lower the nude body of a young woman into a black coffin.
Photo © President and Fellows of Harvard College
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Photo © President and Fellows of Harvard College

In this black ink drawing, two strange-looking demons gently lower the nude body of a young woman into a coffin. The demon on the left has a large forehead crowned by a wild cloud of hair, and wears a black eye mask along with an all-black costume. The demon on the right has a goat’s face and ears, and is otherwise unclothed. The black coffin is decorated with roses and the word "Fin." In front of the coffin stands a giant, fluffy dust brush with an ornamental handle pointed upward.

Identification and Creation

Object Number
1943.642
People
Aubrey Vincent Beardsley, British (Brighton, England 1872 - 1898 Menton, France)
Title
Tailpiece
Other Titles
Alternate Title: The Burial of Salome
Series/Book Title: Salome
Classification
Drawings
Work Type
drawing
Date
1893
Culture
British
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/297775

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Black ink and graphite on white wove paper
Dimensions
16.4 x 17.4 cm (6 7/16 x 6 7/8 in.)

State, Edition, Standard Reference Number

Standard Reference Number
Zatlin 875

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Bequest of Grenville L. Winthrop
Accession Year
1943
Object Number
1943.642
Division
European and American Art
Contact
am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • Joseph Pennell, Catalogue of an Exhibition of Original Drawings by Aubrey Beardsley, exh. cat., Brooklyn Museum (Brooklyn, NY, 1923), no. 32
  • Martin Birnbaum, Jacovleff and Other Artists, Paul A. Struck (New York, 1946), pl. 38
  • Linda Gertner Zatlin, Aubrey Beardsley and Victorian Sexual Politics, The Clarendon Press (Oxford, England, 1990), p. 95, fig. 51
  • Chris Snodgrass, Aubrey Beardsley: Dandy of the Grotesque, Oxford University Press (NY) and Oxford University Press (UK) (New York, NY and Oxford, England, 1995), fig. 3-14, p. 147
  • Kathy Alexis Psomiades, Beauty's Body: Gender and Representation in British Aestheticism, Stanford University Press (Stanford, CA, 1997), pp. 178-179; repr. between pp. 152 and 153
  • Mark Samuels Lasner, "The Pursuit of the Rare: Three Early Beardsley Collectors", Gazette of the Grolier Club (2000), no. 51, p. 17, note 34
  • Allison Pease, Modernism, Mass Culture, and the Aesthetics of Obscenity, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, 2000), p. 125, repr. p. 128 as fig. 21
  • Chikashi Kitazaki and Mina Oya, ed., Between Reality and Dreams: Nineteenth Century British and French Art from the Winthrop Collection of the Fogg Art Museum, exh. cat., National Museum of Western Art (Ueno, 2002), cat. no. 48-9, repr. (color)
  • Linda Gertner Zatlin, Aubrey Beardsley: A Catalogue Raisonné, Yale University Press (U.S.) (New Haven and London, 2016), vol. 2, no. 875, pp. 11, 25, 43-45, 135, repr. pp. 1, 44

Exhibition History

  • An Exhibition of Original Drawings by Aubrey Beardsley, Brooklyn Museum, 12/19/1923 - 01/31/1924; Milwaukee Art Institute, 10/01/1924 - 10/30/1924; Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, 11/01/1924 - 11/30/1924; Memorial Art Gallery, University of Rochester, Rochester, 11/29/1924 - 12/31/1924
  • Between Reality and Dreams: Nineteenth Century British and French Art from the Winthrop Collection of the Fogg Art Museum, National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, 09/14/2002 - 12/08/2002

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of European and American Art at am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu