Binding for Oscar Wilde’s ‘Salome.’

Aubrey Beardsley.

1894

Cloth binding with decorative blocking in gilt

12½ x 10 inches

Beardsley’s exuberant design asserts the Art Nouveau interest in organic forms animated by vital energy; barely related to the content of the text, its emphasis is on effect – catching the eye and inviting the reader to read on, whatever the pages may hold. [continued below]

[Click on image to enlarge it and mouse over text for links.]

Photograph and text by Simon Cooke

[You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the photographer and (2) link to this URL in a web document or cite it in a print one.]

Beardsley’s focus on visual impressiveness is an important ingredient in his style. Modern commentators detect in this tendency evidence of an emergent Modernism, but many of his contemporaries regarded his bindings as a superficial re-tread of the showiness of books of the 1860s.

Bibliography

Wilde, Oscar. <Salomé. London: John Lane, 1894.

---

Victorian
Web

Visual
Arts

Design

Book
Design

Aubrey
Beardsley

Next

Created 14 March 2016