The Art of Aubrey Beardsley: Le Morte Darthur

A few of the smaller, deceptively simple figure studies today. I love the way Beardsley captures so much complexity using high-contrast, geometric lines. It’s hard to believe that he was only 19 when he began work on this book.

 

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

The Art of Aubrey Beardsley: Le Morte Darthur

Today I’m sharing a few of the smaller portraits from the book. The last illustration is one of my favourites. Beardsley uses negative space brilliantly, and his simple line drawings create compellingly complex faces.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

 

Artwork via: Enchanted Booklet

Tummy Thursday: You Gotta Eat it All

Yes, I know, that’s similar to the post in October about the little one’s cake, but we are in for another Pokémon themed cake. It was #1’s birthday on Sunday and she wanted a Zorua cake. Well, actually she wanted a Reshiram cake, but I balked at the idea of trying to make one. There’s being ambitious and there’s being stupid. I think it was my most complicated motive cake so far as it does not have a simple geometric form as a basis but the cut out of the Pokémon and the decoration took me almost three hours.

The cake is vanilla and cherries, the filing is German mango buttercream and roasted almonds. I then covered everything with Italian buttercream and added several layers of fondant. It was delicious and pretty.

©Giliell, all rights reserved

Jack’s Walk

A mayapple masquerading as the sun. ©voyager, all rights reserved

Well, hello there. It’s been a while since Jack and I were here, and we hope you’ve all been keeping well. I don’t know about the weather where you are, but ours has been hellishly hot and dry. It’s been difficult for Jack to get exercise because he still has a lot of hair to shed, despite daily brushing and he overheats quickly. Mostly, though, he’s just getting old. My Bubba is 12 now, and this summer, for the first time, I see the weight of those years hanging on him. He’s slower, fatigues quickly, and he’s lost his delightful prancing gait.

Despite the physical changes, Jack’s attitude remains cheerful, and he still wants to play and go for adventures. I’ve been worried, though, that he couldn’t make it all the way around any of our trials, so we’ve been taking shorter walks just around the block. This helps meet Jack’s physical needs, but not his emotional ones, so this morning I got up at the crack of dawn, fed Jack, packed a large thermos of water and a smaller one of coffee, grabbed my camera and keys and took the boy out to Trillium Woods. That’s a 1 km looped trail with several benches along the path, and it’s Jack’s favourite walk. The entire route is shaded by giant trees, and I crossed my fingers that Bubba could make it from bench to bench and back to the car, and he did! We went slowly and took water at each bench stop, but Jack really struggled to make it up the hill at the end of the trail. We stopped twice for him to catch his breath, and I was getting concerned that bringing him was a bad idea, but one plodding foot after another, Jack finally made it to the top where he beamed with happiness and contentment. Next time, we’ll walk in the other direction, which puts the hilly section at the beginning of the walk, instead of the end. For now, Jack is blissfully sleeping, and I feel like the luckiest mommy in the world because I get to be his mommy.

The Art of Aubrey Beardsley: Le Morte Darthur

Many of the figures in Beardsley’s work are androgenous, and as you can imagine, this created quite a stir during the Victorian times in which they were published. Despite the controversy, or perhaps because of it, Beardsley’s work was well-considered in art circles and the book sold moderately well. Over the next few days, I’ll be posting some of the more well-known figures in the book, but I wanted to introduce a few select examples today as a signpost to the overarching theme of androgyny.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur.

 

Artwork via: Enchanted Booklet

Project Badgermascus – Interlude 4 – New Tools

I have decided to make a sheath for the knife, but since the blade and the fittings are quite fancy, a plain leather sheath would be unbefitting. So the time has come for me to learn some fancy leatherwork. As you know, I am quite fond of making my own tools, but this time around I have decided to bite the bullet and buy some basic stuff for starters.

© Charly, all rights reserved. Click for full size.

These are really just the basics – a swivel knife and six basic stamps, a beveler, and a groover. The cheapest ones there were to find.

I will surely make some of my own tools in the future, but these should, hopefully, suffice for a start. They do not allow me to make anything that cannot be done with the tools that I already have – but they allow me to make those works much easier, more consistently, precisely and quicker.

Now I am going to cut up an old leather handbag and test some design ideas.

Mushroom Hunt Pictures – The Finale

Yes, this series is starting at its end, in my kitchen.

Today I took a day off of knifemaking. And by that I mean completely day off, I tried to not even think about knives (at which I failed). I went on a long walk to the forest to look if there are some mushrooms to collect. And there were, enough for me and my father to have a big lunch and a whole bunch that was cooked and put into the freezer for future use.

I did take my camera with me, but we already had a series of mushroom species. And anyway, what I collected was about 90%  blushers and other species were sparse or not there at all yet – the true season comes in August/September.

Blushers are one of those mushrooms that have their own very specific taste – a bit like meat. So the recipe that I have used was very simple – I chopped them up, salted them, added a bit of cumin, basil, oregano, and a tiny amount of ground pepper bolete. Then I softened some onion on lard, added the mushrooms and I stewed them for at least thirty minutes with frequent stirring until most of the water was gone.

So if you cannot expect pictures of mushrooms, what can you expect? Well, I made random pictures of flowers and roadside stuff that I will post one-two a day until I am done. Unfortunately, there were not that many interesting insects around either, but that might be because I was looking for mushrooms, not for bugs. Do not expect some great art, but some of those pictures would look quite good as a screen background, in my opinion.

The Art of Aubrey Beardsley: Le Morte Darthur

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Le Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. LeMorte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

 

Artwork via: Enchanted Booklet

The Art of Aubrey Beardsley – Le Morte Darthur

Today it’s a peek at the Kingdom and a few courtiers.

Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Plus a bonus taste of some page headers.

Artwork by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

 

Artwork via: The Enchanted Booklet

 

The Art of Book Design: Le Morte D’Arthur

Sir Thomas Malory. Le Morte Darthur. Illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley. Limited First Edition, J. M. Dent and Sons, 1893.

Sir Thomas Mallory. Le Morte Darthur. Illustrations by Aubrey Bardsley. Limited First Edition, J. M. Dent and Sons, 1893.

Marcus submitted this book a very long time ago and I’ve been holding off using it because there is so much more to this book than its very beautiful cover. The book is filled with the most incredible illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley and I’d like to showcase them,  so I’ve decided to change things up a bit. Over the next few weeks, we’re going to dive into this book and savour it, a few delightful illustrations at a time. The book has been republished many times, but in the above photos, Marcus is holding his very rare, limited edition (only 300 copies made).

Bearsley was only 19 when he began the artwork for this book and was working as a clerk in an insurance firm at the time. Dent saw the artist’s potential and hired him on cheaply, hoping to produce a high-quality edition that was affordable for the masses. Beardsley’s artwork exceeded all expectations. In all, there are over 1,000 illustrations and decorations in the book and many have gone on to live in fine art collections around the world. Beardsley died of tuberculosis a mere 4 years later, but he left behind an incredible body of work. I can’t possibly show all 1,000 decorations in the book, but I will show you the best of the full and double-page illustrations plus a selection of borders and chapter headings to give you a good overall flavour of the grotesque, macabre, erotic world that Beardsley created.

edit, July 7/20. The edition that Marcus is holding is from 1893 and not 1927, as I had originally noted, and I’ve made the correction. Thanks to Flex for the wealth of information.

Le Morte Darthur, Dent and Sons, 1927.

Let’s start with a look at the detail of a few monograms and full-page border decorations.

Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley. Morte Darthur. Dent and Sons, 1927.

 

Artwork via: Enchanted Booklet