
Collection Online as of May 23, 2022
(British, 1872-1898)
Pen and black ink with traces of graphite underdrawing
Sheet: 25.6 x 17.4 cm (10 1/16 x 6 7/8 in.)
Dudley P. Allen Fund 1953.136
not on view
In this drawing, Aubrey Beardsley illustrates an early scene in Alexander Pope’s satirical masterpiece The Rape of the Lock (1712) in which the heroine, Belinda, primps in her boudoir. Reflecting the poem’s emphasis on contrived rather than natural beauty, the drawing is densely layered with artifice. A view of an idyllic garden with a cupola-topped pavilion is glimpsed not through a window as it would first seem, but on a folding screen. The bejeweled bottles littering the table serve as emblems of Belinda’s vanity.