Loïe Fuller in Tragedy of Salome

Loïe Fuller (1862 – 1928) in the Dance of Fear from Salomé (Lyric Pantomime), 1895 or 1896 (*)

(*) Retrieved from: Fifteen years of a dancer’s life, with some account of her distinguished friends / with an introduction by Anatole France (Boston: Small, Maynard & Co.,1913) | src NYPL Research Catalog

Henri Manuel (1874-1947) ~ Loïe Fuller in Robert d’Humières’ Tragédie de Salomé at the Théâtre des Arts, Paris, 1907 | src Ader
Henri Manuel (1874-1947) ~ Loïe Fuller (1862 – 1928) in attrezzo for the Tragedy of Salome, 1896 | src getty images

Loïe Fuller by Toulouse-Lautrec

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (French, 1864-1901) :: Miss Loïe Fuller, 1893. Brush and spatter lithograph printed in five colors on wove paper. Loïe Fuller was famous in turn-of-the-century Paris for her dazzling performances which combined dance, colored electric lights, and music. In this print, inspired by her appearance at the Folies Bergère, Lautrec captures the decorative effect of her billowing silk gown, which she manipulated with large poles held in her hands. Lautrec executed about sixty versions of this print in a variety of colored inks, including gold and silver. | src The Met
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (French, 1864-1901) :: Miss Loïe Fuller, 1893. Color lithograph. Parisian audiences were captivated by Loïe Fuller (1862–1928) whose unique performances involved manipulating voluminous translucent gowns with the aid of large poles in each hand. Fuller danced in a specially designed space featuring a glass floor illuminated from below and surrounded by mirrors. Electric lights of various colors projected onto the stage created an ethereal, swirling effect. Fuller’s extraordinary dance was the subject of Toulouse-Lautrec’s most abstract lithograph. The artist used layers of colored ink—including some metallic tones—to convey the movement and energy of Fuller’s performances. | src The Cleveland Museum of Art and Flickr

Portrait of Loïe Fuller by Falk

Benjamin Joseph Falk :: Full length portrait of Loie Fuller, for the portrait she was standing still while moving the fabric of her white costume during the exposure, she stood on top of a mirror and was brightly lit, 1896 (marked nº 12) | src The New York Public Library (NYPL) via Getty Images

Loie Fuller in ‘Serpentine’ dress

Portrait of Loie Fuller wearing an early version of her “Serpentine” dress. The photograph features a full length portrait of the dancer kneeling amidst a pile of cushions, with her arms upraised, and a small carved snake clasped in her right hand. Her skirt, which is decorated with repeated images of snakes, is raised up and spread out in a wide circle behind her, date unknown, late 1890s. | src V&A Museum

La Loïe Fuller (affiche), 1895

Georges de Feure :: Tous les soirs [..] La Loïe Fuller dans sa création nouvelle: Salomé. Lithograph in colors, 1895, printed by P. Lenénil (Asnières). Comédie Parisienne. | src BnF ~ Gallica

Loie Fuller par Henri Manuel

Henri Manuel (1874-1947) ~ Loïe Fuller in Robert d’Humières’ Tragédie de Salomé at the Théâtre des Arts, Paris, 1907 | src Ader
Henri Manuel (1874-1947) ~ Loïe Fuller (1862 – 1928) in attrezzo for the Tragedy of Salome, 1896 | src getty images

Loïe Fuller by B.J. Falk, 1896

Benjamin Joseph Falk :: Portrait of stage actress and dancer Loïe Fuller sitting barefoot atop a mirror, 1896 (marked nº 8). | src Washington University Libraries

Dancer Loie Fuller by Beckett

Samuel Joshua Beckett (1870–1940) ~ Loïe Fuller (1862 – 1928) dancing, ca. 1900. Gelatin silver print | src the Met
Samuel Joshua Beckett (1870–1940) ~ Loïe Fuller (1862 – 1928) dancing, ca. 1900. Gelatin silver print | src the Met
Samuel Joshua Beckett (1870–1940) ~ Loïe Fuller (1862 – 1928) dancing, ca. 1900. Gelatin silver print | src the Met

The American dancer Loie Fuller (1862-1928) conquered Paris on her opening night at the Folies-Bergère on November 5, 1892. Manipulating with bamboo sticks an immense skirt made of over a hundred yards of translucent, iridescent silk, the dancer evoked organic forms –butterflies, flowers, and flames–in perpetual metamorphosis through a play of colored lights. Loie Fuller’s innovative lighting effects, some of which she patented, transformed her dances into enthralling syntheses of movement, color, and music, in which the dancer herself all but vanished. Artists and writers of the 1890s praised her art as an aesthetic breakthrough, and the Symbolist poet Stéphane Mallarmé, who saw her perform in 1893, wrote in his essay on her that her dance was “the theatrical form of poetry par excellence.” Immensely popular, she had her own theater at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris, promoted other women dancers including Isadora Duncan, directed experimental movies, and stopped performing only in 1925.
Loie Fuller’s whirling, undulating silhouette, which embodied the fluid lines of Art Nouveau, inspired many images, from the portraits of Toulouse-Lautrec and the posters of Jules Chéret and Alphonse Mucha to the sculptures of Pierre Roche and Théodore Rivière, as well as the photographs of Harry C. Ellis and Eugène Druet.

The pictures shown here depict movements from such dances as “Dance of the Lily” and “Dance of Flame.” These images do not pretend to evoke the otherworldly effect of the performance, which took place on a darkened stage in front of a complex set of mirrors and whose magic was entirely dependent on lighting. Here, the strange shapes, reminiscent of chalices and butterflies, take form, incongruously, in the middle of an urban park, through the efforts of a short, stout figure. Arrested in crude natural light, they still retain, however, their spellbinding energy. Part of a group of thirteen photographs complemented by six others in the Musée d’Orsay, Paris, these images belonged to the sculptor Théodore Rivière (1857-1912), and were previously thought to have been made by him. They have now been reattributed to Samuel Joshua Beckett, a photographer working in London. / quoted from the Met

Samuel Joshua Beckett (1870–1940) ~ Loïe Fuller (1862 – 1928) dancing, ca. 1900. Gelatin silver print | src the Met

Loie Fuller by Beckett

Samuel Joshua Beckett (1870–1940) ~ Loïe Fuller (1862 – 1928) dancing, ca. 1900. Gelatin silver print | src the Met

The American dancer Loie Fuller (1862-1928) conquered Paris on her opening night at the Folies-Bergère on November 5, 1892. Manipulating with bamboo sticks an immense skirt made of over a hundred yards of translucent, iridescent silk, the dancer evoked organic forms –butterflies, flowers, and flames–in perpetual metamorphosis through a play of colored lights. Loie Fuller’s innovative lighting effects, some of which she patented, transformed her dances into enthralling syntheses of movement, color, and music, in which the dancer herself all but vanished. Artists and writers of the 1890s praised her art as an aesthetic breakthrough, and the Symbolist poet Stéphane Mallarmé, who saw her perform in 1893, wrote in his essay on her that her dance was “the theatrical form of poetry par excellence.” Immensely popular, she had her own theater at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris, promoted other women dancers including Isadora Duncan, directed experimental movies, and stopped performing only in 1925.
Loie Fuller’s whirling, undulating silhouette, which embodied the fluid lines of Art Nouveau, inspired many images, from the portraits of Toulouse-Lautrec and the posters of Jules Chéret and Alphonse Mucha to the sculptures of Pierre Roche and Théodore Rivière, as well as the photographs of Harry C. Ellis and Eugène Druet.

The pictures shown here depict movements from such dances as “Dance of the Lily” and “Dance of Flame.” These images do not pretend to evoke the otherworldly effect of the performance, which took place on a darkened stage in front of a complex set of mirrors and whose magic was entirely dependent on lighting. Here, the strange shapes, reminiscent of chalices and butterflies, take form, incongruously, in the middle of an urban park, through the efforts of a short, stout figure. Arrested in crude natural light, they still retain, however, their spellbinding energy. Part of a group of thirteen photographs complemented by six others in the Musée d’Orsay, Paris, these images belonged to the sculptor Théodore Rivière (1857-1912), and were previously thought to have been made by him. They have now been reattributed to Samuel Joshua Beckett, a photographer working in London. / quoted from the Met