?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,500 - $ 2,000
DUDLEY HARDY (1867-1922) "A GAIETY GIRL." 1894. 89x39 inches, 226x99 cm. Waterlow & Sons Ltd., London. Condition B / B-: losses along sharp creases in image; water stains along left edge; chipping and cracking above text at top. Framed. Hardy studied art in Paris and brought back much of what he learned to London where he garnered recognition as an illustrator and a painter. He designed his first poster, for the magazine Today, in 1893 and then in 1894 he designed three posters for A Gaiety Girl. These images immediately became a huge success in Britain. Hardy's style has often been compared to Jules Cheret. And in that he depicted many attractive, winsome women in his posters there is certainly similarity. However, stylistically they are quite different. Hardy uses a less sophisticated lithographic process (involving fewer colors than Cheret) but produces a bolder, more graphic image. He employs a black outlining, a solid color background and (here) utilizes the white of the paper for the woman's dress. "Hardy . . . had absorbed the flat tones of the Nabis and the exuberance of Cheret respectively into [his] own poster designs." (Graphic Design: Reproduction and representation since 1800, by Paul Jobling and David Crowley. P. 84) What Hardy has most in common with Cherét was his degree of influence on other poster artists. Hardy's style became the basis of the British School even extending to the Beggarstaff Brothers. Hardy went on to design hundreds of posters for the British Theatre and British commercial products. DFP-I 50, Reims 1375.
