August 21

August 21 is the birthdate of illustrator, eccentric and author Aubrey Beardsley. He was a leading artist in the Aesthetic movement that included Oscar Wilde and James A. McNeill Whistler. Much of his work is, shall we say, an acquired taste. His drawings in black ink focused on the grotesque, the decadent and the blatantly erotic. His art reflected the decadence of his circle in late 19th Century Britain, and his influence is evident in the work of the French Symbolists, the Poster Art Movement of the 1890s and works of late-period Art Nouveau artists. He had six years of creative output, dying of tuberculosis before age 26. Pictured: “The Climax” (from Wilde’s “Salome”), 1893.