Carlotta Grisi (facsimile signature)
1844
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
1844
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
Dominant colour
Carlotta Grisi (facsimile signature) is a 1844 by John Brandard, a Romanticism work, held at Victoria and Albert Museum.
This print shows Carlotta Grisi in the famous Romantic ballet *Giselle*. She’s the lead, dancing the peasant girl who dies young and joins ghostly spirits called the Wilis. The ballet’s story turns on love beating revenge. Grisi was a star of her day, picked by the writer Théophile Gautier for her youth and grace. Look up the Victoria and Albert Museum to see this print in person.
The print depicts Carlotta Grisi in Act II of *Giselle*, portrayed in a moonlit mountainous landscape beside a lake with a distant castle. She stands en pointe in profile, her right leg extended behind, arms raised, while wearing a diaphanous, tiered skirt and a bodice adorned with floral details and peacock-feathered wings. A draped cross inscribed "Giselle" and a trellis of roses frame the scene, with the lithograph featuring cut corners and separately mounted title. These mid-19th-century lithographs, characterized by soft lines and hand-coloring, reflect the era’s romanticized ballet…
Read the full account in the museum source.
John Brandard made detailed prints for the theater world in the 1830s–1850s, turning operas and ballets into eye-catching sheet music covers and playbills.
See the richer artist page
