George Barbier (1882-1932) was one of the key artists of the “Art Deco” movement and one of the most prestigious French artist’s and fashion illustrators to emerge from post World War 1 in the early twentieth century.He produced the most exquisite, high-colour fashion plates for the couturier Paul Poiret, as well as contemporaries Lanvin, Paquin and Vionnet.His elegantly refined, graphic style was typical of the “Art Deco” school and the influences of Orientalism, antique vases, Indian miniatures, Aubrey Beardsley, the Ballet Russes (which inspired his lavish costume designs) and (not least) Parisian haute couture are evident in his work.
His stylised, precisely-illustrated fashion vignettes seem to effortlessly capture and define the atmosphere of the 1920s and are so evocative of that by-gone era and a certain type of upper-class lifestyle. George Barbier was born in Nantes in 1882 and went on to study at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts under the tutelage of Jean Paul Laurens.He was an extremely versatile artist and a very fashionable and flamboyant man who would go on to design theatre and ballet costumes, fans, jewellery, glass, fabrics and wallpaper, but he will always be revered/remembered best as a sublimely talented illustrator of haute couture fashions and books.He was part of an elite circle during the 1920’s nicknamed “The Knights Of The Bracelet” by Vogue magazine, whose membership included two of Barbier’s first-cousins – Bernard Boutet de Monvel and Pierre Brissaud, as well as such luminaries as Paul Iribe (one-time lover of Coco Chanel) , Georges Lepape, and Charles Martin.Barbier worked with some of the top writers and journalists of his day; after World War 1 he became an editor and journalist for the magazines “La Gazette du Bon Ton” (published between 1912-1925) and “La Vie Parisienne”, where he pioneered the use of “pochoirs” or stencils for the publication of his colour-plates (a hand-printing method inspired by the classical Japanese masters) to stunning effect (in spite of criticism from purists).Apart from his artwork, Barbier was also a skilled journalist, writing stories and society news for a variety of magazines under various pen-names as well as his own, birth name.He provided superb illustrations for the likes of P.Verlaine, P.Louÿs, C. Baudelaire, T. Gautier amongst others, but his finest illustrations were those which were interpreted by F.L. Schmied, in woodcuts form.
The Songs of Bilitis (French: Les Chansons de Bilitis) is a collection of erotic, essentially lesbian, poetry by Pierre Louÿs published in Paris in 1894 (see 1894 in poetry). Since Louÿs claimed that he had translated the original poetry from Ancient Greek, this work is considered a pseudotranslation.The poems are in the manner of Sappho; the collection's introduction claims they were found on the walls of a tomb in Cyprus, written by a woman of Ancient Greece called Bilitis, a courtesan and contemporary of Sappho to whose life Louÿs dedicated a small section of the book. On publication, the volume deceived even expert scholars. Though the poems were actually clever fabulations, authored by Louÿs himself, they are still considered important literature.
Louÿs claimed the 143 prose poems, excluding 3 epitaphs, were entirely the work of this ancient poet — a place where she poured both her most intimate thoughts and most public actions, from childhood innocence in Pamphylia to the loneliness and chagrin of her later years.
Although for the most part The Songs of Bilitis is original work, many of the poems were reworked epigrams from the Palatine Anthology, and Louÿs even borrowed some verses from Sappho herself. The poems are a blend of mellow sensuality and polished style in the manner of the Parnassian school, but underneath run subtle Gallic undertones that Louÿs could never escape.
To lend authenticity to the forgery, Louÿs in the index listed some poems as "untranslated"; he even craftily fabricated an entire section of his book called "The Life of Bilitis", crediting a certain fictional archaeologist Herr G. Heim ("Mr. C. Cret" in German) as the discoverer of Bilitis' tomb. And though Louÿs displayed great knowledge of Ancient Greek culture, ranging from children's games in "Tortie Tortue" to application of scents in "Perfumes", the literary fraud was eventually exposed. This did little, however, to taint their literary value in readers' eyes, and Louÿs' open and sympathetic celebration of lesbian sexuality earned him sensation and historic significance.

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