Margot Fonteyn, 14 Drawings By Jean Target In 1948

Suite of 14 drawings dedicated to Margot Fonteyn - London, Royal Opera House, 1948-1949
Charcoal, gouache and watercolor on paper. Each sheet mounted on a stiffer paper is signed and some dated Drawing
size 25x31 cm

Produced in the heart of the post-war period, this suite brings together several sketches and studies that Jean Target devoted to the great ballerina Margot Fonteyn, then a young star of the Royal Ballet at Covent Garden. The artist, attentive to the slightest inflections of gesture, captures on the spot the momentum, the suspension and the grace of a dancer who was already establishing herself as the icon of British ballet and soon to be worldwide.
The sheets, often annotated by the artist's hand, bear witness to a passionate eye for the art of choreography. Jean Target having been a painter of dance or rather a designer of dance all his life.
We find Fonteyn's emblematic roles: Giselle, the famous adagios from Swan Lake alongside Michael Somes, the dazzling variations from Don Quixote, but also more contemporary interpretations such as Les Demoiselles de la nuit (created in London in 1948) or Daphnis et Chloé. Several studies isolate a movement, a port de bras, a fragile balance; others fix the intensity of the pas de deux, where technical virtuosity mixes with a very pure emotion also translated by color. Through the liveliness of the line, the sensitive use of color and the accuracy of the attitudes, Target restores not only the silhouette of the dancer, but also the spirit of an art in full effervescence.
Brought together in a portfolio, these drawings form a rare testimony to the emergence of Margot Fonteyn at the end of the Second World War, shortly before her decisive meeting with Rudolf Nureyev.
This beautiful collection illustrates the admiration the ballerina inspired in her contemporaries and constitutes a precious document for the history of ballet and the London scene of the late 1940s.
Margot Fonteyn (1919–1992)
An emblematic figure of 20th-century ballet, Margot Fonteyn, born in 1919, quickly established herself as the star of British ballet. Trained in London and then in Shanghai, she joined the Vic-Wells Ballet, the future Royal Ballet, as a teenager, where she would become its muse. A favorite interpreter of Frederick Ashton, she embodies Giselle, Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty and Odette-Odile in Swan Lake with unparalleled grace. Her style, combining classical purity and dramatic intensity, has left a lasting mark on the history of dance. In 1961, her encounter with Rudolf Nureyev gave birth to one of the most famous duos in the choreographic scene: their partnership became legendary and helped popularize ballet worldwide. Appointed prima ballerina assoluta by the Queen in 1979, she remained a symbol of elegance and artistic dedication. Until a ripe old age, she performed on stage, embodying the ideal of an eternal prima ballerina. Margot Fonteyn died in 1991 in Panama, leaving behind the image of an exceptional artist and a true cultural icon.