Beardsley, Aubrey Vincent, 1872-98, English illustrator and writer, b. Brighton. Beardsley exemplifies the aesthetic movement in English art of the 1890s (see decadents). In his short working span of only six years, he developed a superbly artificial and graphic manner, expressed in flat, linear, black-and-white designs. His works were by turns erotic and cruel in emphasis. The art editor of the famous Yellow Book quarterly (1894-96), Beardsley also edited and contributed some of his best work to Leonard Smithers's periodical, The Savoy, and illustrated many books including Wilde's Salomé (1894), Pope's Rape of the Lock (1896), Aristophanes' Lysistrata (privately pub., 1896), and Jonson's Volpone (1898). His fiction, distinguished by an elaborate and erudite prose style, was collected and published in 1904 as Under the Hill. Criticized for the erotic character of his work and condemned for his association with Oscar Wilde, Beardsley fell from public favor. Ravaged by tuberculosis, he died at the age of 25.

(born Aug. 21, 1872, Brighton, Sussex, Eng.—died March 16, 1898, Menton, Fr.) British illustrator. His only formal training was a few months of evening classes at the Westminster School of Art. His style was based on the work of Edward Burne-Jones and Japanese woodcuts, and he quickly became a master of the curvilinear black-and-white ornamental illustration popularized by the Art Nouveau movement. In 1893 he illustrated an edition of Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte Darthur, and in 1894 he achieved notoriety with his erotic illustrations for the English version of Oscar Wilde's Salome. He became art editor and illustrator of the new quarterly The Yellow Book that same year. He died at age 25 of tuberculosis.

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