Carlotta Grisi as a fairy

What you are looking at

A young woman in mid-nineteenth-century theatrical dress stands alone against a neutral background, posed in a graceful contrapposto stance. She wears a pale blue tulle skirt of mid-calf length with a cream-colored underskirt and hem, typical of Romantic-era ballet costume. Her bodice is a darker blue or teal, with short puffed sleeves that leave the shoulders bare, and she wears a jeweled belt or girdle at the waist. A small tiara or ornamental headdress sits atop her dark hair, which is styled up and back in the fashion of the 1840s. Her right arm extends gently outward at roughly shoulder height, palm open and relaxed, while her left hangs at her side. She stands en relevé—rising onto the balls of her feet in the classical ballet position—with her weight distributed lightly across both feet, her posture upright and her gaze directed downward and away in the demure manner of theatrical portraiture. The print is colored by hand in soft watercolor tones, with careful attention to the translucent quality of the tulle.

The dancing

The figure is a solitary dancer posed in a classical ballet stance. She rises onto the balls of her feet in the characteristic relevé position, demonstrating the lightness and verticality central to Romantic ballet technique. Her upper body is still and composed, with the raised arm held at an elegant but not exaggerated height; the gesture is refined rather than dramatically extended. Her posture and the softness of her expression—gazing down rather than out toward an audience—suggest the introspective quality of the Romantic ballet aesthetic, where ethereal grace superseded technical display.

The dance depicted

This is a theatrical portrait of a Romantic-era ballet dancer, most likely representing a specific performance or character rather than a generalized image of ballet. The title identifies the subject as Carlotta Grisi performing as a fairy—a common character type in the ballet of the 1840s, when Grisi was at the height of her fame. The costume, pose, and styling are consistent with the fairy roles that populated works like Giselle (1841), which Grisi created, and other ballets of that decade. The en relevé stance and the restrained arm position reflect the Romantic ballet technique of the period, in which dancers cultivated an illusion of weightlessness and otherworldly grace. The image records not how the dance moved in performance, but how a celebrated dancer wished to be remembered in a starring role.

How it was made

This is a hand-colored lithographic or engraved print, a standard format for theatrical publicity and souvenir imagery in the 1840s and 1850s. The base image was likely printed in black or sepia, then finished with watercolor washes in blue, cream, and flesh tones, applied by hand to individual impressions. This technique allowed for rapid, affordable production of multiple copies while retaining the appearance of a fine art object—ideal for sale to audiences as a keepsake of a celebrated performance or dancer. The delicate coloring and refined line work indicate this was aimed at a middle- to upper-class market, people who attended the opera house and could afford such prints.

About this work

This is a hand-colored theatrical print of Carlotta Grisi, one of the greatest Romantic ballet dancers of the nineteenth century, depicted in a fairy role of the sort she famously performed in the 1840s. The image captures the aesthetic ideals of Romantic ballet: ethereal grace, weightless elevation, refined technique, and the theatrical persona of a celebrated star. It is both a document of mid-nineteenth-century ballet costume and a record of how dancers of that era were marketed and memorialized through the popular print trade. The work belongs in a dance history collection not as art but as evidence—of a specific moment in ballet practice, of the materials through which performances entered popular memory, and of how a canonical dancer of the period was publicly represented.

How to look at it

Look first at the pose: the dancer is caught in the moment of rising, suspended on the balls of her feet, which was the foundation of Romantic ballet technique and an emblem of the weightlessness the style aspired to represent. The restrained arm position and downward gaze are equally characteristic—Romantic dancers favored introspection and stillness in portraiture, contrasting with the more ostentatious display of earlier ballet. The costume details—the short tulle skirt, the bare shoulders, the modest tiara—establish this as a performer of the 1840s and also signal a particular class of role: the supernatural female figure that dominated Romantic ballet. The hand coloring and the delicate line work are typical of how theatrical celebrity was packaged and sold to a mass audience in this period.

The artist

The print is credited to T. H. Lacy, a London publisher specializing in theatrical prints and playscripts. The artist or engraver is not recorded. Lacy's series of theatrical costume prints was a popular and profitable venture in the mid-nineteenth century, providing both keepsakes for theatergoers and material for costume reference.

The period

This print dates to the height of Romantic ballet in Europe, a period (roughly 1830–1850) when ballet became dominated by the figure of the ethereal, otherworldly ballerina—often a sylph, sprite, or supernatural being. Carlotta Grisi was one of the four greatest dancers of this era, alongside Marie Taglioni, Fanny Cerrito, and Lucile Grahn. The 1840s saw the consolidation of pointe work as a standard technique, the development of the tulle tutu as the canonical costume, and the emergence of the dancer as a celebrated public figure whose image could be reproduced and sold. Theatrical prints like this one were a booming market, reflecting the growing mass audience for opera and ballet and the development of new lithographic technologies that made color printing affordable.

Where it lives

This print is held in the New York Public Library's collection of prints depicting dance. It is one of many such theatrical prints published by T. H. Lacy of London, a major producer of theatrical imagery and dramatic texts in the mid-nineteenth century. The print was likely sold as a souvenir at the theater or through print shops, making it a commercial object designed for a broad audience rather than a fine art work.

Dance in this work

Questions about this work