Christa Giles

44
Symons, too, often focusses on art and artifice in his choice
of subject matter. In Impression: To MC, ˝Powder, wig, and
pink and lace/And those pathetic eyes of hers˝ conduce to
the ideal in ˝this miraculous rose of gold.˝ 111 In Beardsley’s
work the toilette scene predominates, and the dressing
table becomes an altar and beauty or artifice – the absolute
good. Des Esseintes possesses an enormous collection of
perfume and makeup, and through him artifice is raised to
the level of a disciplined idealism. From the constraints of
nature, the decadent artist triumphs, crying, like Yeats, ˝Art
is art because it is not nature.˝ 112 Thus, Arthur Symons
prefaced the second edition of Silhouettes, which appeared
in 1896, with a short essay which defends his
poetry against reviews which had objected to ˝the faint
smell of patchouli about them.˝ In his defence he says,
Is there any ‘reason in nature’ why we should
write exclusively about the natural blush if
the delicately acquired blush of rouge has any
attraction for us? Both exist: both, I think, are
charming in their way: and the latter, as a
subject, has, at all events, more novelty. If you
prefer your ‘new-mown hay’ in the hayfield,
and I, it may be, in a scent-bottle, why may
not my individual caprice be allowed to find
expression as much as well as your? ... but I
enjoy quite other scents and sensations as