Chloë: Evening Dress by de Beer

This hand-colored woodcut from Gazette du Bon Ton depicts a fashionable woman in an elaborate evening gown, attended by a winged cherub. The print exemplifies Art Deco design aesthetics applied to haute couture illustration. Rather than political satire, this work belongs to the commercial print tradition—fashion journalism rendered through woodblock technique with selective hand-coloring in gold and magenta.

Yet it inherits the compositional wit of earlier caricature: the exaggerated proportions, the theatrical staging, the ornamental detail crowding the frame. By the 1920s, satirical printmaking had largely given way to commercial and decorative purposes. Fashion plates like this show how the formal language of Gillray and Daumier—bold line, selective color, social theater—migrated into modern advertising and design.