Gibson Girl

At the beginning of the century, the ideal was not a woman of flesh and blood at all, but the one that Charles Dan Gibson conveyed in his drawings. He collaborated with Colliers magazine for almost 20 years, from 1890 to 1910. The artist supported the movement for the emancipation of women and regularly painted his cartoons, reflecting the reaction of society to emancipation.

In his drawings, a young and beautiful girl has always played the main role, with a slim and athletic figure, keeping her style. Gibson's Girlfriend was the first girl to have postcards and photographs that were later distributed to single men and decorated soldiers' barracks. But they were still women from real earthly life, and Gibson's girlfriend was a girl invented by an artist.

She was the silent style icon of the day. The creation of the American artist received his name. She penetrated the pages of secular magazines not only in America and England, but also in Russia ("New Russian Bazaar", "Vestnik Fashion").

What was her portrait? She had lush, slightly wavy hair, neatly pulled into a high hairstyle, a closed blouse with embroidery or ruffles, with long sleeves, and a wide long skirt. The girl's gaze was befitting a youthful - modest and at the same time prone to sensuality. She expressed an independent and mischievous character, showing all the sides of a new woman.

She managed to flirt, beautifully pout her lips, beat men in a chess game, overtake bike... The drawn girl showed both beautiful fashionable toilets from Wort and Redfern, and clothes of a new model - American blouses with a high collar and a tie.

In the drawings, this young lady, educated and intelligent, was always busy with what women of that time could only dream of - she went in for sports (tennis, cycling, horse riding, and even got behind the wheel of a car), read through an elegant lorgnette, demonstrated luxurious evening gowns - it already belonged to a new time - the sports and independent XX century.

And together with Gibson's girlfriend, those who posed for the artist became popular - Evelyn Nesbit and Camilla Clifford. The 1890s are the dizzying success of the silent style icon, Gibson's Girlfriend.