Ballet Costume for Microton (Habit de Microton berger extravagant des banboches)

Etching and engraving with a design for a ballet costume for Microton, created by Juan Dolivar and printed by Jacques LePautre after a design by Jean I Berain. Entrusted with drawings for costumes, stage sets, and royal ceremonies at the 'Academie Royale de la Musique' since 1680, Berain's ingenious creations took acanthus and laurel leaves, palmettes and grotesques, mixing them with dancers, acrobats, monkeys and satyrs, to create his own, imaginative, theatrical world. His designs were multiplied and disseminated by means of engravings, his design motifs and manner objects becoming highly influential in the closing years of the seventeenth century. Like this print, many of his designs were for costumes intended for the performances of the Royal Academy of Music.

The costume is made up of a short tunic decorated with trianglular motifs on the border of the skirt and the collar, and with sleeves pouched and held by a hand at the elbows, decorated again with triangular motifs at the cuffs. The shoulders and knees are surrounded by puffy bands of fabric with hanging triangles with bells on the tips. A jeweled band crosses, diagonally, the torso, and a large, cone-shaped hat with a tassel on the tip and a bundle of large, scrolling feathers, covers the head. A lace collar with scalloping edges and a cape, hanging from the collar and covering the back of the character, with tight hose and square-toed, high-heeled shoes embellished with stones complete the outfit. Microton holds a spear on his left hand, its tip pointing towards the lower left side of the sheet, and stands, the weight on his right foot, in front of a misty landscape with trees.