This Orientalist art deco avant-garde pen & ink drawing by Cardwell Higgins is an early work by the renowned illustrator that recalls the erotic and stylized work of British artist Aubrey Beardsley. This is part of a series of similarly exotic and provocative drawings Higgins created between 1927 – 1929, which would much later be marketed as a series of limited edition art prints under the guidance of Charles Martignette in 1979. The work is finely matted and framed behind glass in a handsome black and silver fine gallery frame.
This finely executed illustration shows a topless Chinese dancer accompanied by a man playing an erhu, depicted in a burlesque vaudeville-era Ziegfeld Follies style production. From the vast estate of legendary art collector Charles Martignette, who befriended the artist in his retirement in Hollywood, Florida and organized a one-man retrospective for Higgins in the late 1970s.