{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O1329907"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1329907/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2016HY7086/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2016HY7086/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"high","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2016HY7086","copyright":"©Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":{"_iiif_pres":"https://iiif.vam.ac.uk/collections/O1329907/manifest.json","_alt_iiif_pres":[]}},"record":{"systemNumber":"O1329907","accessionNumber":"S.2680-2015","objectType":"Costume design","titles":[{"title":"H.M.S. Pinafore","type":"generic title"}],"summaryDescription":"<i>HMS Pinafore</i>, or, <i>The Lass That Loved a Sailor</i> by W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan was produced at the Opera Comique Theatre under the management of the Comedy Opera Company, on Saturday 25th May 1878 until 24 December and from Saturday 1st until Thursday 20th February 1879.\r\n\r\nDelighted with <i>The Sorcerer</i>, D’Oyly Carte commissioned a new work from Gilbert and Sullivan in December 1877. Britain was a seafaring nation, and Gilbert’s new libretto satirised the popular nautical melodramas of his youth such as Douglas Jerrold’s <i>Black Eye’d Susa</i>n. Gilbert had featured nautical folk and language in his <i>Bab Ballads</i>, and developed them in <i>H.M.S. Pinafore</i>, a shipboard opera that opened in May 1878 featuring the considerate Captain Corcoran, his gallant crew, the dastardly Dick Deadeye, the First Lord of the Admiralty Sir Joseph Porter (a thinly-veiled portrait of the bookseller turned politician W.H. Smith), his sisters, cousins and aunts, and Buttercup the Bumboat woman.\r\n\r\nAfter a slow start due to a summer heatwave, the opera was a hit by August after Sullivan included its sparkling tunes in a Covent Garden concert. Angered by a host of unauthorised American productions starting with one in Boston in November 1878, Carte planned its first authorised American production which opened the following year at New York’s Fifth Avenue Theatre in December 1879, with Sullivan conducting.\r\n\nThe prolific costume designer Attilio Giuseppe de Comelli von Stuckenfeld (1858-1925) was born in northern Italy to a wealthy family. He came to London in the late 19th century and working as Atillio Comelli, some of his earliest designs were the costumes for Covent Garden’s production of <i>La Bohème</i> (1899).  He became one of the most prolific designers for the London stage in the late 19th and early 20th century and was credited as Artist in Chief at the Alhambra, the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, and the Royal Opera House where he provided costume designs for over seventy-eight opera and ballet productions.\r\n\r\nKnown for his colourful and inventive designs especially for pantomime, Comelli researched his commissions thoroughly, studying authorities on the period he was working at the British and South Kensington Museum. He married Cecilia Emily Middleton in 1900 and died in west London, survived by his wife.\r\n","physicalDescription":"Watercolour and bodycolour over over pencil on paper. The design features a female figure wearing a white and pale blue dress with a matching pale blue headdress.","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Comelli, Attilio","id":"A30582"},"association":{"text":"designers","id":"AAT25190"},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"watercolour","id":"x33202"},{"text":"bodycolour","id":"x34671"},{"text":"pencil","id":"x30347"},{"text":"paper","id":"x30308"}],"techniques":[{"text":"designing","id":"THES268626"},{"text":"drawing (image-making)","id":"AAT54196"},{"text":"painting (image-making)","id":"AAT54216"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"watercolour and bodycolour over pencil on paper","categories":[{"text":"Entertainment & Leisure","id":"THES48959"},{"text":"Theatre","id":"THES250537"},{"text":"Designs","id":"THES48968"}],"styles":[],"collectionCode":{"text":"T&P","id":"THES48602"},"images":["2016HY7086"],"imageResolution":"high","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"004","id":"THES356607"},"free":"","case":"","shelf":"","box":""}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"costume design","id":"AAT163423"}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"Great Britain","id":"x32019"},"association":{"text":"designed","id":"x29338"},"note":""}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"1918","earliest":"1918-01-01","latest":"1918-12-31"},"association":{"text":"designed","id":"x29338"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[],"creditLine":"Given by Dame Bridget D'Oyly Carte. \r\nThe V&A wishes to acknowledge the generous support given by The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, which facilitated the cataloguing of the D’Oyly Carte Archive designs in 2015/16.","dimensions":[{"dimension":"Height","value":"28.4","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"19","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""}],"dimensionsNote":"","marksAndInscriptions":[],"objectHistory":"","historicalContext":"","briefDescription":"Costume design by Attilo Comelli for a Sister, Cousin or Aunt from a touring production of <i>H.M.S. Pinafore</i>, first performed in Dublin, 1918","bibliographicReferences":[],"production":"","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[],"contentPerson":[],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":[],"galleryLabels":[],"partNumbers":["S.2680-2015"],"accessionNumberNum":"2680","accessionNumberPrefix":"S","accessionYear":2015,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":[],"recordModificationDate":"2025-05-08","recordCreationDate":"2016-01-29","availableToBook":true}}