“Who the heck was ERTE”, you ask?!  All I can say is, once you’ve discovered his lifes’ amazing body of work, you can claim bragging rights to everyone else and say “You don’t know what you’ve been missing!”

ERTE’ was born Romaine de Tirtoff, in 1896, to a wealthy and powerful Russian family, which produced key officers in the Russian Navy.  His father was an admiral, and fully expected Romaine to join up and follow family tradition. Being of a more gentle nature, and abhorred any kind of violence for any reason, he resisted his fathers wishes, and with the support of his mother, went to art school in Paris.  ERTE” showed promise as a fashion designer at the young age of 6 years old, when he showed his mother a sketch of a dress he’d designed.  She was so impressed with the design, that she brought it to her dressmaker, and had the dress made up for herself. When she wore it to an important military function with her husband, everyone asked where she had gotten her lovely dress!!  Imagine their responses when they were informed that her six year old son had designed it!!

Finding formal classes in Paris too confining to his burgeoning creativity, ERTE” dropped out, and took to the streets of Paris’ elite bohemian art scene, and mingled with the who’s who of people who were famous, or about to become famous.  He soon found work when he walked into the atelier of the premier designer of the early turn of the century, Paul Poiret.  Poiret was an important designer in the history of fashion, who at the time was a big proponent of the abolition of the corset, as was his contemporary, Madeliene Vionnet. Fashion was taking on a more natural form, following the lines of the body without fussy underpinnings.  The look came to be known as “aesthetic dressing”.  Poiret pushed the envelop to include his new look based on the craze for all things Oriental, thus “Orientalsim” became de riguer!

As ERTE’s career skyrocketed, he went on to design costumes for Serge Diagilev’s Ballet Russe, Ziegield’s Follies Bergeres, including many set and costume designs for the opera.  He made his way to America in the early 1920′s with an invitation and a lucritive contract, to design lavish costumes for MGM.  He returned to Paris after his contract with MGM expired, citing that they did not use his talents to his liking. During the 1920′s the style aesthetic was leaning toward all things modern, streamlined, and geometric.  ERTE’ is considered to be the initial innovator the the style of Art Deco.  He is best known in the art world for his lithographs and serigraphs of beautiful fashionable women, which for several years in the 20′s, were used as covers for Harpers’ Bazaar Magazine.

Never to be without inspiration or employment, ERTE frequently juggled a multitude of projects simultaneously. He went on to indulge his prolific and limitless creative genius exploring and producing sculpture, jewlery, and even furniture design. In 1986, when ERTE’ turned 90 years of age, The Circle Gallery in NYC, funded and mounted a retrospective of his work.  Galleries and museums all around Manhattan were filled with all things ERTE’. I was fortunate enough to go that year, and saw his graphic art, costumes, sculpture, jewelry and furniture designs. Needless to say, the experience has stayed with me all these years, and I can say without reservation, that he is the greatest designer of all time, in the world of art.  No one that I know of, was so prolific, versatile, and ingenious as was ERTE’!!

I once had one of ERTE’s posters hanging in my shop on Angell St., in Providence in 1987, and a customer walked in and asked me to reproduce the black evening gown in the picture.  Happily, we came to an agreement on the price, and I had the pleasure to drape black velvet, cut on the bias (crossgrain with stretch), and created an ERTE’ copy for her.  She was absolutely stunning in it!!  I am now feeling very inspired to finally indulge the inspiration all over again, but in a more focused and studious manner.  I plan to make up some of his designs, and include them in my online retail shop, on ETSY.com this fall. So, now you know a little bit more about ERTE’ than you did a few minutes ago, but I would be doing a diservice to my reader if I did not encourage you to investigate ERTE’s work more in depth, because “you simply don’t know what you’re missing!!!