Cyril William Beaumont

Cyril Beaumont kept a tiny bookshop in London’s Soho that doubled as a backstage pass to the ballet—dancers and designers dropped by between matinees to gossip over ink and stage lights. He sketched the same fiery Diaghilev ballets over and over, not to sell programs but to prove he could freeze the shimmer of a back-flip on paper. Tap his Scene from Le Dieu Bleu: the cobalt costume of the Blue God looks like it’s still spinning when you tilt the page.