Salome painting by the belgian painter Léon Herbo (1850-1907).

One of the most popular subjects at the end of the 19th century was Salome. Different to older paintings she appears now as the incarnation of exotism and seduction. Oscar Wilde brought her to the theatre and a little later Richard Strauss wrote an adaption for the opera.
She was THE women of the fin de siecle.Many artists like the american painter Robert Henri (1865–1929) transferred the old myth to their modern world of nightclubs and bars. Salome appeared as the prototype of the modern vamp or femme fatale.