Reproduction & Sexuality
The Reclining Nude & the “Male Gaze”
Reclining nude paintings were for a privileged audience as a sexual exchange implied in the painting. The female is usually alone in a private setting, available for the viewer to gaze upon and to consume without being seen or consumed himself.
In the 20th Century, both female and male artist address the “male gaze” in different ways. Aphrodite (Greek) or Venus (Roman) in the Syracuse style
Roman marble copy 2nd Century CE after Praxiteles’ Greek bronze original 4th Century BCE
restorations by Antonio Canova Aphrodite Anadyomene (cropped) Casa di Venus, Pompeii 1st Century CE Sandro Botticelli Birth of Venus 1486 Tempera Gustave Klimt Water Serpents II Art Nouveau René Magritte Collective Invention 1934 Surrealism
Jean Paul Gaultier Marion Cotillard in Mermaid Dress 2008 Oscars Giorgione Sleeping Venus 1508 Renaissance Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres with student Jean-Paul Flandrin Odalisque with Slave 1842 Victorine Meurent was a model for Manet and a painter in her own right.
She represents a courtesan in Paris as a confident, independent woman with fine belongings and even a servant.
Manet’s painting was seen as scandalous, yet he felt it reflected the “girl” of his time. The new “Olympia”, someone you might meet on the sidewalk. Appropriation
Èdouard Manet Yasumasa Morimura Olympia (Victorine Meurent) Futago (Portrait) 1863 Realism 1988 Postmodern Paul Cézanne
A Modern Olympia 1873-1874 Post-Impressionism
In this painting, Cézanne admits to the “male gaze” as he places himself or a male figure in the foreground of the painting enjoying the view of “gaze”. Modern women of the early Twentieth Century started seeing themselves differently, independent and with self-worth. Not the subject, necessarily, of the “male gaze” but a woman reclining not for male enjoyment, but a statement about everyday life.
Suzanne Valadon Henri Matisse The Blue Room Odalisque a la Culotte Rouge 1922 Early Feminist Art 1910s Les Fauves Pierre Auguste Renoir Late 19th Century Impressionist
Renoir was a master of the female form. His delicate, feathery brushstroke is a recognizable trait.
Two Bathers La Toilette 1886 1902 Oil 36” x 28” Post-Impressionism
Henri Rousseau
The Dream 1910
Paul Gauguin Spirit of the Dead Watching 1892
Paul Gauguin
Te Arii Vahine (A Noble Woman) 1896 Pablo Picasso Les Demoiselles d’Avignon 1907 Oil 8’ x 7’ Cubism
An appropriation
Robert Colescott Les Demoiselles d’Alabama-Vestidas 1985 Postmodern Pablo Picasso
Nude, Green Leaves and Bust 1932 Nude Women in Red Chair 1932 Tamara de Lepincka Belle Rafaela 1927 Art Deco Henry Moore
Reclining Figures
Travertine Marble & Bronze Late 50’ – late 60’s
Early 20th C Abstraction Fernando Botero
Reclining Nude
Woman Reading 2002 Lara Croft 2003 Computer generated image (CGI)
Laura Aguilar In Sandy’s Room (Self-Portrait)
1991 Postmodern Alice Neel John Perreault 1972 Oil 38” x 63 ½” Neo-Realism
In the late sixties and early 1970s, female artists started questioning the “male gaze” and its representation and starting switching the roles.
Sylvia Sleigh Philip Golub Reclining 1971 Neo-Realism What might Lynn Herschman’s appropriation of the Venus of Urbino mean in today’s context?
Why would she digitalize the venus?
An appropriation example
Titian Venus of Urbino 1538 oil 47” x 65” Renaissance
Lynn Hershman Digital Venus
1996 iris print 40” x 60” Postmodern Lynn Hershman
Deep Contact
1990
How is this work of art progressive for today?