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art I N Q U I R I E S art art • Volume X VII • Number 4, 2019 art VOLUME XVII, NUMBER 4, 2019 www.secacart.org secacart inquires_xviii_cover_2019.indd 1 12/12/19 9:29 AM Wicked, Hard and Supple An Examination of Suzanne Valadon’s Nude Drawings of Young Maurice Courtney Hunt he artist Suzanne Valadon’s Lautrec and Auguste Renoir. As an of her subjects came from her singular position was the artist’s model, Valadon was able neighborhood of Montmartre, but result of many intersecting to observe the bohemian art scene one model occupied a closeness to circumstances in her life that on the Butte and then to use this the artist that the others did not— allowed her the freedom unique perspective for her own her own son. Tand ability, rare among women artwork, supplementing it with the In this article, I will address the artists, to depict not just the female encouragement and assistance of nude drawings of Maurice Utrillo, nude, but also the male. Born in those who painted her.1 Valadon depicted by his mother from the French countryside in 1865, began as an artist by making late childhood until adolescence. Valadon moved to Paris with her drawings, a practice that is evident in Portraits of Maurice, who was the mother Madeleine when she was the signature bold line present even sole male model in Valadon’s body just a child. In Montmartre, Valadon in her later paintings. Her drawings of work representing children, are became an acrobat and then a model in the 1890s include pictures of intrinsically complicated, and are for such artists as Henri Toulouse- children, often in the nude. Most markedly different from works made 410 • secac Figure 1. Suzanne Valadon, My Utrillo by well-known contemporaries (such into the public eye her own private at the Age of Nine, 1892, black as Mary Cassatt and Berthe Morisot) life as a single mother, muddying crayon on paper, 9 x 11 13/16 in. who were creating a new intimate the boundaries of the personal and (22.9 x 30 cm). Private Collection. view of motherhood. This difference professional. Using Maurice as a Work in the public domain; retrieved hinges in part on Valadon’s unique model, Valadon found an avenue in from Wikiart.org. relationship to Maurice.2 The which to experiment with the young artist’s interest in the body as a site male nude, a subject otherwise Figure 2. Suzanne Valadon, A Nude of representation reflects a strong off-limits for a woman artist, using Girl Reclining on a Couch, 1894, acknowledgement of the western established artistic conventions to black crayon on yellow tracing paper, canon as well as the importance examine the form of her son’s body 7 5/8 x 8 7/8 in. (19.4 x 22.5 cm). of the nude to the contemporary and his budding sexuality. Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Parisian avant-garde. Valadon’s The nude is a well-documented Bequest of Meta and Paul J. Sachs. choice to use her own son’s body as subject for artistic representation. © President and Fellows of Harvard College. source material in her work brings Valadon’s paintings of nude male art I N Q U I R I E S • Vol. XVII, No. 4, 2019 • 411 adults are arguably easily consumed her neighborhood,” Maurice was Significantly, Valadon’s other and analyzed, even if they were not familiar to her, as well as readily drawings of young nude female initially adored, because they fit into available, appearing in many of her models often explore themes of that canonical tradition.3 In contrast, early works.8 Maurice’s position as young sexuality. Both Nude Girl her drawings of her son Maurice, Valadon’s son, however, distracts Sitting (1894) and Young Girl which depict him not simply as a from the relationship between artist Hiding her Forehead, (1913–14) child but also as an individual with and artist’s model. He was not offer stereotypical representations erotic potential, have received less simply another youth chosen out of of childish behavior while hinting at attention.4 Perhaps this is because, convenience, but had a particular sexuality. The figure in Nude Girl as Lauren Jimerson notes in her relationship to the artist, who was his Sitting sits alone on the floor, in a recent article on Valadon’s later male mother. This seemingly simple fact bare room, with her hands beside nudes, “Valadon would not portray makes it all the more unusual that her and her legs stretched out in him past early adolescence, but out of the drawings made by Valadon front. Her hair pulled back into a rather, adopted [Andre] Utter as her of Maurice, at least fourteen depict half-ponytail, she pouts as she stares muse.”5 But even scholars who have her son in the nude between the ages at an unknown point in front of her. addressed the images of Maurice of nine and thirteen.9 Alone in her thoughts, her nudity have tended to downplay any sexual But how to read these works? feels not at all natural. Rather than implication. For instance, Thérèse To begin with, Valadon’s frequent an innocent depiction of a child in Diamand Rosinsky asserts, “The inscriptions on these works (D’après her most natural state, this young nude children, even Maurice, are just mon fils, mon fils, and others) suggest girl appears tense yet resigned to her seen as children, and Valadon does a maternal attachment that expresses lack of apparel. Reading this work not allude to their sexuality.”6 To a sentimental awareness toward her invites a series of contradictions, suggest that Valadon was interested son. But scholars have also pointed where the viewer can understand her in the sexual qualities of her own to certain basic tensions produced by sexual potential through her unease. son might thus seem scandalous— the drawings: tensions that hint at And in A Nude Girl Reclining on especially in the shadow of our a sexual content. In considering My a Couch (fig. 2), also from 1894, modern culture, which has crucified Utrillo at the Age of Nine (fig. 1), for Valadon again imbues her young photographers such as Sally Mann example, Thérèse Diamand Rosinsky model with sexuality in an awkward and Edward Weston for daring to notes “an uneasiness as the viewer and uncomfortable way. The little photograph their children in what becomes a voyeur.”10 Her use of the girl leans back into a sofa, displaying some have deemed pornographic term “voyeur” indicates a potentially her newly budding chest with her compositions.7 Despite this, I argue erotic aspect. And Jean-Pierre Valeix right arm bent so that her head rests that Valadon’s pictures of Maurice writes that Valadon appropriates the on it atop the pillow. Her left arm, indeed explore his youthful sexuality, gaze when she paints the male nude, dangling above her head, allows her pushing the accepted norms for both subjugating the norm of the male to twirl her hair between her fingers. a woman artist depicting a male spectator, and perhaps even creating The model’s gaze is melancholic and nude and a mother depicting her son. a female counterpart.11 Germaine detached, her mouth shaped into Greer, meanwhile, makes note of a distinct frown. The model’s age Mother and Son the unconventional way in which is apparent in her childish frame, Valadon and her son were involved, yet the sinewy lines that make up Born on December 26, 1883, invoking a Freudian context: “From her body lead us to understand her Maurice Utrillo grew up primarily his earliest childhood, when he as sexually available. As she leans under the care of his grandmother lived on the fringe of her hectic life, back into the sofa, the entire front in Montmartre while Valadon Maurice adored his mother, the more of her figure is on display, her gaze continued her carefree lifestyle, because he was the unsuccessful rival unengaged with the viewer/voyeur.13 which included a revolving door of her lovers.”12 Such analyses thus The sexual tension present in of lovers and general participation gesture towards an erotic content, the drawings of Maurice, however, in the Montmartre party scene. while resisting any explicit mention is more precarious, due to the Like many of her female models, of it. implicit inappropriateness of a often “young adolescents from 412 • secac Figure 3. Suzanne Valadon, Utrillo nu assis sur un divan (Utrillo Seated Naked on a Sofa), 1895, black crayon on paper, 7 5/8 x 7 5/8 in. (19.4 x 19.4 cm). Photo: Phillipe Migeat, Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France. © CNAC/MNAM/Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY. art I N Q U I R I E S • Vol. XVII, No. 4, 2019 • 413 mother depicting her child within the tie between Valadon and artistic the parameters of well-defined convention is clear. It is possible and sexual visual language. The artist’s probable that Valadon possessed a choices in how Maurice is depicted degree of art historical awareness further this uncertainty, as there is and knowledge. However, her little difference in how she poses decision to place Maurice in poses him and her female models, child typical for female models may also or adult. Valadon often placed her have been informed by her own son in an odalisque pose, as is the modeling career. Valadon used her case with My Utrillo at the Age of son as a male artist might have Nine (1892), in which the viewer used her, naturalistically depicting encounters Maurice asleep in the the body by manipulating already nude.