Alberti’s Window

I think everyone has some kind of dream in which their worst fears are realized. Apparently, my worst fear revolves around being unprepared to teach an art history lecture. Last night, I dreamed that I went to go visit my past professors at my alma mater. It was the first day of summer term, and I discovered upon arrival that I was slated to teach a course that began that very afternoon! The title of the course seminar was “Washer Women in Art,” and it was supposed to cover all the extant depictions of laundresses. I started to scramble around campus, trying to find materials for the class, but I couldn’t think of any paintings to include in the slide list. I kept thinking, “I can’t think of any paintings of washer women,” and “If any paintings exist, they probably are Dutch from the 17th century.”

Needless to say, I woke up in a panic.

Naturally, I had to find out today if there are any paintings of laundresses. And there are. A lot. (Though not really any Dutch ones from 17th century, much to my subconscious’ chagrin!) Here are a couple of my favorites:

Chardin, The Laundress, 1733

 This book points out how the laundress does not wear a hoop skirt or any other fashionable clothing of the Rococo period – Chardin was interested in painting the domestic life of an ordinary French woman.

When I was in college, one of my professors explained her theory that art is cyclical in nature. Over the centuries, there are certain themes and styles in art that keep emerging and fading in popularity. I have often thought about this theory in regards to the Classical and Baroque styles. Although this theory can apply to different types of art, I am in the mood for looking at sculpture, so I’ll only mostly use sculptural examples.

In early Greece, the serene, harmonious Classical style pervaded the artistic scene:

Polykleitos, “Spear-bearer” (Doryphoros), original dated c. 450-440 BC.

However, a short time later, the calm Classical style was disrupted by a taste for more dramatic, diagonal compositions in the Hellenistic period. In addition, relief sculptures were carved more deeply (some sculptures were practically in-the-round, almost jumping off of the relief wall) so that intense shadows could be cast:

Athena Battling Alkyoneos, Detail of the Gigantomachy Freize from the Altar of Zeus (Pergamon, Turkey, c. 175 BC).

The cycle between serenity and drama began again centuries later, when the Classical style became revived during the Renaissance:

Michelangelo, David, 1501-04

And only a century later, the Baroque period began as the artistic scene once again favored diagonal, dramatic compositions and subject matter:

Bernini, David, 1623

With the discovery of Pompeii in 1748, the interest in Classicism began the cycle all over again. This interest brought about the Neoclassical movement:

Antonio Canova, Pauline Borghese as Venus, 1808

The Romantic movement began about the same time and can be interpreted as a continuation of this cycle. In a way, the Romantics reacted against Neoclassicism by favoring drama and emotion over the serenity. This painting by Géricault focuses on dramatic subject matter by depicting a real-life event of shipwrecked passengers that were on the boat “Medusa.” A shortage of lifeboats caused 150 passengers to build a raft, and survivors resorted to cannibalism in order to stay alive on the open sea. (You can read more of the story here.) Can you see how this subject matter is dramatic? To heighten the drama, Gericault depicted an emotional moment when the survivors spot their rescue ship in the distance. Géricault even follows the same dramatic diagonal compositions that were favored in earlier dramatic styles:

Géricault, Raft of the “Medusa”, 1818-19

Since the Neoclassical/Romantic periods, the artistic continuum really hasn’t seen another revival of the serene/dramatic styles. There have been some slight interest in traditional subject matter, such as the Regionalism movement (think of American Gothic). I guess Regionalism could be considered a continuation of serenity and tradition, if one is willing to categorize abstractionism (the style the Regionalists rejected) as dramatic. Hmm.

I’m curious to see if art will ever return back to this cycle. Since the 19th and 20th centuries, art has just exploded into different types of media and styles. Have we left traditional cycles altogether? It is interesting to think about what art will be like in a hundred years or so.

What do you think about the future of art? Have you observed any other types of artistic cycles besides this one?

Like most people who study art, I was taught that Goya’s portrait, Family of Charles IV (1800-1801), is a caricature of the royal family. Most introductory art history textbooks discuss the ugly features of the family members and their awkward poses. In short, the painting was supposed to reveal the stupidity of the royal family. I further interpreted this picture to show the family in an unflattering light – who in the royal family would approve of having a young woman (on the left) painted with her face turned towards the wall?

In fact, I was going to write a post on this unflattering portrait until I began to do some more research this morning.

Recently (within the past decade), there have been new arguments regarding Goya’s portrait of Charles IV and his family. Edward J. Olszewski argued in 1999 that the Goya adds a sense of animation to this portrait because the sitters lack a common focal point. However, he also admits that there is a lack of unity that resulted because Goya sketched the members of the group individually, not collectively.¹ He argues that the family members approved of the sketches that were taken for the portrait. Suggestions that a family member looks “foolish” or awkward are because the elderly Dona Maria Josefa was suffering from the effects of lupis (she died shortly after the portrait was completed) and Dona Maria Luisa Josefina (on the far right, holding a baby) suffered from a spinal defect.² In addition, Olszewski finds the brilliant colors and pigments in the painting to be very favorable; they were quite modern for the period.

I also learned from Olszewski’s article that the woman on the left side of the canvas (with her face turned towards the wall) is the future bride of the prince regent, as yet unchosen. Of course she would be depicted with her face towards the wall, since the family wasn’t sure whose face to portray! Maria Antonia could have been painted in the portrait after she and Ferdinand married in 1802, but Goya was never asked to change the painting.

As for the infamous critic’s statement that the painting looks like a “grocer and his family who have just won the big lottery prize,” Alisa Luxenberg wrote in 2002 that this statement has been misquoted.³ Several historians have picked up on this quote and scattered it throughout art historical texts. She and Olszewski both point out that a similar quote was stated by Renoir in 1907. Renoir mentioned that the portrait looked “like a butcher’s family in their Sunday best.” However, the point of this comment was not to pinpoint the painting as caricature. Instead, this statement was an indication of Renoir’s belief that “an artist’s ‘true’ personality – meaning class to Renoir, who seemed acutely sensitive to his own working-class roots – manifests itself in art. In the recounting of this discussion, Renoir supposedly explained that Goya’s plebian background emerged in his rendering of artistocrats as shopkeepers.”⁴

These articles have made me rethink the Family of Charles IV portrait. I still don’t find many of the family members to be terribly attractive, but this doesn’t mean necessarily that the portrait is a caricature. Instead, perhaps this portrait is a paradigm for its age; with the ongoing Enlightenment in the 18th century, perhaps the stress on scientific, visual evidence affected the production of idealized portraiture? Maybe the members of the family wanted to be portrayed as how they really looked, whether attractive or unattractive.

If you want to read more, I would particularly recommend Olszewski’s article. It’s quite fascinating.

1 Edward J. Olszewski, “Exorcising Goya’s ‘The Family of Charles IV’,” Arbitus et Historiae 20, no. 40 (1999): 176-177.

2 Ibid., 178.

3 Alisa Luxenberg, “Further Light on the Critical Reception of Goya’s ‘Family of Charles IV’ as Caricature,” Arbitus et Historiae 23, no. 46 (2002): 179-180.

4 Ibid, 179. See also Olszewski, 182-183.

Keeping with this week’s theme of stolen art, I am particularly interested in the story regarding the portrait Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. This portrait was completed in 1787 by Thomas Gainsborough, a popular English portrait painter. I’m particularly interested in this painting because my grandparents own a reproduction of it (or else it’s another painting that closely mimics the style and pose of Gainsborough’s portrait – I’ll have to look more closely next time I visit).

Georgiana is the great-great-great-great aunt of Princess Diana, and there have been many parallels drawn between the two women. Both beautiful women were the toast of England during their life, although Georgiana outlived her days of high public favor. (The film “The Duchess” (2008) was based on Georgiana’s life; actress Kiera Knightly (who played Georgiana) was angered that her character was often compared to Diana).

Almost a century after the painting was completed, it was sold in 1876 at an auction. Crowds of people gathered to catch a glimpse of this famous portrait. It was eventually sold to the American banker Junius Spencer Morgan, who bought the painting as a gift for his son, J. P. Morgan. However, before the portrait was shipped to America, it remained for a while on exhibition in London.

During this short period of exhibition, Adam Worth crept into the Agnew Gallery and stole the Georgiana portrait from its location of display. Worth hoped that he could use the well-loved painting as collateral; he wanted to bargain with the government to get his brother John freed from prison. However, John’s lawyer was able to negotiate a release for the prisoner before Adam even had time to strike a bargain with the government. Consequently, Adam Worth was left with the beautiful portrait on his hands.

For the next twenty five years, Worth kept the painting. When he traveled, he would bring the Georgiana with him in a false-bottomed trunk. While at home, Worth would sleep with the beloved portrait under his mattress. Ben Macintyre writes in his book Napoleon of Crime that Georgiana was a “permanent, hidden companion” for Worth. Even when Worth experienced financial troubles and threats of capture, the theif preferred to “face disgrace, penury, and imprisonment rather than part with the Duchess.”¹ Finally, near the end of his life, Worth sold the painting for an undisclosed sum and negotiated a promise of immunity.

Today, Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire is part of the Devonshire Collection. In 1994, the current Duke of Devonshire bought the portrait and placed it at Chatsworth, his ancestral home. Edward Dolnick points out that Georgiana now “presides” in the grand dining room, the location where she held court during her lifetime.²

1 Ben Macintyre, Napoleon of Crime (New York: Harper Collins, 1997), 16.

2 Edward Dolnick, The Rescue Artist (New York: Harper Collins, 2006), 151.

This month marks the one year anniversary of my thesis defense. I think I will always associate Leap Year Day as the day I became a Master of Arts. I can’t believe that a whole year has passed; sometimes I think that I haven’t done enough with my degree.

I really loved working on my thesis. I was lucky to receive a grant which enabled me to travel to Brazil and do research and analysis on-site. My thesis was about an 18th century Brazilian sculptor named Aleijadinho (a nickname which means “The Little Cripple”) who lived during a time of political unrest in Brazil. I argued that Aleijadinho’s sculptures of twelve Old Testament prophets (located at the church Bom Jesus dos Matozinhos) reflect this political unrest because they are positioned in the movements and formations of capoeira, an Afro-Brazilian martial art. Capoeira is inherently political because it probably developed as a way for African slaves to fight their way off of plantations. Therefore, I interpreted these statues as a type of political propaganda; through the representation of capoeira, I find that these statues exhibit a call for liberation for not only African slaves, but also Brazilian colonists (who were under Portuguese rule at the time).

Chapter one of my thesis discusses the political unrest that occurred in Brazil during the lifetime of Aleijadinho. It also discusses how Aleijadinho may have been associated with the rebel group, the Inconfidência Mineira. This group formed in Aleijadinho’s hometown and tried to overthrow the Portuguese crown. Chapter two deals with the history of capoeira and its political associations. Chapter three contains my analysis of the Prophets – I look at specific capoeira movements and compare them to different statues. I also compare capoeira formations with the formation of and interplay between the Prophets statues. The chapter also contains an analysis of how the signifiers of capoeira (as found on the statues) can be interpreted as political propaganda.

Phew – it was hard to type those last two paragraphs. I guess I haven’t had a lot of practice explaining my thesis lately! If you want to read an abstract of my thesis (it contains more details than what I typed above), click here. Or, if you want to read my thesis (or look at the pictures of the statues!), it has been published online here. It’s quite a lot of reading, though. I won’t be offended if you just want to peruse.