Alberti’s Window

Hello everyone! I wanted to let people know that I have written a guest post on Lavinia Fontana and self-portraiture at Three Pipe Problem. This fantastic art history blog is regularly featuring posts about women artists, and I was very pleased to contribute to the series.

This post was very fun for me to write; I regularly discuss Fontana’s self-portraiture (including her Self-Portrait at the Spinet, 1577, shown left) with my Renaissance students. If you want to see a sneak-peek at some of the topics that I discuss in my classroom, check out the post!

I’ve been on a Renaissance kick lately, haven’t I? For several weeks I have been wanting to write a post about Titian’s Venus with a Mirror (c. 1555, shown left). I think this painting is so interesting, especially because it can be applied to a few theories that are popular in art historical analysis.

I often feel a bit unsettled when looking at this painting, and it has to do with Venus’ mirror reflection. The reflection of Venus’ eye captures my attention the most. For one thing, only one eye is reflected in the mirror, causing goddess of love’s reflection to look a little bit like the Cyclops! Ha! The eye also seems to stare out of the picture plane towards the viewer (perhaps as a way to invite the viewer into the painting, as was suggested by Obridge in a comment for an earlier post of mine). This direct gaze makes the viewer extremely aware of his (the pronoun is intentional) voyeuristic gaze. (And although I don’t bring a “male gaze” to the painting, perhaps I feel unsettled because I’m a heterosexual woman; I don’t want to be accused as a voyeur while gazing at a female form!) One perceives that Venus is completely aware that her nude body is on display, since her reflected eye acknowledges the viewer’s presence.

But it’s not only the direct gaze in the reflection that captures my interest. It’s the fact that only part of Venus’ body is revealed in the reflection. Through the “cropping” of the mirror frame, Venus’ eye and shoulder become fetishized for the viewer. This reminds me so much of Laura Mulvey’s discussion of women in film. Mulvey discusses how the film camera crops and fetishizes the female form, particularly with camera close-ups on specific parts of the female body.¹ It can be argued that Titian is doing the same thing, by having the mirror highlight certain parts of Venus’ body.

I wonder what psychoanalyst Lacan would say about Venus with a Mirror. Lacanian theory discusses how the mirror stage is the most important stage of development for a child (and the child’s ego) – it’s the point in which an infant recognizes himself/herself in the mirror.² Lacan also is interested in the idea of the gaze, particularly how one develops awareness through looking.³ Given the usage of a mirror (and gaze!) in this painting, can anything be related to the mirror stage? Does the viewer feel compelled to recognize his own eye (and, perhaps by extension, his role as a spectator) when gazing at the reflected eye? Perhaps this is one reason that I feel a little unsettled; I am accustomed to seeing my own eye when I gaze at a mirror, and not the direct gaze of another person’s eye.

Lacan discusses how a young infant experiences elation during the mirror stage, for the child imagines the mirror image to be more complete and more perfect than the child experiences his own body. Obviously, the viewer can’t get a sense of completion and perfection in the mirror image that Titian has created, since Venus’ body is fragmented from the viewer’s perspective. The viewer expects to see (and anticipates that Venus also sees) a more complete reflection of the goddess in the mirror, but in actuality the more complete image of Venus (for the viewer, at least) is displayed on the left side of the canvas. Hence, I feel unsettled; the mirror has failed my expectations, yet paradoxically I am still given a “complete image” of Venus within the picture frame.

Does anyone else feel a bit unsettled by looking at this painting? Why or why not?

1 Laura Mulvey, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” in Screen 16, no. 3 (Autumn, 1975): 21-22. I’ve written a little bit about Mulvey’s ideas in a previous post.

2 Ibid, 17. See also “Lacan: The Mirror Stage” for further information and resources.

3 Jacques Lacan, The Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), 67-78.

I hope the title of my post grabbed your attention! I’ve been reading a terribly interesting book this afternoon: Picturing Women in Renaissance and Baroque Italy. This book includes a chapter by Caroline P. Murphy, a scholar on 16th century artist Lavinia Fontana.¹ Murphy’s chapter discusses how art was used in conjunction with the conception and delivery of children, and it’s absolutely fascinating.

To introduce this aspect of her argument, Murphy mentions how people in early modern Europe were both “appalled and fascinated by the birth of monstrous children” (e.g. children with severe birth defects).² It was believed in order to avoid the conception of a monstrous child, a woman should look at pictures of beautiful figures. In essence, this beautiful image was supposed to have “a positive morphological effect on the child in [the woman’s] womb.”³ Consequently, some pictures with beautiful figures were designed so that they could be placed over a bed or attached to the bedframe (since the bed was the place where sexual intercourse would take place). In addition, a pregnant woman would spend much of her time resting on the bed, and she would have additional opportunities to look at the beautiful figures (and positively affect the growth of the child).

So what constituted a “beautiful figure” in 16th century Bologna, the city in which Lavinia Fontana worked? You may be think that such figures were mythological, such as Venus or Cupid. Actually, due to the Counter-Reformation and promotion of religious imagery, it is more likely that women looked at images of Mary and the Christ Child. Murphy mentions a few Holy Family paintings by Lavinia Fontana which were probably bought for married couples, one being The Virgin Adoring the Sleeping Christ Child (Boston Museum of Fine Arts).

However, I think there is one more painting by Fontana which should be added to Murphy’s discussion. Given Murphy’s emphasis on childbirth, I think it’s surprising that she did not discuss Fontana’s Holy Family with Saints Margaret and Francis (1578, shown right) in her article.* Not only do these beautiful figures fit with other Holy Family images that Murphy discusses, but this painting also includes a depiction of Saint Margaret: the patron saint of childbirth! (Saint Margaret is identified on the left, through her symbol of the dragon.)

Couldn’t this image have been a source of comfort to pregnant women at the time? Murphy mentions how some images of the Holy Family include St. Elizabeth; the inclusion of St. Elizabeth would have been comforting for a female viewer, particularly a woman who was attempting to get pregnant (since Elizabeth conceived in old age). Although this painting does not depict Elizabeth, I think this inclusion of St. Margaret in this painting would have served as a source of comfort too (and it seems to be an even more appropriate connection, given St. Margaret’s role and patronage!).

Interestingly, the Davis Museum and Cultural Center of Wellesly College (which has this painting on loan), does not make any mention of Murphy’s argument in their webpage for this painting (and their bibliography does not cite Murphy). I’m going to have to write them – I think they need to slightly modify their discussion of this painting!

*Update: the comments section for this post discusses Murphy’s reasoning for not including this painting in her argument.

1 Caroline P. Murphy, “Lavinia Fontana and the Female Life Cycle Experience,” in Picturing Women in Renaissance and Baroque Italy, edited by Geraldine A. Johnson and Sara F. Matthews Grieco (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 111-138.

2 Ibid., 120.

3 Ibid., 121.

Some of my long-time readers will remember my previous post on Saint Lucy, whose iconography (or visual symbol) is a pair of eyeballs. I remember being struck by how St. Lucy’s iconography was so unusual (and kinda grotesque, in my opinion). Some comments on that previous post mentioned another unusual example of hagiographic iconography: Saint Agatha carries her breasts on a platter (see an example by Zurbaran here). Today, though, I remembered another female figure associated with kinda bizarre iconography: Diana of Ephesus. Although Diana (or “Artemis” to the ancient Greeks) isn’t a Catholic saint like Lucy and Agatha (she’s a fertility goddess from classical mythology), I would have to say that her iconography might be the most unusual of all. Take a look:

With breasts aplenty, it’s easy to tell that Diana of Ephesus was an ancient goddess of fertility, but her iconography might be little more complex than one would suppose! In 1979 a scholar name Gerard Seiterle pointed out that none of the supposed breasts of Diana/Artemis figurines have nipples. Seiterle argued that instead of breasts, Diana is laden will bull testes.¹ This is an interesting argument for two reasons: 1) the bull was symbol of fertility in ancient times and 2) the altar at Ephesus would have been large enough to sacrifice a bull. Although Seiterle’s argument is not accepted by all scholars (I personally don’t feel quite convinced), it does add an interesting element to the discussion of Diana’s iconography, don’t you think?²

Even if early depictions of Diana do not include nipples on her breasts, I noticed that later depictions do include nipples:

Diana of Ephesus was a very popular goddess in ancient times (in fact, some readers may be interested to know that worship of Diana is mentioned in the Bible (see Acts 19:28 and Acts 19:35). Additionally, Diana’s temple at Ephesus (Temple of Artemis) was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. I get the sense, though, that she wasn’t as popular (and more specifically, her traditional iconography wasn’t as popular) in more recent artistic periods like the Renaissance (although some examples from later periods exist, as I’ve shown above).³ Perhaps Diana of Ephesus’ multi-breasted appearance was too far from the Renaissance standards of idealization?

If you can put forward a more unusual type of iconography than Diana of Ephesus, speak up!

*UPDATE (07/12): Upon visiting the Ephesus Archaeological Museum this past summer, I purchased a copy of the museum catalog. The museum wholly endorses Seiterle’s interpretation. This is what the catalog says, “The distinctive feature that all these three statues [the Great Artemis, the Beautiful Artemis, and the Little Artemis statuette] have in common in the presence of multiple pieces resembling eggs, hanging on the goddess, who was thought to have a connection with the way of worship, and initially, since these were believed to be breasts, the Artemis Ephesia was referred to as the Multi-breasted Artemis for years. Interpretations regarding them as bunches of grapes, dates or eggs, however, did not gain much credence.

In 1978, G. Seiterle came up with a new interpretation. He claimed that these pieces resembling eggs were bull testicles offered to the goddess in religious rituals, as a symbol of fertility. In order to prove his claim, he presented a reconstruction of the statue with testicles hung on it. The resulting sight was identical with the statue!

Excavations at around the altar of the temple also indicated that the bull had a great cultural impact for the Artemis cult. Thus the much-debated academic question was resolved.”⁴

2 Wikipedia mentions here that Seiterle’s argument was “accepted in the 1980s by Walter Burkert and Brita Alroth, among others, criticised and rejected by Robert Fleischer, but widely popularized.” For an argument against Seiterle, see Fleischer, “Neues zur kleinasiatischen Kultstatue” Archäologischer Anzeiger 98 1983:81-93; Bammer 1990:153.

3 It’s interesting to note that a Renaissance humanist scholar might have been interested in Diana of Ephesus, though. It’s possible that Andrea Odoni is holding a statuette of Diana of Ephesus in his portrait (painted by Lorenzo Lotti, 1527). See portrait and discussion here.

4 Cengiz Topal et. al (Curators of the Ephesus Museum), Ephesus Museum Guide (Istanbul: BKG Publications, 2010), 120.

Art historians have previously discussed how Ghiberti’s self-portrait on the “Gates of Paradise” doors (shown on the far left of the image, 1424-52, see detail image here) can be interpreted not only as a signature portrait, but also as a promotional image.¹ By placing his portrait in such a prominent public location, there is little doubt that Ghiberti was interested in promoting himself as an artist. Catherine King also records that “the Latin inscription alongside [the doors] reads in translation: ‘Made with wonderful skill by Lorenzo Ghiberti.'”²

This past week, when looking at dates and details regarding the “Gates of Paradise,” I was struck with an additional idea. The “Gates of Paradise” were completed in 1452, when Ghiberti would have been about 74 or 75 years old. Therefore, at such a late point in the artist’s life, it is not surprising that Ghiberti decided to include his son Vittorio’s portrait on the door as well (see portrait on right side of the image). Vittorio inherited the family workshop after his father’s death (which was in 1455, only three short years after the “Gates of Paradise” were finished). I think that Lorenzo has anticipated his death (at least to some degree) by including his heir’s portrait. That way, even after Lorenzo died, the Ghiberti family business would still be promoted on the baptistery doors.

Smart thinking, Lorenzo.

As other historians have noted, Lorenzo was quite a “shrewd” and “keen” businessman.³ The inclusion of Vittorio’s portrait seems to be further evidence for this fact.

1 Catherine King, “Italian Artists in Search of Virtue, Fame, and Honour c. 1450-1650,” in The Changing Status of the Artist by Emma Barker, Nick Webb and Kim Woods, eds. (London: Yale University Press, 1999), 60-63.

2 Ibid.

3 Ibid., 59. See also Gary M. Radke, ed., The Gates of Paradise: Lorenzo Ghiberti’s Renaissance Masterpiece (London: Yale University Press, 2007), 67. Citation available online here.