Cupid dancing: from Foggia to London

Today the focus of my attention is a dancing Cupid who managed to find his way from Italy’s Foggia to London’s British Museum. The bronze sculpture dates back to 10 – 100 AD. But before we meet the dancing Cupid of Roman times, let us have a look at a picture with Cupids from the early 19th century.

albani

The picture shows the dance of eight cupids, and is made after Albani.

There is so much happening in this picture, so many forms and movements.

cupid1.jpg

Comparing and contrasting this to the Roman Cupid  we see that the sculpture is almost minimalist. Cupid is naked, and he carries no accessories like his famous bow – with or without arrows.

cupid1_hair

If there is an area where the unknown artist has gone overboard is the hair.

cupid2

All this Cupid features is his dance. He has no wings, and no blindfold.

The dance motion is light and simple.

right_foot

Observe the way the right foot lifts while is touches the ground.

cupid3

The boy’s nakedness is restrained, as shown by the right hand that curls behind the back.

cupid4 True to its Hellenistic inheritance, the Roman sculptor portrays Cupid as a chubby boy.

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Putti Sculptures from three periods: Hellenistic, (late) Renaissance, and Neoclassicism

Introduction

The Italian word “putto” is derived from the Latin word “putus”, meaning “boy” or “child”.

In this post I present sculptures with children from three periods: Hellenistic, Renaissance, and Neoclassicism.

Cupid is not included in the genre of “putti”, being a rather special child. So there will be no cupid here. Along the same line of sticking to the “ordinary”, I will not include “winged” chldren, or deities of any time.

Finally, I will not include any sculptures of the Holy Child with or without the Holy Mother.

Children (ordinary, I emphasize this) were depicted in sculpture in the Hellenistic period, and became again the subject of a sculpture in the Renaissance. The neoclassicism of the 18th century also depicted children in sculptures.

I have taken all the photos in this post.

Hellenistic Period

This sculpture of a boy with a goose, was originally created by the famous sculptor Boethus of Chalcedon, near Constantinople, in the second century B.C. The Roman Emperor Nero transported the original to his palace in Rome, where he had it copies. What survives today in Munich’s Glyptothek is the Roman copy of the original.

boy_goose4
Roman copy of Hellenistic sculpture, Boy with Goose. Glyptothek, Munich.

There is an incredible energy and motion in this sculpture, but also the spirit of having fun and enjoying life. This is what our protagonist does here, even at the expense of the goose, which seems to be rather subordinated. In real life, I would be surprised if the boy could handle the goose like this for more than one second.

boy_goose3
Roman copy of Hellenistic sculpture, Boy with Goose. Glyptothek, Munich.

From this angle, the boy has taken an almost wrestling posture.

Roman copy of Hellenistic sculpture, Boy with Goose. Glyptothek, Munich.
Roman copy of Hellenistic sculpture, Boy with Goose. Glyptothek, Munich.
Roman copy of Hellenistic sculpture, Boy with Goose. Glyptothek, Munich.
Roman copy of Hellenistic sculpture, Boy with Goose. Glyptothek, Munich. – Detail
Roman copy of Hellenistic sculpture, Boy with Goose. Glyptothek, Munich. - Detail
Roman copy of Hellenistic sculpture, Boy with Goose. Glyptothek, Munich. – Detail

Late Renaissance

Giambologna was a Flemish sculptor who spent most of his productive years in Florence.

Two bronze Giambologna statues depicting a child fishing are at the Bargello Museum in Florence.

Giambologna: Child Fishing - Putto Pescatore, Bargello Museum, Florence
Giambologna: Child Fishing – Putto Pescatore, Bargello Museum, Florence

The boy is playing with the fish. He is holding the remnant of a fishing rod and is having a good time. Playful and carefree.

giambologna_putto_pescatore2
Giambologna: Child Fishing – Putto Pescatore, Bargello Museum, Florence

In the second sculpture, we see the fishing boy in a different posture, something like a declaration to the world “I caught a fish!”. Simple and beautiful.

giambologna_putto_pescatore_head
Giambologna: Child Fishing – Putto Pescatore, Bargello Museum, Florence. – Detail
giambologna_putto_pescatore2_head
Giambologna: Child Fishing – Putto Pescatore, Bargello Museum, Florence. – Detail

Neoclassicism

The period is represented in this post by Lorenzo Bartolini and his student Luigi Pampaloni.

Basrtolini was an Italian sculptor of the late 18th – early 19th century. I saw an exhibition of their works in Academia Gallery in Florence, the Bartolini’s birth place.

bartolini_child_swan
Lorenzo Bartolini: Child with Swan

I somehow feel that this boy with the swan comes nowhere near the boy with the goose. It is an ok sculpture, but it is flat, and almost superficial.

bartolini_orphan
Luigi Pampaloni Praying Putto (the Orphan) (after 1826)

Pampaloni’s orphan is also an ok sculpture, but it does not move me. Technically it is fine, but the sculpture has no soul.

Which reminds me, that in art as in society, we need the great and the bad and the average, otherwise, this would have been a very strange world!

Kallipygos: The nude female behind in Classical Greek and Hellenistic sculpture

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Aphrodite Kallipygos, National Archaelogical Museum, Naples, Italy

“ήν καλλιπύγων ζεύγος εν Συρακούσαις”

Ήταν στις Συρακούσες ένα ζευγάρι κοπελιές μ’ ωραία πισινά”

“There was in Syracuse a pair of girls with beautiful buttocks”

Athinaeos, Deipnosophistae, 554d, Vol. 12

Athinaeos wrote a wonderful story about culture and dining in the Greco-Roman world of the 3rd century AD. His masterpiece is considered to be the first cookbook, but it is a lot more.

He tells a story about two girls with beautiful buttocks and concludes by referring to a temple in Syracuse, dedicated to Aphrodite Kallipygos.

Kallipygos is a composite Greek word, meaning the one who has beautiful buttocks.

Kalos = beauty

pygos = buttock, or behind, or arse

Aphrodite Kallipygos, National Archaelogical Museum, Naples, Italy
Aphrodite Kallipygos, National Archaelogical Museum, Naples, Italy

The statue of Aphrodite Kallipygos in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples is a Roman copy of the Greek original, dating back to the 1st century BC (1).

The woman lifts her dress and turns to see her buttocks reflected in the water of a pond or something like that.

She may be one of the two sisters mentioned by Athinaeos, but we will never know.

The original sculpture is attributed to 2nd century BC, and thus belongs to the Hellenistic period.

The attribution of a work to a period (Classical Greek or Hellenistic) is indicative. A lot of the information on the original sculpture is questionable, and the resemblance of the copy to the original is also subject to scrutiny. It is well known that the Roman copiers had quite an eclectic attitude towards making copies.

Aphrodite Cnidus, Glyptothek, Munich
Aphrodite Braschi, Glyptothek, Munich (Photo by Panathinaeos)

The works included in the post contain a representation of the female nude.

I use the word “nude” rather than “naked”, in reference to a distinction that originated in Kenneth Clark’s “The Nude” (2).

According to Clark, the “nude” is an invention of the Greeks, an “idealization”. The “naked” is the ordinary, the mundane.

I will use the term “nude” differently, to imply a multiplicity of layers of sense and representation, compared and contrasted to the “naked” that has a single layer, the physical / instinctual.

The first Greek sculpture depicting a female in full nudity was most likely Praxiteles’ Aphrodite.

It was the middle of 4th century BC when the Greek sculptor Praxiteles was commissioned by the island of Kos to produce a sculpture of goddess Aphrodite.

He produced two, one fully clothed, and another fully nude.

The citizens of Kos were too conservative to accept the nude sculpture, and it was purchased by the city of Knidos, on the Minor Asia peninsula just south of Kos.

Aphrodite Braschi, back, Glyptothek Munich
Aphrodite Braschi, back, Glyptothek Munich. (Photo by Panathinaeos)

The Aphrodite of the Glyptothek in Munich is one of the many copies of Praxiteles’ Knidian Aphrodite, made in the Roman period.(3)

It shows Aphrodite placing her drape on top of a “hydria” (water jar), as she is ready to take her bath. Her right hand (broken) covers her pubic area.

Until the depiction of the fully nude female by Praxiteles, Greek Art was only depicting full male nudity.

Even after the Aphrodite of Knidos, the dominant theme in nudity was male, be it athletes, warriors, gods, deities, and so on.

The Three Graces Roman copy of a Greek work of the second century B.C. Marble. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
The Three Graces
Roman copy of a Greek work of the second century B.C.
Marble. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

The impact of the Knidian Aphrodite on the Greek world was huge.

The three graces, surviving today as a Roman copy of the 2nd century B.C. Greek original, is a good example of the impact. The original belongs to the “Hellenistic” period. Its distinctive feature is that instead of one female figure we have a group of three in harmony.

The Hellenistic period was a “lighter” period compared to the “classical”, during which the artists celebrated the joy of life and emphasized earthly, hedonistic aspects of the human existence. They also depicted vices (e.g. The Drunken Woman) It is as if the classical period landed on earth.

The Three Graces Roman copy of a Greek work of the second century B.C. Marble. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
The Three Graces
Roman copy of a Greek work of the second century B.C.
Marble. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

We have three female figures, more relaxed compared to the rather uncomfortable Aphrodite of Knidos, ready to take their baths, as their towels indicate, enjoying the moment.

Notice that they do not attempt to cover their body. Their hands rest elegantly on the other graces’ shoulders.

The Roman copy sculpture was placed in a garden or  a public building like a bath.

The Broghese Hermaphrodite, Louvre, PAris, France.
The Borghese Hermaphrodite – front, Louvre, Paris, France.

Hermaphroditus was the son of Aphrodite and Hermes.

The marble sculpture that reclines on a marble mattress sculpted by Bernini in 1620 was discovered in the Church of Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome. It is an early Roman Empire copy of a bronze sculpture created by Greek sculptor Polycles around the middle of the 2nd century BC.

The sculpture was sold to Napoleon and thus it found itself in the Louvre.

Another copy is displayed today in Villa Borghese of Rome.

hermaphrodite_back_750
The Borghese Hermaphrodite – back, Louvre, Paris, France.

This is a highly sensual sculpture.

The hermaphrodite is seemingly asleep, but there is expectation all over.

The breasts and male genitals are visible, leaving no doubt as to the hybrid nature of the creature, man and woman bound together.

A 18th century visitor commented: “This is the only happy couple that I have seen”.

Sources

1. The National Archaeological Museum of Naples. Electa Napoli, 1996.

2. Kenneth Clark. The Nude: A Study in Ideal Form.

3. Raimund Wuensche. Glyptothek, Munich.  C.H. Beck. Verlag, Munich 2007.

Eduardo Chillida: Comb of the Winds, La Concha Bay, San Sebastian, Basque Country

I wrote about the Basque Sculptor Eduardo Chillida some time ago.

Eduardo Chillida working on the terrace of Mas Bernhard painting his fired sculptures. St Paul de Vence 1973.
Eduardo Chillida working on the terrace of Mas Bernhard painting his fired sculptures. St Paul de Vence 1973.

The first time was on freedom, quoting what my friend Manolis wrote commenting on a photograph I took when I visited the Museum – Estate Chillida near San Sebastian.

The second time it was in reference to his homage to the German philosopher Martin Heidegger.

Eduardo Chillida in the Comb of the Winds
Eduardo Chillida in the Comb of the Winds

Today, after my second visit to the monumental installation “Comb of the Winds”, I want to write about it. This was my second visit, the first being in 2010. The weather was windy and cloudy both times. The sea was rough, foamy waves all over. Something tells me this is the best weather to appreciate the installation.

Map of San Sebastian
Map of San Sebastian

Before I proceed, it is important that we look at the map and locate the installation in the San Sebastian area. You can see the installation on the left hand side, inside the red ellipse, which is the western edge of the bay, the foot of Igueldo hill. The Santa Clara island is in the middle, and the Urgull hill on the right, the eastern side.  Visitors will need to follow the signs to “Ondarreta Beach”. Interestingly enough, there are no public signs for “El Peine del Viento”.

Looking east: Santa Clara island
Looking east: Santa Clara island – January 2015. Photo NM.

I call the “Comb of the Winds” an installation, because it comprises three sculptures mounted on rocks.

Formally, it is more than that, it is a project, comprising the installation and the plaza (square) in front.

The plaza
The plaza before the installation was called “Paseo del Tenis”

The plaza in front of the installation was designed by the architect Luis Peña Ganchegui, who worked with Chillida for the first time in this project.

The project started in 1966 and took eleven years to complete in 1976.

The main rock before the installation
The main rock before the installation

The initial idea was to place one sculpture on the main rock.

But soon after they started working on the designs, Chillida realized that the sculpture was going to attract all the attention, and this was contrary to what he wanted to achieve, which was to use the sculpture as a means to highlight the space around it and the environment.

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Chillida loved this edge of the San Sebastian coastline, at the foot of the Igueldo hill. He retreated there often, to enjoy the sea, the wind, the rocks. It was this atmosphere that he wanted to enhance and promote with his work, rather than have his work dominate the natural setting and in this sense, distort it.

The Comb of the Winds - January 2015
The Comb of the Winds – January 2015. Photo NM.

This is why he came up with the idea of three sculptures instead of one.

Luis Chillida, son of sculptor Eduardo Chillida, suggested in an interview (1) that the three sculptures represent the three domains of time: past, present, future.

The Comb of the Winds - January 2015. Photo NM.
The Comb of the Winds – January 2015. Photo NM.

The sculptor’s son claims that the sculpture mounted on the left side and the one on the rock right opposite to it are the past and the present, whereas the thirs sculpture that appears to be far away is the future, a future that blends in the horizon.

The  sculpture at the foot of the Igueldo Hill
The sculpture at the foot of the Igueldo Hill. Photo NM.

In his writings, the sculptor speaks for himself (2, p.61):

“I want for the space in my work to be like the grease that allows a machine to function properly. Masses that slip and engage with each other, but I do not want to start any machine. I want my pieces to be quiet and silent, the only way to partially escape the influence of time.”

The sculpture on the eastern rock - January 2015. Photo NM
The sculpture on the eastern rock – January 2015. Photo NM.

All three sculptures are made of steel.  Each weighs approximately 13 tonnes and is anchored to the rock in two pIaces. They were made at Patricio Echeverria’s industrial forge in Legazpia.

The northern sculpture - January 2015. Photo NM.
The northern sculpture – January 2015. Photo NM.

Chillida “worked” the material directly, he did not use a model or a mold. As the sculptures were big and complex, he built them in two parts each, and then connected the pieces.  Chillida learned from a local blacksmith the demanding labour of the forge, from stoking a fire and handling a bellows to pounding the malleable metal to achieve a desired form. “A piece of iron is an idea itself,” he said. “I must gain complete mastery over it and force it to take on the tension which I feel within myself.” (3)

Interestingly, after the mid 1960’s Chillida transitioned from working with steel to working with marble.

Moving the sculptures
Moving the sculptures

Moving the sculptures and installing them was not an easy operation.  They had to set up supporting structures for moving and lifting the heavy sculptures. One must note that the cranes of today were not available back then.

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Today the three sculptures occupy their place anchored on the three rocks, day and night, be it sunny or rainy. The people of San Sebastian visit the Comb of the Winds on every possible occasion and they love it. There is something deeply egalitarian about the installation. It brings all people together to enjoy the sea landscape and their heritage. It is like part of this heritage are the strange metal structures hanging from the rocks.

Comb of the Winds - January 2015. Photo NM.
Comb of the Winds – January 2015. Photo NM.

Are they anchors?

Are they letters?

We do not know, and we do not need to know.

But what I know is that like the temples in the valley of Paestum in Italy, they exist in harmony with the landscape. It is like they belong there, like the landscape cannot exist without them and they cannot exist without the landscape.

Whereas in Paestum the temples are in a valley, in the Comb of the Winds is literally submerged in the foam of the sea waves. But in both cases the resplendent harmony is there.

Like the temples of Ancient Greece, Chillida’s sculptures are open. Space makes sense only when you make sense of the vacuum, of emptiness.

The analogy with temples is not limited to the harmony and the integration with the landscape, or the use of emptiness to denote space.

In a sense the “Comb of the Winds” is an open temple where you can pray to whoever and whatever you believe in, or contemplate life, or…

Concha Bay, San Sebastian. Photo NM.
Concha Bay, San Sebastian. Photo NM.

“In a certain way I am a disciple of the sea and, consequently, also of Bach because Bach is very similar to the sea. I do not know if Bach ever saw the ocean, but his work has a very impressive relationship to it. And he is among my mentors.” Eduardo Chillida (2, pg.30)

Eduardo Chillida at work
Eduardo Chillida at work

“…I have found that time exists in my sculpture. It exists in a version that is not the standard temporal one. Rather, this version is time’s brother: space. Space is the twin brother of time. They are two concepts that are absolutely parallel and similar. And because I am so conditioned by space, I have always been interested in time. In fact, my time is very slow:traditional time – that of the clock – does not interest me. I am interested in a concept of time that is about harmony, rythm and dimensions.” Eduardo Chillida (2, pg. 32)

Sources

1. El Peine del Viento. Mas Context.

2. Eduardo Chillida, Writings. Richter Verlag, 2009.

3. Eduardo Chillida. Obituary. The Telegraph.

Nutcracker: by Jennifer Rubell

2200-gf12540_nocetto_nutcracker

nutcracker: a device for cracking nuts (Oxford Dictionaries).

Jeniffer Rubell: Portrait of the artist
Jennifer Rubell: Portrait of the artist

New York based artist Jennifer Rubell has created her own nutcrackers.

In doing so, she objectified a metaphor of the female body.

Dal Shabet Merilis Foto Teaser “Look At My Legs”
Dal Shabet Merilis Foto Teaser “Look At My Legs”

A 2007 review of studies examining depictions of women in the media including commercials  prime-time television programs, movies, music lyrics and videos, magazines advertising, sports media, video games, and Internet sites revealed that women more often than men are depicted in sexualizing and objectified mannerrs (e.g., wearing revealing and provocative clothing, portrayed in ways that emphasize their body parts and sexual readiness, serving as decorative objects). (Sexual Objectification of Women: Advances to Theory and Research)

Rubell builds dramatically on the SO metaphor, and turns the female body into a nutcracker.

The Nutcrackers Project in Dallas Texas, 2011
The Nutcrackers Project in Dallas Texas, 2011

In the artist’s website, we read the following introduction to her “nutcracker” project:

“In the Dallas Contemporary’s largest gallery space, Nutcrackers consists of 18 life-size interactive sculptures of women surrounding a pedestal holding one ton of Texas pecans. Each prefabricated female mannequin is mounted on her side in an odalisque position and has been retooled to function as a nutcracker. Visitors interact with each sculpture by placing a pecan in the mannequin’s inner thigh, then pushing down the upper leg to crack open the nut so they may eat it in the gallery. Inspired by nutcrackers depicting female figures – especially one of Hillary Clinton – these interactive sculptures embody the two polar stereotypes of female power: the idealized, sexualized nude female form; and the too-powerful, nut-busting überwoman.”

jennifer-rubell
“Lea L” Nutcraker, by Jennifer Rubell. New York Frieze Art Fair 2012

One cannot resist but consider the artful play with words.

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Nutcraker, by Jennifer Rubell

A nut-busting woman is a stereotype in a man’s world.

phoca_thumb_l_NUTCRACKERS_JenniferRubell_2011_photobyAndrewShephard_websiteimage_fullres-7

Rubell is explicit. The nut is broken high up, between the thighs.

phoca_thumb_l_LYSA-II_JenniferRubell_2012_photobyAdamReich-5
Nutcraker, by Jennifer Rubell

What can be the source of life (Courbet) can also break one or more nuts.

phoca_thumb_l_NUTCRACKERS_JenniferRubell_2011_photobyAndrewShephard_websiteimage_fullres-5
The Nutcrackers Project in Dallas Texas, 2011

I must confess that the close ups reminded me of Jeff Koons. Although totally irrelevant, Rubell’s parents are art collectors and their collection includes some of Koon’s works.

Having seen pictures from Dallas and New York, I prefer the “factory-like” arrangement of Dallas to the solitary and rather depressing “solo” of New York.

The “contingent” of the factory gives a totally different meaning tot he work.

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I think I will return to the work of Jennifer Rubell.

P.S. What is the relationship between sexual objectification and heartbeats?

P.S. 2 Here is the answer.

Aphrodite (Venus), Pan and Eros: A sculpture in the National Archaelogical Museum of Athens

A sculpture of Aphrodite, Pan and Eros, exhibited in the National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, in Greece, is the subject of this post.

The sculpture was made at about 100 BC of Parian marble, and was found on the island of Delos, in the House of the Poseidoniasts of Beirut. On the low base of the group an inscription is carved: ‘Dionysos, son of Zenon who was son Theodoros, from Beirut dedicated [this offering] to the ancestral gods for his own benefit and that of his children’.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

A few introductory words about who is who are in order.

Aphrodite (Venus for the Romans) is the goddess of love and beauty. A victim of her own success and beauty, Aphrodite has never lost her sense of earthy pleasure.

Eros (Cupid for the Romans) is the god of love, son of Aphrodite. Somethies he is innocent, with rosy cheeks and beautiful smile, other times he is totally vicious, tormenting humans with his arrows.

Pan is the god of the Wild, half goat half man, and a very very notty old fart!

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

What is the story in the sculpture?

Aphrodite, is stark naked. She appears to be trying to fend off an overwhelming expression of affinity by Pan.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

Her right hand is slightly raised and holds a sandal.

Is she ready to strike Pan?

It appears to be so.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

But it isn’t.

For one, a closer look at ther muscles will show us that is very relaxed.

For another, her face is almost smiling. A veiled smile emerges. And the angle of her head is such that she is not directly looking at Pan.

The last unmistakable signal that Aphrodite sends to the observer of the scene is the position of her left hand. A woman under attack would almost by instinct try to cover her most exposed nudity, touching the puberty area using her palm. But Aphrodite is not doing that. Her palm is relaxed and at some distance from her flesh.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

Pan is in a hopeless state. He cannot help himself and is totally at a loss.

He is trying to embrace Aphrodite in the most awkward of ways. Look at his right hand, how high it is in Aphrodite’s back. Not exactly a gesture of aggression. More a gesture of creeping affinity.

It is like he is lusting for her but at the same time he is shying away from expressing his lust.

group6
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

Eros (I would have preferred to call him “Putto” like the Italians do, but being Greek I have to stick to my mother tongue) is a little devil in the middle of the two protagonists of this subdued ensemble action. His apparently tries to separate them, in a sense protecting Aphrodite.

But is he?

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

His smiling face, his posture (look at the angle of the head) is more like saying “I want to be part of this”.

His bodily posture is a posture of palying. He pushes Pan’s right horn ever so gently, more touching than pushing, smiling all the time.

And the old boy returns the smile.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

As a final observation before my conclusion, I offer the angle of Aphrodite’s left ankle. How gentle and relaxed and playful! Restrained and at the same time powerful, but not aggressive!

And this brings me to the supreme feature of the sculpture. Its ambivalence.

All three protagonists are doing something and at the same time they are not.

And in the process, being totally submerged into this ambivalence, they have a hell of a good time!

Ancient Greece at her best!

Aphrodite (Venus), Pan and Eros: A sculpture in the National Archaelogical Museum of Athens

A sculpture of Aphrodite, Pan and Eros, exhibited in the National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, in Greece, is the subject of this post.

The sculpture was made at about 100 BC of Parian marble, and was found on the island of Delos, in the House of the Poseidoniasts of Beirut. On the low base of the group an inscription is carved: ‘Dionysos, son of Zenon who was son Theodoros, from Beirut dedicated [this offering] to the ancestral gods for his own benefit and that of his children’.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

A few introductory words about who is who are in order.

Aphrodite (Venus for the Romans) is the goddess of love and beauty. A victim of her own success and beauty, Aphrodite has never lost her sense of earthy pleasure.

Eros (Cupid for the Romans) is the god of love, son of Aphrodite. Somethies he is innocent, with rosy cheeks and beautiful smile, other times he is totally vicious, tormenting humans with his arrows.

Pan is the god of the Wild, half goat half man, and a very very notty old fart!

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

What is the story in the sculpture?

Aphrodite, is stark naked. She appears to be trying to fend off an overwhelming expression of affinity by Pan.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

Her right hand is slightly raised and holds a sandal.

Is she ready to strike Pan?

It appears to be so.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

But it isn’t.

For one, a closer look at ther muscles will show us that is very relaxed.

For another, her face is almost smiling. A veiled smile emerges. And the angle of her head is such that she is not directly looking at Pan.

The last unmistakable signal that Aphrodite sends to the observer of the scene is the position of her left hand. A woman under attack would almost by instinct try to cover her most exposed nudity, touching the puberty area using her palm. But Aphrodite is not doing that. Her palm is relaxed and at some distance from her flesh.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble  100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

Pan is in a hopeless state. He cannot help himself and is totally at a loss.

He is trying to embrace Aphrodite in the most awkward of ways. Look at his right hand, how high it is in Aphrodite’s back. Not exactly a gesture of aggression. More a gesture of creeping affinity.

It is like he is lusting for her but at the same time he is shying away from expressing his lust.

group6
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

Eros (I would have preferred to call him “Putto” like the Italians do, but being Greek I have to stick to my mother tongue) is a little devil in the middle of the two protagonists of this subdued ensemble action. His apparently tries to separate them, in a sense protecting Aphrodite.

But is he?

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

His smiling face, his posture (look at the angle of the head) is more like saying “I want to be part of this”.

His bodily posture is a posture of palying. He pushes Pan’s right horn ever so gently, more touching than pushing, smiling all the time.

And the old boy returns the smile.

Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.
Aphrodite, Pan and Eros; Parian marble 100 BC. National Archaelogical Museum of Athens, Greece.

As a final observation before my conclusion, I offer the angle of Aphrodite’s left ankle. How gentle and relaxed and playful! Restrained and at the same time powerful, but not aggressive!

And this brings me to the supreme feature of the sculpture. Its ambivalence.

All three protagonists are doing something and at the same time they are not.

And in the process, being totally submerged into this ambivalence, they have a hell of a good time!

Ancient Greece at her best!

Woman in a tub: a journey from Manet to … to Koons

I saw Edgar Degas’ “The Tub” and Jeff Koons’ “Woman in a Tub”at the Art Institute of Chicago back in April and was inspired to write about paintings and sculptures depicting a woman having a bath.

The following post is relevant to the Art Institute of Chicago

Modern Art

This is a personal view (most views are). I selected the paintings and sculptures I like and/or find interesting. 

One of the most important feature of the paintings and sculptures is – of course – the way the artist has depicted the female body.

Another is the degree of privacy and intimacy of the instance depicted.

Ingres, The bather of Valpincon, 1808, Louvre, Paris
Ingres, The bather of Valpincon, 1808, Louvre, Paris

I would like to start the journey with Ingres. The painting “The Bather of Valpincon” (my thanks for the photo to “The Art Appreciation Blog“) that hangs today in the Louvre in Paris marks in my book the beginning of a new era in the depiction of the nude female. The setting is domestic, the subject is alone. And the body is not perfect. The depicted woman is a real woman. There is no story in the picture. It is a “boring” mundane scene in the domestic life of a woman.

Although there is not tub in Ingres’ picture, in my view he creates the context for the topic of my overview.

Edouard Manet (1832-1883) Woman in a tub 1878 Paris, Musée d'Orsay Pastel on canvas
Edouard Manet (1832-1883)
Woman in a tub
1878 Paris, Musée d’Orsay
Pastel on canvas

The first painting strictly within the context of this article is Manet’s “Woman in a Tub”. Manet painted his picture in 1873.

My adoration of Manet started with “Olympia” (1863) and “The Luncheon on the Grass” (1862-1863), both exhibited in Paris’ Musee d’ Orsay.

I quote from Musee d’ Orsay’s web site:

“This pastel is one of the artist’s most beautiful portrayals of a woman bathing. All the characteristics of Manet’s style are there: a special blend of spontaneity, freshness combined with precise composition, and a taste for light, curving lines against a background of horizontals. The background is in fact divided up into subtly coloured bands, formed by the mirror, the dressing table and the floral cretonne cloth.

A large metal tub, always used by Degas in these scenes, occupies the lower part of the pastel. But whereas Degas’ models usually appear to be unaware of the viewer, here the model is unconcerned at being observed by the painter. She knows that her nudity, even though imperfect, will attract a friendly or even tender glance.

After Manet’s death, Degas produced his stunning series of women bathing, where he used plunging perspectives and more sophisticated poses. But it was Degas who, after 1877, first started to produce less innocent scenes of women washing, painted in brothels. It is difficult to determine from that point, which of the two artists had the greater influence on the other. Degas’ sarcasm is absent from Manet’s work; it is Bonnard’s gentle scenes of women at their toilette that are the real precursors of this Woman in a Tub.”

The palette of the picture is light. Only the tub turns to heavy grey.

Edouard Manet La blonde aux seins nus vers 1878 huile sur toile,  musée d'Orsay, Paris, France
Edouard Manet
La blonde aux seins nus
vers 1878
huile sur toile,
musée d’Orsay, Paris, France

Contrast the bathing woman to the bare breasted blonde of the same year. The air of “neutral” intimacy of the bathing woman is gone, and replaced by the naked aggression of the breasts. Totally different.

Woman in a Tub Femme au tub
Edgar Degas, Woman in a Tub, Femme au tub, 1883, Pastel on paper, Tate Gallery, London

I continue with another master, Edgar Degas.

Degas’ picture “Woman standing in her bathtub”, painted in 1883, adorns the exhibition halls of Tate Gallery in London.

It was in London’s National Gallery in 1996 that I saw the exhibition “Degas beyond impressionism”. This exhibition marked the beginning of my admiration for Degas’ work.

The woman seems to be drying herself, and is totally absorbed in what she is doing.

The picture is full of contrasting lights and shadows, of bright and dark colors.

Woman Bathing in a Shallow Tub, 1885 Edgar Degas (French, 1834–1917) Charcoal and pastel on paper, Metropolitan Museum, New York
Woman Bathing in a Shallow Tub, 1885
Edgar Degas 
Charcoal and pastel on paper, Metropolitan Museum, New York

Another nude in a tub by Degas is the picture he painted in 1885, which you can see today in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

When Degas exhibited his “suite of nudes,” which included this pastel, at the eighth—and final—Impressionist exhibition, in 1886, critics viciously attacked the ungainly poses of his bathers. After the exhibition, Degas gave the picture to Mary Cassatt in exchange for her Girl Arranging Her Hair (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.).

Edgar Degas French, 1834–1917 The Tub, modeled 1889 (cast 1919/21)
Edgar Degas
The Tub, modeled 1889 (cast 1919/21)

And now the tub I saw at the Art Institute of Chicago.

I quote the Art Institute of Chicago’s text:
“This charming work, cast in bronze after Degas’s death, is a particularly appealing, even playful, variation on that subject. In a round basin partially filled with water, a young woman relaxes and absently plays with the toes of her left foot…The Tub is innovative in another, more subtle way. The female nude is of course a central subject in the history of Western art, associated with many conventions and traditions. However, unlike so many of his predecessors and more conservative contemporaries, Degas did not depict his adolescent bather in the guise of a nymph or goddess, nor did he imbue her features and gestures with eroticism. Instead, she is self-absorbed, modest, and engaged in a mundane activity.”

Edgar Degas, The Tub, c.1896-1901, Pastel on wowe paper, Glasgow Museums
Edgar Degas, The Tub, c.1896-1901, Pastel on wowe paper, Glasgow Museums
Degas also painted this stunning minimalist depiction in a period spanning 5 years, and just crossing into the 20th century. It is almost as if Francis Bacon came to Earth early to paint this picture and disappear until his birth in 1909.
Pablo Picasso, The Blue Room, 1901
Pablo Picasso, The Blue Room, 1901
I cannot help assuming that the great Picasso was influenced by the aura of Degas’ paintings when he painted the blue room in 1901.
Pierre Bonnard, Woman in a tub, 1912
Pierre Bonnard, Woman in a tub, 1912
The next painting in line was made by Pierre Bonnard.
I encountered Bonnard for the first time in a comprehensive way when I visited the exhibition of his works in London’s Tate Gallery in early 1998. It was a wonderful surprise.
 The Bath Baignoire (Le Bain) Date1925  Oil paint on canvas, Tate Gallery, London

The Bath – Baignoire (Le Bain) 1925
Oil paint on canvas, Tate Gallery, London

“Like Degas, Bonnard painted a lot of nudes in the bath. Sometimes he even photographed them.  So the bathtub appears as a kind of original place, Plato’s chora in which forms materialize, or space, the matrix of Derrida.”

“This is one of a series of paintings that Bonnard made of his wife Marthe in the bath. Though she was in her mid-fifties, the artist depicts her as a young woman. Marthe spent many hours in the bathroom: she may have had tuberculosis, for which water therapy was a popular treatment, or she may have had an obsessive neurosis. The bath, cut off at both ends, and the structure of the wall create a rigorously geometric composition. The effect is strangely lifeless, and almost tomb-like; as if the painting were a silent expression of sorrow for Marthe’s plight.”

Matisse, Large reclining nude (The Pink Nude)

Pierre Bonnard La Grande Baignoire (Nu), 1937–1939 The Large Bathtub (Nude) Oil on canvas, 94 × 144 cm Private collection
Pierre Bonnard
La Grande Baignoire (Nu), 1937–1939
The Large Bathtub (Nude)
Oil on canvas, 94 × 144 cm
Private collection

Pierre Bonnard: La Grande Baignoire (Nu), 1937–1939
The Large Bathtub (Nude)

There is a formula, which fits painting perfectly,” wrote Bonnard, “many little lies to create a great truth.”

Nude in the Bath and Small Dog. 1941-46. Oil on canvas. 48 x 59 1/2" (121.9 x 151.1 cm). Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh
Nude in the Bath and Small Dog. 1941-46.
Oil on canvas. 48 x 59 1/2″ (121.9 x 151.1 cm). Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Bonnard 1941-1946: Nude in the Bath and Small Dog (with thanks to Sheila Thornton)

The efflorescent explosion of colors in “Nude in the Bath and Small Dog” (1941-46) almost bars us from making any sense of the painting were it not for a few key recognizable objects–notably the dog and the bathtub, within which the details of the immersed figure of Marthe slowly appears. Bonnard places the figure frankly in the center of this fantastic scene. We witness the inanimate becoming animate as the bathtub mutates to adhere to Marthe’s form: bulging to accommodate the bend of her right knee and expanding with the curve of her head. The walls seem to gently breathe like a living organism, warping in dazzling, undulating waves along with the ripples of the tub water.

Ostensibly the scene is serenity itself, yet Bonnard allows us no rest in front of it. Not only does the bathroom sway in our vision, the whole of it will not come into focus at once from any one position. We must move from side to side and back and forth. By thus “performing” the painting we are made all the more conscious of our movement in contrast to the stillness of Marthe’s body. Marthe died in 1942, at age 72, before Bonnard had finished the painting.
Nude in Bathtub, the last of Bonnard’s treatments of this subject, is one of the great nudes of the twentieth century. The audacity of color that characterizes the artist’s mature work is evident in this painting’s dazzling mosaic of oranges, yellows, pinks, blues, violets, and greens. The originality of Bonnard’s chromatic daring is nearly equaled in this painting by a pictorial construct in which perspective and volume are denied and forms are piled up to hover over the flat plane of the canvas.

Bonnard transformed this domestic environment, with its comfortably curled-up family dachshund, into an exotic setting in which a young woman floats in a pearly tub, her flesh reflecting the opalescent colors that surround her. Marthe appears as the youthful woman of Bonnard’s memories. The result is a sensual, dreamlike, and private evocation.

Jeff Koons: Woman in Tub, Porcelain, 1988, Art Institute of Chicago
Jeff Koons: Woman in Tub, Porcelain, 1988, Art Institute of Chicago

Landing from Bonnard to Koons is a shock.

It is like landing on another planet.

In the website of the Art Institute of Chicago, we read:

Woman in Tub, based on a postcard, depicts a female nude acting out a crude sexual joke in the bathtub. Jeff Koons explained: “There’s a snorkel and somebody is doing something to her under the water because she’s grabbing her breasts for protection. But the viewer also wants to victimize her.” The cartoonlike rendering of the form belies the exquisite hard-paste porcelain finish, typical of 18th-century Rococo figurines. Part of his Banality series, which is characterized by oddly eroticized, comic, and kitsch images, this work demonstrates Duchampian and Pop Art strategies of appropriation and, combining imagery from multiple sources, makes the primary subject taste itself.” (1)

Jeff Koons: Woman in Tub, Porcelain, 1988, Art Institute of Chicago
Jeff Koons: Woman in Tub, Porcelain, 1988, Art Institute of Chicago

An article in Art Tattler International informs us: Koons has a strong connection to Chicago where he came in the 1970s to study at the School of the Art Institute under artists Ed Paschke and Jim Nutt and briefly worked at the MCA as a preparator. For Koons, this was a critical time in his development — what he calls a period of transcendence. In practical terms, working for and befriending the artist Ed Paschke taught him that he could be a professional artist. Koons began to see his ideas in dialogue with Dada, Surrealism, and the Chicago Imagists, all genres that communicate with personal icons: from Salvador Dali’s mustache to Paschke’s tattoo parlors. Through Paschke and others, he looked to the external world to find his personal iconography, which he used to explore his subjectivity, transcend his limits, and fulfill his potential as an artist. 

It is time to recap.

What a journey!

Edouard Manet
Edouard Manet

Manet’s picture is effecting a dialogue between the woman/model and the observer/painter.

There is no idealization of the female body.

Edgar Degas
Edgar Degas

Degas is painting with passion, but the woman looks like an object enclosed in a solitary space.

We can see her, but she cannot. She is alone.

No idealization of the female body here.

Pierre Bonnard
Pierre Bonnard

Bonnard moves us to a different world.

The interplay between the flesh and th water, the function of the tub as the defining space, the luminosity of the tiles, they all contribute to create a world of ever changing illusion.

Jeff Koons
Jeff Koons

Koons is ending the journey as a hurricane, There is violence, panic, and sensuality. And a very peculiar sense of humour.

Relevant posts: 

Painting the human body, October 2011

Three female nudes, October 2010

The Crouching Venus at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London

Some time ago I wrote about “A crouching Aphrodite in London“, a sculpure I saw at the British Museum. It is Roman, 2nd century AD; a version of an original from Hellenistic Greece.

Crouching Aphrodite, British Museum. London
Crouching Aphrodite, British Museum. London

Today I want to introduce “The crouching Venus” (1702) of John Nost the Elder, which I saw at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.

Crouching Venus, V&A Museum, London
Crouching Venus, V&A Museum, London

I quote form the Museum’s website:

“The Crouching Venus is a remarkable instance of John Nost the Elder’s assured carving, and is a rare surviving example of a classical subject by the artist in marble. The sculpture’s scale and accomplishment give it a grandeur and presence which were truly exceptional at that date in Britain. Like the antique prototype, Venus is depicted ineffectually attempting to cover her nakedness, her gesture only succeeding in drawing attention to her sensual body. The goddess is thought to be bathing, or possibly adjusting her hair, and caught unawares. Nost’s sculpture suggests the sophisticated level of patronage of the wealthy gentry in Britain at the start of the eighteenth century, and tantalisingly evokes the way in which interiors of eighteenth-century country houses were adorned with sculpture.”

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

I must confess that I did not know of the artist before I saw the crouching Venus.

What attracted my attention to it was that it looked very similar to the crouching Aphrodite I Saw at the British Museum. As a matter of fact, it seemed to me that it was a copy of the Roman-Hellenistic sculpture.

(Quite interestingly, there is no mention of such likeness in the V&A description.)

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

Let us start from the left arm and the band around it.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

The head is the next area of examination.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The face, the hair style and the expression are the same. However, Aphrodite turns to her far left her face and looks down, while Venus just turns and looks straight.

Also, Venus clinches loosely her right fist, while Aphodite’s right hand’s fingers are straight.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

Venus is slightly slimmer than Aphrodite.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

Aphrodite’s figure is sumptuous.

Let us now have a look at the left hand.

Crouchnig Venus - detail
Crouchnig Venus – detail

The hand in both sculptures is “locked” between the thigh and the elbow.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The only difference appears to be the angle to the thigh and the fingers. One should point out though that quite obviously, Aphrodite’s fingers are reconstructed, as they were broken in the sculpture’s journey through the centuries.

Finally, the back side.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

This may be the final and concluding observation regarding the hypothesis that the V&A Venus is a copy of the British Museum Aphrodite.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The posture of the body, the support of the jug, the tension of the muscles.

It seems that Venus is a copy of Aphrodite after all! 

Which of the two do I like best?

 

Head of a Woman: Picasso’s interpretations of Fernande Olivier

Head of a Woman (Fernande), autumn 1909
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), bronze, autumn 1909, Art Institute of Chicago

During a visit to Chicago I viewed the Picasso Exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago. Prominent amongst the exhibited artwork, was the sculpture “Head of a Woman (Fernande)”.

The following post presents modern art from the Art Institute of Chicago.

Modern Art

It is not a simple sculpture. It is an adventure. Every angle opens new dimensions, interpretations, and insights into what the head might be. 

This sculpted head gave me the inspiration to write this article.

Pablo Picasso, "Portrait of Fernande Olivier”, 1906, Gouache on Paper, private collection, Stockholm
Pablo Picasso, “Portrait of Fernande Olivier”, 1906, Gouache on Paper, private collection, Stockholm

Picasso and Fernande Olivier met on a rainy day in August 1904.

Fernande became reportedly Picasso’s first known long-term relation & subject of many of Picasso’s Rose Period paintings (1905-07).

Their romance lasted until 1909, but continued to be together as friends until 1912.

Pablo Picasso, Fernande with a Black Mantilla (Fernande à la mantille noire), Paris, 1905–06. Oil on canvas. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Thannhauser Collection,
Pablo Picasso, Fernande with a Black Mantilla (Fernande à la mantille noire), Paris, 1905–06. Oil on canvas. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Thannhauser Collection,

Picasso’s portrait Fernande with a Black Mantilla 1906, is a transitional work. Still somewhat expressionistic and romantic, with its subdued tonality and lively brushstrokes, the picture depicts Fernande Olivier wearing a mantilla, which perhaps symbolizes the artist’s Spanish origins. The iconic stylization of her face and its abbreviated features, however, foretell Picasso’s increasing interest in the abstract qualities and solidity of Iberian sculpture, which would profoundly influence his subsequent works. Though naturalistically delineated, the painting presages his imminent experiments with abstraction. (Source: Guggenheim Museum).

Head of a woman, 1906
Head of a woman, 1906

Another 1906 picture “Head of a woman (Fernande)”, is totally different in style. Space and perspective are somehow distorted. The angular aspects of the face are prominent.

As we approach 1907 “Les Demoiselles d’ Avignon” cleared the way to cubism, as John Richardson comments in his “A Life of Picasso”.

Pablo Picasso, Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. Oil on Canvas, 1907, MOMA, New York
Pablo Picasso, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. Oil on Canvas, 1907, MOMA, New York

Two years later, Picasso paints Fernande in the “Head of a Woman” as a multi-level distorted face.

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman, summer 1909
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman, summer 1909, oil on canvas, Art Institute of Chicago

“Woman with Pears” has the same style.

This is one of several portraits Picasso painted of Fernande, during the summer of 1909, a period that the couple spent in Picasso’s native Spain. While the pears in the background are modeled in the round, Picasso radically reconfigured Oliviers head and bust, fragmenting them into geometrical segments. This fracturing of solid volumes offered an alternative to the traditional illusionistic and perspectival approach to depicting three–dimensional space on a two–dimensional surface and suggests the direction Picasso’s process would take in the development of Cubism. (Source: MOMA).

Pablo Picasso, Woman with Pears (Fernande), 1909
Pablo Picasso, Woman with Pears (Fernande), summer 1909, oil on canvas, MOMA, New York

The slices carved into the figures neck and the diamond recesses of her eyes are replicated in the sculpture Womans Head (Fernande), which Picasso created in the fall of that year.

‘My greatest artistic emotions were aroused when the sublime beauty of the sculptures created by anonymous artists in Africa was suddenly revealed to me’ Picasso told the poet Apollinaire. This sculpture is of his companion Fernande Olivier. Its flat, planed surface relates the work to his cubist paintings of the same period. Picasso made two plaster casts of the head, from which at least sixteen bronze examples were cast.

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande) 1909, Plaster, Tate Gallery
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande) 1909, Plaster, Tate Gallery, London

One of the plaster casts is today at London’s Tate Gallery.

“One of only two plasters made by Picasso from which at least sixteen bronzes were cast, this version is completely white, unlike Tate Modern’s version which has been toned in a brownish finish (presumably to emulate bronzes cast from it). The point of Cubism was to disregard one-point perspective in painting—long held since the Renaissance—breaking down the picture plane, the prison of two dimensions, enabling the artist to show the object or figure in the round.” (Culture Spectator, PABLO PICASSO AT MFA HOUSTON UNTIL THE 27TH MAY 2013)

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) Head of a Woman (Fernande), 1909 Plaster Raymond and Patsy Nasher Collection, Dallas, Texas
Pablo Picasso, 
Head of a Woman (Fernande), 1909
Plaster Raymond and Patsy Nasher Collection, Dallas, Texas, USA

The other plaster cast is in Texas.

We now come to the bronze sculptures. The one I saw in Chicago was donated by Alfred Stieglitz to the Art Institute in 1949.

Head of a Woman (Fernande), autumn 1909
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago

“Like Rembrandt’s most intimate portraits, it is about the mystery of being close to another human being. Picasso makes you recognise this by inviting your eye down into those channels and crevices, until you feel you are inside Fernande’s head.

This is one of the seminal works of cubism, and in the state that Picasso liked it best. He moulded Fernande’s head in clay, then made two plaster casts from which he authorised a series of bronzes. He never liked the bronzes as much as this raw plaster version. It is a key work in the development of cubism because it was the first time Picasso realised he could translate his new kind of painting into three dimensions this is one of his paintings from that time given solid form.”

(Jonathan Jones, Head of a woman, The Guardian)

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande) c 1909, bronze, Art Gallery of Ontario
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande) c 1909, bronze, Art Gallery of Ontario

In 1909, over a ten-month period, Picasso was inspired to create more than sixty Cubist paintings, sculptures, and drawings of women that bear a striking resemblance to his paramour at the time, Fernande Olivier. Although few of these works could be considered traditional “portraits,” they do form a unique group within his oeuvre that shows him working with unusually singular focus. This bronze head of Fernande was modeled in autumn 1909 in Paris after the couple returned from a summer trip to Spain (Horta de Ebro), and represents Picasso’s first Cubist sculpture. Like his early Cubist paintings, the shape of her sculpted head is faceted into smaller units. Fernande’s hair, which she wore up in a rolled do, is here a series of crescent blobs, while her contemplative face is more sharply chiseled into flat planes. Intended to be seen in the round, the composition changes form when viewed from different angles, and the head’s slight tilt and the neck’s sweeping curves give the allusion of movement as if she were about to look over her shoulder. (Source: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).

Head of a Woman, 1909
Head of a Woman, 1909, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
picasso1_detail
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), detail – autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), detail - autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), detail – autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), signature - autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago
Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), signature – autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago