Exploring Art: A Global, Thematic Approach

Chapter 7Reproduction and Sexuality

The Promise of Fertility

• Art as sympathetic magic in the promise of fertility– Fertility gods and goddesses –

Mother Goddesses from the Paleolithic and Neolithic era

– Fertility figures – to aid in human reproduction

– Rituals – mystical images and enactments

Henry Moore, Draped Reclining Mother and Baby, 1983 bronze 104.5’ Fukuoka Art Museum, Japan

Moore references both modern and ancient art—visual expression of human reproduction

Venus of Willendorf, Austria, c.15,000-20,000BCE 4 3/8”Idol from Amorgos, Cycladic Islands off Greece, 25,000-23,000BCE marble 30”

Female burial figureFertility figure?

Venus of Willendorf. Stone, 43/8" high. Austria, c.

25,000–20,000 BCE. © Ali Meyer/Corbis.

Venus of Willendorf is an icon of prehistoric art. She is included in introductory art history textbooks. Being both female and nude, she fitted perfectly into the patriarchal construction of the history of art. As the earliest known representation, she became the "first woman," acquiring a sort of Ur-Eve identity that focused suitably, from a patriarchal point of view, on the fascinating reality of the female body.

Cycladic/early Minoan: 2500-2000 BC

Female figure, c. 2500-2200 BCE

Art of the Ancient Aegean

Ancient peoples placed figurines like this in grave sites. Their lack of eyes and mouths--as well as their folded arms-- was perhaps intended to depict death. Their gender may indicate that they represented deceased men's wives or a mother goddess.The size and style of Cycladic figurines varies greatly. Some are among the earliest naturalistic sculptures discovered in the Mediterranean area. Others, like this example, are highly abstract.

God Te Rongo and His Three Sons. Wood, 273/8"

Cook Islands, Polynesia, c. 1800–1900s.

The British Museum, London.

This male figure has three carved figures on the chest and two on each of the arms. Only one other similar figure is known, which has carved figures on the chest and buttocks. An old label describes the figure as a depiction of the Rarotongan god Te Rongo and his three sons. It has also been suggested that the figure represents the Polynesian god of creation, Tangaroa.

The large penis—virility.

Fertility and ritual

Dionysiac mystery frieze

Second style (antithesis of 1st style)

Aim to dissolve walls…replace with illusion of three-dimensional world…purely pictorial

Dionysiac mystery frieze Room 5, Pompeii, Italy ca. 60-50 B.C.E.

Bamana Female Figure. Wood and brass, 21" high. Mali,

Africa, 1947.

Most fertility figures were likely connected with now-lost

rituals.

These figures were idealized youthful females. They have

prominent conical breasts that project sharply from a flattened chest, exaggerated buttocks, and cylindrical arms, legs and

torsos.

Young unmarried Bamana men use nyeleni sculpture to

represent the ideal marriageable woman they hope to find as a wife and

partner.

An Asante legend holds that a woman named Akua, who was barren, was instructed to commission a small, female, child statue and to care for the doll as if it were real. She did so, until she conceived and successfully gave birth to a female child.The Akua'ba dolls are commissioned by women wanting to conceive or desiring a healthy and safe pregnancy of both male and female children. "After the akua'ba is blessed by the fertility deity in rites conducted by a priest, the women carries it and treats it like a real child; she adorns it with beads and earrings, 'nurses' it, and puts it to bed. After a successful birth, a mother may give the akua'ba doll to a daughter to play with or use it to teach child care (Seiber and Walker 44). The doll is female due to the matrilineage of the Asante society. Women also desire female children to help them with raising sibilinss and doing household chores.

Akua'ba Fertility Figure

Primordial and Human Couples

• Explore the Dogon primordial couple– The primordial couple epitomizes– the ideal social pairing and– commemorates the creation of the

world.

• Human couples in creation myths

Primordial…existing at or before the beginning of time

Dogon Primordial Couple, Mali

This work's scale and complexity have led scholars to suggest that it may have been created for display at the funerals of influential Dogon men. The graphic composition constitutes an eloquent statement concerning the distinct and yet complementary roles of male and female partners as a unit of life. With understated elegance and an economy of details, the artistic distills man and woman to a perfectly integrated and harmonious union. One of the most striking aspects of the representation is the degree of bilateral symmetry that describes man and woman as reflections of each other with delicate and subtle departures that indicate their distinct identities. The figures' elongated bodies are depicted as a series of parallel vertical lines traversed by horizontals that draw them together. On the reverse side a small child clinging to the female's back is balanced by a quiver on the back of the male. That concluding pair of features distinguishes their respective role as nurturer and provider joined together to procreate and sustain life.

Masaccio.

The Expulsion from Paradise, Italy, 1427. Fresco

Drama—anguish, pain, shame.Masaccio modeled his figures using soft contrasts of values and color.

Compare

Dogon Primordial Couple, Mali, Africa, c. 19th-20th century.

Masaccio.

The Expulsion from Paradise, Italy, 1427. Fresco.

Giovanni Arnolfini, a prosperous Italian

banker who had settled in Bruges, and his wife

Giovanna Cenami, stand side by side in the bridal chamber, facing towards the

viewer. The husband is holding out his wife's

hand. “Johannes de Eyck fuit hic 1434 (Jan van Eyck

was present, 1434)

HUMAN COUPLES

• It is uncertain that the picture depicts an actual marriage ceremony. The Latin inscription on the back wall, 'Jan van Eyck was here/1434', has been interpreted as the artist's witness to their marriage, but may simply attest to his authorship of the painting,

• his creation of 'here'.The mirror is the focal point of the whole composition.

• The central motif of the painting, the so-called 'joining of hands', has long been recognized as a special gesture with a specific meaning. It has been the subject of debate for decades.

• Oranges placed on the low table and the windowsill are a reminder of an original innocence, of an age before sin. Unless, that is, they are not in fact oranges but apples (it is difficult to be certain), in which case they would represent the temptation of knowledge and the Fall.

• The small dog in the foreground is an emblem of fidelity and love.

• The clogs and outdoor sandals which the couple have removed might be typical wedding presents, or represent the taking of shoes in a sacred precincts.

Menkaure and his Queen, Dyn. IV c.2500 BCE

Son of Khafre, Grandson of Khufu.Menkaure and his wife are idealized and stylized, according to the Egyptian cannon.It was meant to mark a lifetime, meant for posterity and spiritual presence—and to transmit information to viewers in the afterlife.

Pharaonic symbols:Wedge-shaped ceremonial beardNemesKilt (shendjyt)

Menkaure and his Queen, Dyn. IV c.2500 BCE

Lovemaking, Sexuality, Gender

• Images of ideal sexuality• The feminine body and the gaze• Abstracted sexual imagery

Depictions of Lovemaking

• Peruvian Moche pots– Likely made by women– Buried with the dead

• Ukiyo, “floating world” subject matter from Japan– Shunga prints

• Jeff Koons’s pieces– Blur the boundary between art and pop culture

• Hindu depictions from India

• The album “Poem of the Pillow” is a masterpiece of erotic works by Utamaro.

• Ignoring stereotypical scenes, he uses a low viewpoint and places the large figures so they seem to expand beyond the frame.

Kitagawa Utamaro, Lovers in an upstairs room, from Uta makura ('Poem of the Pillow'), a color woodblock printErotia—gently and intimately erotic—private moment of closenessInterplay of pattern and line of the kimonos—echoes the intertwining of bodies

Made in Heaven 1989Lithograph on paper on canvas3180 x 6910 mmNumber 2 in an edition of 3

The billboard Made in Heaven and the Art Magazine Ads use standard advertising methods and were made to publicize the project. Koons reflects upon the power of consumer industries and the aesthetics and culture of taste.

Krishna and Radha in a Pavilion, India, from Punjab, c. 1760. Opaque watercolor on paper, 11” X 7 1/4”.

Indian Love Legend

It is believed that Krishna enchants the world, but Radha enchants even Him.

The topic is the spiritual love affair between the divine Krishna and his devotee Radha.

Images of ideal erotic sexuality were relatively common in Indai

Loving couple (mithuna), Eastern Ganga dynasty, 13th centuryOrissa, India (Ferruginous stone; H. 72 in.)

Once part of the subsidiary decoration of a Hindu temple facade, the figures of this bejeweled couple embrace while peering rapturously into each other's eyes.

Couples such as this pair are understood to have multiple meanings, ranging from an obvious celebration of life's pleasures to the more metaphorical symbolism of a human soul's longing for union with the divine.

The Feminine Body and the Gaze

• Female nudes in Europe and the U.S. were made for the male gaze– Gaze completed sexual exchange

implied in the painting

• Females alone in the painting– Subject “available,” allowing viewer to

“consume” with his gaze• Ingres’ Grande Odalisque

Titian

Venus of Urbino

1538oil on canvas4 ft. x 5 ft. 6 in.

Ingres, Grande Odalisque, France, 1814Nude Turkish harem woman—erotic image for European men

Édouard Manet

Olympia

1863oil on canvas4 ft. 3 in. x 6 ft. 3 in.

LYNN HERSHMAN. Deep Contact. Interactive

computer-video installation at the Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco. USA,

1990. Courtesy of the Artist.

SEX, POLITICS, CONSUMERISM

HOW MASS MEDIA USES SEXUALITY IN WESTERN CULTURE

• Barbara Kruger uses pronouns that are gender neutral, with no fixed subject, to imply that attitudes about sexuality (as well as race) are not fixed by nature.

During the early 1980s Barbara Kruger perfected a signature style, using cropped, large-scale, black-and-white photographic images juxtaposed with raucous, pithy, and often ironic aphorisms, printed in Futura Bold typeface against black, white, or deep red text bars. The inclusion of personal pronouns in works like Untitled (Your Gaze Hits the Side of My Face) (1981) and Untitled (I Shop Therefore I Am) (1987) implicates viewers by confounding any clear notion of who is speaking. These rigorously composed mature works function successfully on any scale. Their wide distribution—under the artist’s supervision—in the form of umbrellas, tote bags, postcards, mugs, T-shirts, posters, and so on, confuses the boundaries between art and commerce and calls attention to the role of the advertising in public debate.

Kruger, 1989

Kruger voices

her opinion to protect women’s rights through an image that also raises issues of power,

patriarchy, stereotyping, and consumption.

Catherine Opie. Justin Bond. 1993.

Opie's methods and subjects are diverse, ranging from portraits of transgendered people to landscape and urban photography, in both bold, rich colors and black-and-white. Often turning her lens upon the seemingly mundane.Opie explores themes of sexual and cultural identity, and how they're affected by relationships.Justin Bond…cross-dressing male whose attire and hair suggest “good girl” and sexual potential.

Abstracted Sexual Imagery

• Allusions to human body– Georgia O’Keeffe– Constantin Brancusi– Louise Bourgeois

Georgia O’Keeffe. Grey Line with Lavender and Yellow, 1923

Brancusi,Torso of a Young Man I1917Polished bronze

“Organ-logic” (a term used by the art historian Rosalind Krauss) refers to the representation of an organ which stands for the person who is significant in some way to another person; this other person is also represented by a body organ and the two organs are united to make something which signifies both people.

Louise Bourgeois, Blind Man's Bluff, 1984

Robert Mapplethorpe, Louise Bourgeois, 1982

Breast-like protuberances which seem to be on the verge of becoming phallic—it is a body of power.

Images of Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Progeny

• Mayan representations of pregnant women– Kidder Figure – Small, infantile figures linked bearers of human

offspring with mother nature and progenitors of plant life.

• Alice Neel’s Pregnant Woman shows physical effects of pregnancy

• Peruvian Moche culture offers straightforward depiction of childbirth

Clay figurine from Las Charcas culture

• Hand-modeled clay female figurines highly characteristic of Las Charcas culture…generally of reddish brown. These female figurines are often pregnant and are thought to have been offerings to promote fertility in the fields. Usually the arms and legs of the figures are mere stumps but some attempt at a realistic body shape has been made. The head has received the most attention to detail…often have earplug flares.

Alice Neel. The Pregnant Woman 1971• Neel painted her daughter-

in-law, Nancy, nude and in the last week of pregnancy. Considering the perpetual presence of the condition, there are surprisingly few images of pregnant women. Neel's work is remarkable for including at least eight pregnant nudes. "I thought the whole picture of woman without pregnancy was . . . trivial," Neel said. "It's treating woman as sex object. But you know, sex results in something." The painting depicts Nancy at ease despite the obvious physical strain of this late pregnancy that resulted in twins. Directly behind Nancy's head hangs Neel's drawing of Richard, the husband, father, and son.

Mother and Nursing Child. Ceramic effigy vessel, Mississippian Period.

Cahokia, Illinois, USA, 1200–1400.

ROGIER VAN DER WEYDEN. Virgin and Child in a Niche. Oil on panel, 71/4" x 43/4".

Flanders, Northern Europe, c. 1432 –1433. Kunsthistorisches

Museum, Vienna.

Fertility Figure, found at Catal Huyuk, c.6000 BCE

Discussion Topics

• How are various attitudes toward sexuality reflect in the art you see?

• What attitudes toward sexuality, gender, and marriage do you see display in the media (TV, movies, advertising, etc.)? Do you agree with these attitudes?

• Why does “the gaze” objectify women in art?

• Can you identify some of the symbols of marriage displayed in the works of art from other time periods or other cultures?

• Fertility• Rituals• Couples• Love Making, Sexuality, Gender• Feminine Body and the Gaze• Abstract Sexual Imagery• Pregnancy, Childbirth, Progeny