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Vanity: Disrupting the Female Nude

A brief history of the female nude in western art

INTRODUCTION READ MORE

Group of three paintings joined together. The painting on the left is a skeletal figure, the painting at the center is a nude woman with light skin and long hair, looking at a small painting, and the figure on the right is a demon with black clawed feet, a red body, and horns.
Vanity (Triptych of Earthly Vanity and Divine Salvation), Hans Memling, 1485, oil on oak panel, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Strasbourg, France
Painting of a nude woman with light skin and red hair, reclining asleep outside, atop a pile of red and white silk. One hand is behind her head, and the other is covering her genitals.
Sleeping Venus, Giorgione, 1510, oil on canvas, Germäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden, Germany
Painting of a reclining nude woman with light skin and long blonde hair, holding a small bouquet of flowers in one hand and covering her genitals with the other. In the background are two other woman, one of whom is rooting through a chest.
Venus of Urbino, Titian, 1538, oil on canvas, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, Italy
Painting of a reclining nude woman with light skin and red hair, as seen from the back. A baby angel with brown hair and small wings holds up a mirror, where her face is visible to the viewer.
Venus at Her Mirror, Diego Velazquez, 1644, oil on canvas, National Gallery, London, England
Painting of a nude woman with light skin and dark hair reclining on a bed covered in silks. She holds a feather duster, is viewed from the back and has her head towards the viewer. Her anatomy is very snakelike.
The Grand Odalisque, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, 1814, oil on canvas, Louvre Museum, Paris, France
Painting of a nude woman with light skin, red hair, and a pink flower tucked in her hair reclining on a bed. A woman with dark skin and a white robe holds a bouquet of flowers beside her.
Olympia, Edouard Manet, 1856, oil on canvas, Musée d’Orsay, Paris, France
Painting of a nude woman with light skin and long curly red hair, reclining on top of the ocean waves. Above her fly 5 chubby baby angels, with small wings and golden hair.
THE BIRTH OF VENUS, ALEXANDRE CABANEL, 1863, OIL ON CANVAS, MUSÉE D’ORSAY

THE ADVENT OF CUBISM & AVANT-GARDE

Painting of five nude women with light skin, done in an abstract and cube-like manner. Two of the women's faces are styled as masks, instead of regular human faces.
Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, Pablo Picasso, 1907, oil on canvas, Museum of Modern Art, New York City, UNited States © 2017 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Colorful painting of a nude woman with light skin laying on the ground outside. The painting style is slightly abstract, with large, expressive brushstrokes.
Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954), Blue Nude, 1907, Oil on canvas, 36 1/4 x 55 1/4 in. (92.1 x 140.3 cm.), The Baltimore Museum of Art: The Cone Collection, formed by Dr. Claribel Cone and Miss Etta Cone of Baltimore, Maryland, BMA 1950.228, Photography By: Mitro Hood © 2017 Succession H. Matisse / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

At the dawn of the 20th century, artists like Pablo Picasso, Egon Schiele, and Marcel Duchamp “seized the erotic as a means of challenging and transgressing the accepted categories of high art, particularly the tradition of the nude.”1

As sexual transgression became a widespread motif in a new age of stylistic experimentation, representing the female nude continued to signify the artist’s masculinity, virility, and lack sexual inhibition. This served to extend the established norms surrounding the female nude.

The advent of Cubism and the new avant-garde allowed Picasso and Henri Matisse an opportunity to disrupt the classic art historical narrative of the female nude as strictly an object offered up for the consumption of the male gaze. Instead of departing from these traditions, however, these artists used the female nude (and, specifically, bodies of women of color) as a space to assert their dominance in the art world—a battleground for their own ego. In so doing, they left room for future generations of artists to confront this problematic legacy and adopt new approaches to the female nude and subjectivity.

The Contemporary Female Nude in the Hood’s Collection

A variety of contemporary artists featured in the Hood Museum’s collection have both investigated the art historical conventions related to representations of the female nude and made visual critical responses to that tradition. By exploring what constitutes the “acceptable” female nude, and by considering who is allowed to frame its criteria, these artist reinvent the nude as a site of reclamation and disruption.

Meghan Dailey writes in Curve: The Female Nude Now that it is “virtually impossible to create an image of a female nude today without invoking its long and complex history in Western art, a history that continues to undergo scrutiny and revision by artists and scholars alike.”2 The female nude in contemporary art dovetails with a variety of inquiries, such as the (relatively) new medium of photography, the power of self-portraiture, and an increasingly intersectional examination of race as it pertains to the female nude throughout art history.

Notes
1. Alyce Mahon, Eroticism and Art, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007, 36.
2. Meghan Dailey, Sarah Valdez, and Jane Harris, Curve: The Female Nude Now, New York: Universe, 2003, 15.

Color print of a reclining nude white woman with blonde hair and light skin. Behind her is a Black woman with medium dark skin and curly hair, holding a bouquet of flowers. A monkey is at the feet of the white woman.
Mel Ramos, American, born 1935
Manet’s Olympia, from an untitled portfolio (“Salute to Art History” series), 1974
Color collotype on wove paper
Sheet: 20 1/16 x 26 1/2 in. Image: 14 9/16 x 22 7/16 in.
Gift of Ernesto Ostheimer; PR.980.286.1
© Mel Ramos/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY
Photograph of a nude woman painted blue with white squiggly lines, holding a wooden boat, with a milk-filled baby bottle draped over each breast. Her face is not in the image.
Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, Cuban, born 1959
Untitled (Breast and Bottle Feeding) from the series When I Am Not Here / Estoy Alla, 1994
Polaroid photograph
20 x 24 in
Purchased through the Contemporary Art Fund; 2009.12
© Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons
Color photograph of a reclining blond woman in a gold bathing suit with light medium skin, looking at herself in a hand mirror. The wallpaper behind her is opulent and depicts a scene of women resting or reclining, both nude and partially or fully dressed.
Daniela Rossell, Mexican, born 1973
Untitled (Janita Harem Room, Villa Arabesque, Acapulco, Mexico) from the series Ricas y Famosas, 2001
Chromogenic print
30 x 40 in.
Purchased through gifts from Charles W. Gaillard, Class of 1962, Kenneth I. Reich, Class of 1960, James and Susan Wright, Lee and Marguerite Berlin, Karen Berlin, Class of 1989, Elizabeth E. Craig, Class of 1944W, Jan Seidler Ramirez, Class of 1973, and the Class of 1952. Selected by participants in the seminar “Museum Collecting 101”: Sarah Bohlman, Class of 2004, Jeffrey Cooperman, Class of 2006, Joanne Kim, Class of 2005, Amy Kurtz, Class of 2006, Sarah Murray, Class of 2004, Rolaine Ossman, Class of 2004, Arielle Ring, Class of 2007, Catherine Roberts, Class of 2005, Emily Salas, Class of 2006, Liz Seru, Class of 2004, Eleanor Smith, Class of 2004, Miell Y. Yi, Class of 2002; PH.2004.18
© Daniela Rossell, courtesy of Greene Naftali Gallery, New York
Color photograph of a nude woman with light medium skin and dark hair, draped at the waist in a towel, laying on her side and facing away from the viewer. Diagonally across her back is an enormous wound that has been sewn shut with clear threads that dangle from the stitches.
Rebecca Belmore, Canadian (Anishinaabeg), born 1960
Fringe, 2007
Digital print (pigment on archival paper)
Sheet: 26 x 67 1/8 in. Image: 21 x 63 in.
Purchased through the Elizabeth and David C. Lowenstein ’67 Fund and the Olivia H. Parker and John O. Parker ’58 Acquisition Fund; 2010.65
© Rebecca Belmore
Color photograph of a fat, curvy Black woman with dark skin and short black hair, laying facedown on a bed. Behind her, the wall is blank.
Zanele Muholi, South African, born 1972
Untitled (female nude); from The i-jusi Portfolio Number 3: South African Photographs
Gelatin silver print on Baryta Fibre 300g archival paper
7 5/16 x 10 5/8 in.
Lent by Andrew E. Lewin; EL.2013.67.10
© Zanele Muholi
Print of a nude woman silhouette against a black background. Words are written across her body. Her face, breasts, and genitals disappear into the black background.
Lesley Dill, American, born 1950
Front (The Soul Has Bandaged Moments) from the suite A Word Made Flesh, 1994
Photolithograph, etching and aquatint on tea-stained Mulberry paper, hand sewn onto Arches buff paper
25 7/8 x 21 7/16 in.
Purchased through the Hood Museum of Art Acquisitions Fund; PR.995.7.3
© Lesley Dill
Black and white print of a nude woman, as seen from behind within a mirror. At the bottom, text reads, "It was clear, I was not Manet's Type Picasso -- who had a way with woman -- only used me & Duchamp never even considered me"
Carrie Mae Weems, American, born 1953
Not Manet’s Type, 2001
Offset photolithograph on paper
Sheet: 40 1/8 x 20 in. Image: 17 x 17 in.
Purchased through the Olivia H. Parker and John O. Parker ’58 Acquisition Fund; PR.2002.17.1
© Carrie Mae Weems
Sculpture of a woman with brown skin and long black hair laying on her side. Her hair extends into a large ball.
Alison Saar, American, born 1956
Cache, 2006
Wood, ceiling tin and wire
28 x 26 x 90 in.
Purchased through the Virginia and Preston T. Kelsey 1958 Fund; 2006.32
© Alison Saar
Color photograph of a nude Black woman with medium dark skin and locs gathered into a ponytail, lounging on a yellow chair, facing away from the viewer. Her face is seen in profile, and she holds a silver and black flail and wears red high heels.
Renee Cox, American, born 1956
Baby Back, 2001
Archival digital “C” print mounted on aluminum
100 x 144 in.
Purchased through the Sondra and Charles Gilman, Jr. Foundation Fund and the Fund for Contemporary Photography; 2008.31
© Renee Cox

Bibliography

A young woman with light skin, blue eyes, and shoulder-length dark hair, wearing all black, looks at the camera.

About the author: 

Jessica King Fredel graduated in 2017 from Dartmouth College, where she was a history major and art history minor, She also served as a Levinson Senior Intern at the Hood Museum of Art. She grew up in San Francisco, California. This project on the female nude and its implications was inspired by John Berger’s Ways of Seeing, and by a class King Fredel took on Pablo Picasso in her freshman fall at Dartmouth. This class sparked an interest in Picasso, a paper on Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, her academic focus on art history, and her interest in serving as an intern at the Hood Museum.

Tremendous thanks to the Hood Museum of Art and the DALI Lab at Dartmouth for all their help with this project. 

Please feel free to contact Jessica with questions or feedback at jkingfredel@gmail.com.