Ink & Image, 15th Edition

Ink and Image 15

Spring 2023

Undergraduate Research Journal

New York University | Department of Art History

Ink & Image

Spring 2023

Volume 15

Contributors

Ian Beard

Dustin Chen

Jacklyn Van der Colff

Lila Pearl Zinner

Leonard Zhu

Co-Editors in Chief

Adelle Aba

Elizabeth Baltusnik

Editors

Rachel Nazar

Celia Pardillo-Lopez

Meghan Watters

Emilie Meyer Alumni Editor

Design Editor

Elizabeth Baltusnik

Dear Reader,

As the editors of Ink and Image, we are delighted to present the fifteenth edition of NYU’s undergraduate research journal of the Department of Art History. This journal was founded in 2009 with the intention of granting undergraduates the opportunity to present work typically reserved for graduate students. The original founders, Malcolm St. Clair (Urban Design and Architecture Studies ‘09) and Alexis Wang (Art History ‘09), intended to create a dialogue between Art History departments and researchers, both within NYU and with other academic institutions. We are proud to be a part of continuing their vision in the journal’s subsequent editions.

This year, we present a selection of papers with topics ranging from an analysis of Chinese Ghost Cities to representations of female sexuality in Venetian Renaissance portraiture. Throughout these works are themes of equity and justice: how can our art and our built environments adequately support the societies for which they were created? These debates are central to the advancement and expansion of art history, as well as daily life. We hope that reading these papers will encourage you to question the structures and artworks around you.

We take this opportunity to thank our faculty advisor, Professor Carol Krinsky, and also Professors Dennis Geronimus, Meredith Martin, Jon Ritter, and other NYU faculty and staff who have helped us bring this year’s edition to print. The advisors and authors of this year’s papers must also be thanked for their tireless efforts and their serious research.

Central to the mission of Ink and Image are the ideas of inspiring new research, encouraging creativity, and furthering connections. Happy reading!

Sincerely,

Elizabeth Baltusnik, Co-Editor in Chief

Adelle Aba, Co-Editor in Chief

Decoding Anachronism in Domenico Ghirlandaio’s Innocenti Altarpiece

Ian Beard

Anachronism as a pictorial device was ubiquitous during the quattrocento. Anachronism, here meaning the situation of a person, object, or event in a time or space to which it does not belong, is nonetheless peculiar. It evades the dogmatic assumption of the linearity of time. For this reason, the anachronism has been given considerable attention by art historians

Alexander Nagel and Christopher S. Wood, who introduce a model for understanding the anachronism which they call the theory of substitution. It posits that images and buildings can be understood as tokens of an original model. Each time the model is replicated, it adds to a chain of replications.1 In Nagel and Wood’s book Anachronic Renaissance they elaborate their theoretical framework and rely on abstractions that obscure the anachronism’s function. Analyzing a concrete example of anachronism using their theory would clarify its utility and limitations. Altarpieces lend themselves well to this, as their liturgical function is implicitly anachronistic. One altarpiece stands out as a case study: Domenico Ghirlandaio’s

Adoration of the Magi of 1485 for the Ospedale degli Innocenti in Florence. I find that the model presented by Wood and Nagel distracts from more immediate explanations for the anachronism in the Innocenti altarpiece. An alternative reading of this altarpiece reveals that sacra rappresentazione, a type of ecclesiastical drama popularized in quattrocento Florence, likely influenced Ghirlandaio’s employment of anachronism in this altarpiece.

The Adoration of the Magi (Fig. 1) altarpiece was commissioned in 1485 by Messer Francesco di Giovanni Tesori, then the prior of the Ospedale degli Innocenti. The Ospedale was an orphanage opened in 1445 with patronage by the city of Florence and the Arte della Seta, Florence’s silk guild.2 Originally built according to the plans of

1. Alexander Nagel and Christopher S. Wood, “Toward a New Model of Renaissance Anachronism,” The Art Bulletin 87, no. 3 (Sep. 2005), p. 405.

2. Richard Trexler, “The Foundlings of Florence, 1395-1455,” History of Childhood Quarterly 1, no. 2 (1973), p. 261.

Filippo Brunelleschi, the Ospedale sheltered Florentine foundlings and provided them with opportunities otherwise inaccessible. Boys, when old enough, would become apprentices of a trade, and girls were taught weaving, earning them later employment at the Arte della Seta. 3 Although not originally intended as a clerical institution, during this period hospitals often adopted religious responsibilities.4 After the Ospedale opened it quickly grew in size and eventually merged with the nearby Ospedale di San Gallo. In 1451 the Ospedale’s church was consecrated by the archbishop of Florence.5 The contract for the altarpiece was written by Fra Bernardo di Francesco, at the church of the Gesuati, for whom Ghirlandaio painted an altarpiece around 1480; so it is likely that Fra Bernardo recommended Ghirlandaio’s name to the Ospedale. Although the panel’s contract stipulates remuneration clauses, not subject matter, the Adoration of the Magi and secondary Massacre of the Innocents scene would have been appropriate given the dedication of the panel to the orphans’ hospital and church. Documentations pertaining to the altar’s decoration reveal that the predella, now separated from the altarpiece, was to be executed by Bartolomeo di Giovanni, Ghirlandaio’s pupil.6 Unlike the main panel’s contract, the one predella specifies the seven scenes chosen by Tesori. In the main panel, Ghirlandaio painted figures by adroitly contrasting saturated colors in the figures’ dress, a practice often observed in his work.7 This made Ghirlandaio’s work legible from a distance. Despite this, individual identities are sometimes mistaken. In the center of the painting the Virgin and Child are seated with Saint Joseph at their left. Two magi kneel before Christ, one kissing Christ’s foot and the other turned towards the viewer with his hand over his chest. The third and youngest magus presents a chalice at the Virgin’s right, and by his side are portraits of Ghirlandaio himself and the patron, Francesco di Giovanni Tesori who is clad in black. On Tesori’s right, a figure wearing a turban has been identified as the Greek humanist, Demetrius, although the evidence to support this is unsubstantial.8 Saint John

3. Philip Gavitt, Charity and children in Renaissance Florence: the Ospedale degli Innocenti, 1410-1536 (University of Michigan Press, 1990), p. 319.

4. John Henderson, “Healing the Body and Saving the Soul: Hospitals in Renaissance Florence,” Renaissance Studies 15, no. 2 (2001), pp. 188-216.

5. Philip Gavitt, Charity and children in Renaissance Florence: the Ospedale degli Innocenti, 1410-1536 (University of Michigan Press, 1990), p. 149.

6. Archivio degli Innocenti, Florence, ser. XIII, no. 8, Giornale dal 1484 al 1489.

7. For a deeper understanding of Ghirlandaio’s use of color to produce legible paintings, see: Julia DeLancey, “Before Michelangelo: Colour usage in Domenico Ghirlandaio and Filippino Lippi,” Apollo (Feb. 1977).

8. This claim is made by Gerald S. Davies, Ghirlandaio. (New York, 1909), p. 91. Davies’ identifications must be

the Baptist is easily recognized in the bottom left corner of the panel, and any doubt regarding the identity of the genuflecting man at the bottom right is resolved by the contract for the predella which reveals him as Saint John the Evangelist: “a piè di san Giovanni Vangielista ch’ (è) nella tavola, la storia quando san Giovanni fu messo nella caldaia.”9 The Baptist and the Evangelist present a young and presumably martyred innocent wearing translucent white robes. Two sumptuously dressed figures standing at the right side of the panel are likely members of the Arte della Seta. Besides the figures essential to the Adoration—namely the holy family and the three magi—everyone else appears anachronistically.

The substitutional theory by Nagel and Wood postulates that an artifact presents itself as an instance of a universal type. This type can be thought of as a blueprint or model of some original artifact. Through its reproduction throughout history, the artifact becomes commonly recognizable and understood. These replications define a continuous existence of the artifact, so an instance does not point to a specific moment, but towards a macrocosmic perception of history which collapses time. To make explicit what is meant by “collapses time,” one can imagine a dimension in which the past, present, and future occur simultaneously and eternally. A sacred mystery in Christian worship, such as the sacrament, assumes a similar function. During the performance of the mass, the sacrament lifts the congregation from a mortal linear perspective of time to a realm sub specie aeternitatis. For this reason, many altarpieces refer to the sacrament in some way, making the altarpiece a particular area of interest in the study of Renaissance anachronism.10 The altarpiece’s liturgical function separates it from other religious works in the taxonomy of visual art. Its placement above the high altar of the church demands participation from the congregation during the celebration of the mass. Nagel and Wood’s substitution theory has theological precedence, particularly in the theory of typology. Typology, meaning a stamp as in a coin or mold, is a method of writing history used by Christian exegetes to unite the Old Testament with the New. It proposes that people and events from the Old Testament are seen as historical prefigurations, later fulfilled by Christ taken with a grain of salt as he also mistakes Saint John the Evangelist for San Gallo. 9. Translated from E Archivio degli Innocenti, Florence, ser. XIII, no. 8, Giornale dal 1484 al 1489. “at the foot of St. John the Evangelist who (is) in the panel, the story when St. John was put in the cauldron.”

10. Martin Kemp, “Introduction. The altarpiece in the Renaissance: a taxonomic approach,” in The Altarpiece in the Renaissance, ed. Peter Humfrey and Martin Kemp (Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 11.

and the new covenant.11 For example, Saint Paul in Romans 5:14 calls Adam “a type of the one who was to come,” i.e., a type of Christ.12 This might also find a home in the altarpiece.

The anachronistic saints Johns pictured in Domenico Ghirlandaio’s Adoration of the Magi can be easily reconciled with the narrative. The inclusion of these two saints likely stems from the Gospel of St. John: “The next day he [John the Baptist] saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, ‘Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!’” The Baptist pointing to the Christ Child and Saint John the Evangelist’s presence can be harmonized with the Adoration.13 Their function serves to emphasize Christ as the sacramental Agnus Dei, or Lamb of God, which is a typological symbol. The two kneeling innocents with their backs facing the viewer are remarkable, too. Often regarded as Christ’s first martyrs, the infants massacred under Herod have body positions parallel to those of the active congregation, integrating the Florentine innocents with the altarpiece. Their appearance could also be read as a typological symbol for Christian martyrs. However, their presence at the Adoration does collapse time in the way described by Nagel and Wood, they are not substitutes for an original model. Their origin is fixed, unlike artifacts with origins that may predate history. Moreover, anachronistic saints in quattrocento altarpieces prove to be the rule rather than the exception, as they appear ubiquitously. Caution is advisable when categorizing the Renaissance altarpiece, especially since historians of the time were also uncertain about their classification.14 Therefore, studying them solely based on their anachronistic quality may not lead to further insight.

Like anachronistic saints, donor portraits are also common. Due to their mortal status, they are typically relegated to a subordinate position in the altarpiece and posed stereotypically to make obvious their status as human witnesses separate from divine protagonists. Their Florentine clothing, especially in a biblical setting, also separates them. We see this in Ghirlandaio’s fresco of the Annunciation to Zacharias in the Tornabuoni

11. Erich Auerbach’s essay “Figura” from 1963 provides an in-depth treatment of biblical typology as it relates to literature and art. While the essay is philosophical in nature and far beyond the scope of this paper, he particularly notes the importance of typology for the instruction of Hebrew scriptures to the public in medieval Europe.

12. English Standard Version Bible, Romans 5:14. ESV Online, 2001. https://esv.literalword.com/.

13. English Standard Version Bible, John 1:29. ESV Online, 2001. https://esv.literalword.com/.

14. Paul Hills, “The Renaissance altarpiece: a valid category?” in The Altarpiece in the Renaissance, ed. Peter Humfrey and Martin Kemp (Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 45.

Chapel. The portrait of the altarpiece’s donor, Francesco di Giovanni Tesori, and Ghirlandaio’s self-portrait both follow this convention. The integration of the members of the Arte della Seta is more overt Their inclusion reminds the praying orphans that the Ospedale’s philanthropic patrons, like the kings who adore the Christ child, can improve their welfare. These anachronistic donor portraits, albeit self-aggrandizing, show a preoccupation with civic pride and the success of Florence’s charitable institutions. They are not typological symbols. Instead, their presence is a didactic measure taken by the artist for the congregation’s sake.

The figures define a temporal specificity in their anachronism, contradicting the idea that anachronism is best suited to a substitutional interpretation.

The stable under which the Adoration occurs is supported by four decorated pilasters. To its right is an inconspicuously-placed triumphal arch with the altarpiece’s date inscribed. The background contains a richly detailed townscape containing Roman architectural landmarks including the Colosseum, Column of Trajan, and the Pyramid of Caius Sestius. These architectural components of the Innocenti altarpiece demonstrate Nagel and Wood’s substitutional theory more effectively than its portraits do. A typological reading is applicable for the triumphal arch, all’antica decoration on the stable’s pilasters, and architectural allusions to Rome. They do instantiate some original type. Ghirlandaio did this two years before receiving the commission from the Ospedale degli Innocenti, when he adorned his Sassetti Chapel altarpiece with all’antica elements such as the triumphal arch and a Roman sarcophagus. One could trace back these objects’ roots, but any meaningful or original results is difficult due to the quantity of art that employs the same replications. A theoretical approach leads one beyond concrete understanding of art history, towards a labyrinth of neologisms and abstraction. Instead of better understanding some chain of replications, one becomes tangled in the threads these artifacts stitch through time.

This is precisely the difficulty with Nagel and Wood’s theory. Adopting it leads one away from the immediate causes of Renaissance anachronism and towards a debate shaped by modern thought. In Nagel and Wood’s book, anachronism as an art historical mode is regularly abandoned in favor of a metaphysical one that engages with the philosophies of Immanuel Kant, Sigmund Freud, and Erwin Panofsky. Moreover, their analysis of

Renaissance anachronism is philosophical instead of art historical. This flight into abstraction is only as useful as its safe return to ground. To reposition oneself and accurately assess the nature of the anachronism in the Innocenti altarpiece, one must voluntarily leave modern thought behind and imagine life and belief as it was during quattrocento Florence.

True, typology was familiar to lay people at that time. An unambiguous example of typology’s public appeal can be seen in various Biblia Pauperum of the fifteenth century. A Biblia Pauperum, or Paupers’ Bible, is an illustrated Bible that presents a scene from the New Testament flanked typically by two scenes from the Old Testament. Although many of these illustrated Bibles came from northern Europe, fifteenth century printing technology significantly increased the popularity of these Bibles in the rest of Europe.15 The illustrations are paired with banderoles containing verses related to the narrative as both literacy learning tools and mnemonic devices. The accessibility of the stories in the layperson’s mind led to the personal relived experience of biblical narratives. This idea that one can relive the past, thereby collapsing time, is paramount to this discussion. Already, the performance of mass has been discussed with respect to its anachronistic nature. Other kinds of religious performance, particularly liturgical drama, are logical next points of interest.

The Innocenti altarpiece is full of dramatic tension that turns the panel from a devotional object into a powerful narrative. A component of the altarpiece that has not yet been discussed is the secondary scene in the background depicting the Massacre of the Innocents. Although the Adoration and the Massacre of the Innocents do not coincide chronologically in the Bible, regarding this as an anachronism in the substitutional sense is too intense an idea. They are close enough temporally for an anachronistic depiction of the Massacre to be a convenient way to tell the story in a confined space. A dramatic irony is introduced to the altarpiece by showing the tragedy that soon follows the birth of Christ. At this point in Ghirlandaio’s career, he had already completed the Sassetti Chapel frescoes and was concurrently working on the fresco cycle for the Tornabuoni Chapel. While in these cycles Ghirlandaio was able to paint multiple distinct scenes, here he is forced to work within

15. Paola Ventrone, “Acting and Reading Drama: Notes on Florentine sacre rappresentazioni in Print,” in Journal of Early Modern Studies, vol. 8, ed. Raimondo Guarino and Lene Buhl Petersen (Firenze University Press, 2019), p. 69-132.

the confines of a single image.

Another unexamined element of the Innocenti altarpiece is the quartet of angels who hover above the nativity carrying a scroll inscribed with the Gloria. The gospel according to St. Luke records that angels sang “Gloria in excelsis deo,”16 to announce Christ’s birth to the shepherds. Thus, it is presented here. Angels similar in appearance to these have been modeled by Ghirlandaio before, notably in a fresco completed for the Saint Fina Chapel in 1475 (Fig. 2). He worked with Benedetto da Maino who sculpted the chapel’s stone altar (Fig. 3).17 Benedetto was a pupil of sculptor Antonio Rossellino who clearly inspired Benedetto’s Saint Fina altar’s Tomb of the Cardinal of Portugal (Fig. 4). The angels of the Innocenti altarpiece evoke those of the aforementioned altar and tomb. A closer examination of Rossellino’s Tomb of the Cardinal of Portugal reveals more theatrical devices. The several registers of depth exhibited in the tomb construct a quasi-stage for the sculpted actors. The sculpted curtains surrounding the tomb’s niche have also been compared to the curtains of a stage for an Annunciation festa of 1439,18 which revealed a fictive backdrop when drawn.19 The Innocenti altarpiece has a similar theatrical quality, particularly in the ensemble of figures occupying different registers and the careful attention to detail in the imagined background. The spectacular clothes become costumes. The accompanying mensural notation of the Gloria’s melody on the angels’ scroll shows the congregation of innocents how to sing the hymn. Thus, the altarpiece provides dramatic action, a musical score, scenery, and a script easily conjured by visual shortcut. Here we see all the elements needed for a sacra rappresentazione, a type of Florentine religious drama specific to this period.

Sacra rappresentazioni are different from earlier medieval liturgical dramas, in that the actors were boys belonging to a youth confraternity.20 The plays’ subject matter was based on biblical and hagiographic stories, and their production also included music and scenery.

16. Vetus Latina, Luke 2:14. Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, 6th/7th century.

17. Gerald S. Davies, Ghirlandaio (New York, 1909), pp. 27-28.

18. More reading on Florentine feste and celebrations are available in Richard C. Trexler, Public Life in Renaissance Florence (New York, 1980), pp. 215-278.

19. Morgan Ng, “Illuminated sculpture and visionary experience at the Cardinal of Portugal Chapel in Florence,” in The Art of Sculpture in Fifteenth-Century Italy, ed. Amy R. Bloch and Daniel M. Zolli (Cambridge University Press, 2020), p. 254.

20. Richard C. Trexler, “Ritual in Florence : Adolescence and Salvation in the Renaissance,” in Studies in Medieval and Reformation Traditions, vol. 10, ed. Heiko A. Oberman (E. J. Brill, Leiden, Netherlands, 1974), p. 228.

Through entertainment, they taught moral lessons to young Florentines of any social class. For this reason, adults sanctioned their performance and engaged with them as well.21 The earliest documented performance of a sacra rappresentazione was a 1430s production of the Birth of Christ, performed by the Natività confraternity. The plays were triumphs for the confraternities that performed them. In 1476 the attention of Lorenzo de’ Medici was captured by the performances, and in 1491 he penned his own rappresentazione, called San Giovanni e Paolo. These plays often stressed familial order and patriarchal authority, as is unmistakably clear in Feo Belcari’s Abramo ed Isac. The popularity of sacra rappresentazioni, especially as literature, significantly increased in the 1490s due to printing technology. (Although fascinating, printed rappresentazioni of the 1490s and cinquecento will not be considered here since the Innocenti altarpiece was painted in 1487.) The innocents’ exposure to sacra rappresentazioni and their accompanying stagecraft is probable. The confraternities often proceeded through the streets wearing angel costumes and singing. Even if largely ignored by adults, they were sure to capture the attention of other children.22 Performances of the sacra rappresentazioni, including stagecraft inventions such as the so-called ascension machine, were held in the church of Santissima Annunziata which was off the same square as the Ospedale degli Innocenti.23 The plays were a local phenomenon, and although most performances were led by an all-male cast, girls living in nunneries also performed sacra rappresentazioni for their clerical guardians.24 We can assume that the orphans of the Ospedale degli Innocenti, with a male to female ratio higher than in previous Florentine orphanages,25 also performed these rappresentazioni

The myriad theatrical devices employed in the sculptural artworks of Bernardo Rossellino and Benedetto da Maiano culminate in the Innocenti altarpiece. The panel captures the fleeting performance of a sacra rappresentazione. The explicit function of 21. Ibid., p. 224.

22. Richard C. Trexler, Public Life in Renaissance Florence (New York, 1980), p. 376.

23. Anna Maria Testaverde, “God’s Theater: Space for Performance and Stagecraft Experimentation,” in Sacred Drama: Performing the Bible in Renaissance, ed. Giorgio Bonsanti, Silvia Castelli, and Anna Maria Testaverde (Museum of the Bible, Washington, DC, and Florence, Italy, 2018), pp. 23-24.

24. Richard C. Trexler, “Ritual in Florence : Adolescence and Salvation in the Renaissance,” in Studies in Medieval and Reformation Traditions, vol. 10, ed. Heiko A. Oberman (E. J. Brill, Leiden, Netherlands, 1974), p. 229.

25. Richard Trexler, “The Foundlings of Florence, 1395-1455,” History of Childhood Quarterly 1, no. 2 (1973), p. 275.

anachronism in the Innocenti altarpiece is not just to collapse time; that is an implicit function assigned by historians. Rather, it is to stimulate the memory of a lived performance in the orphan devotee’s mind. A northern altarpiece of the same period, Hugo van der Goes’ Portinari Altarpiece in particular had an influence on Ghirlandaio’s paintings, and may have encouraged the laity to intensify a personal religious experience.26 Furthermore, anachronisms representing contemporary subjects could inspire a mental pilgrimage, although this might be the wrong term to employ for the Innocenti altarpiece.27 For the performers of a sacra rappresentazione, the mental pilgrimage is communal. When foundlings of the Ospedale looked at fellow orphans, they did not only remember their fixed identity, but they also remembered their embodied role: as Isaac, the Virgin, or even the devil.28 The innocents themselves became the substitutions for sacred tales designed to be remembered and re-lived. The Innocenti altarpiece can, then, be seen as the model on which the orphans based their dramatis personae. Uncovering the function of anachronism need not be a purely theoretical pursuit. A precise understanding of its power requires us to accept that it is often ephemeral or invisible. That is the nature of memory; that is the nature of time.

26. Jean K. Cadogan, Domenico Ghirlandaio: Artist and Artisan (Yale University Press, 2000), p. 254.

27. Craig Harbison, “The northern altarpiece as a cultural document,” in The Altarpiece in the Renaissance, ed. Peter Humfrey and Martin Kemp (Cambridge University Press, 1990), pp. 70-73.

28. Richard C. Trexler, Public Life in Renaissance Florence (New York, 1980), p. 375.

Figure 1. Domenico Ghirlandaio, Adoration of the Magi, tempera on panel, 1488-1489, Il Museo degli Innocenti, Florence.

Figure 2. Domenico Ghirlandaio, Announcement of St. Fina’s Death to San Gimignano, fresco, 1475, San Gimignano, Siena, Italy.

Figure 3. Benedetto da Maiano, Santa Fina Altar, marble, 1475, San Gimignano, Siena, Italy.

Figure 4.

Antonio Rossellino, Chapel for the Cardinal of Portugal, east bay with Tomb of the Cardinal of Portugal, marble, 1461-66, Cappella del Cardinale di Portogallo, San Miniato al Monte, Florence, Italy.

Between and Beyond Art and Science: Charles Cordier’s Chinese Man and Woman

Dustin Chen

The pair of gilt bronze busts Chinese Man (Chinois) (Fig. 1) and Woman (Chinoise) (Fig. 2) by the mid-nineteenth-century French sculptor Charles Cordier (1827-1905) was a novelty when it was shown to the public at the Paris Salon of 1853. Its combination of silver, gilt, and enamel gave the busts an exceptionally ornate finish. Unlike the impassive faces of white marble busts, the Chinese woman’s round face expressed what the critics called “mimetic shrewdness and cunning.”1 To these 19th century critics, Cordier’s work was not only realistic, but also confirmed the racialized stereotypes of people from East Asia. This was not the first time Cordier’s artworks had provoked controversy about race at the Paris Salon. In France, the Paris Salon was considered by society to be the highest level of fine art exhibition and could dictate the conservative stylistic tendencies and tastes for visual art. Cordier was already widely known for his Saïd Abdallah, a bust of a formerly enslaved African man, which was displayed at the Salon after France abolished slavery for the second time in 1848. Since then, Cordier’s sculptures had been characterized by his engagement with issues of race and empire and his interest in representing non-Western people with a classicizing idealization that was transplanted from European sculptural traditions.2

Different from various sculptures representing North Africans, Cordier’s Chinese Man and Woman stood out within his oeuvre as both the first set of polychrome busts he created and put on exhibition, and his only works dedicated to the representation of Chinese people.3 These busts are still understudied in their own right as reflections of Cordier’s

1. Tatiana Kontou, Victoria Mills, and Kate Nichols, “Art and Artists: Mr Cordier’s Ethnographical Sculpture,” in Critic, 9 February 1861, p. 190, republished in Victorian Material Culture. (Milton: Taylor & Francis Group, 2022), 153.

2. James Smalls, “Exquisite Empty Shells: Sculpted Slave Portraits and the French Ethnographic Turn,” in Slave Portraiture in the Atlantic World, 283-312, (Cambridge University Press, 2006), 283.

3. Various titles have been attributed to this pair of artworks in different exhibitions, namely Homme and Femme, type mongol (Male and Female, mongol type) at the Paris Salon of 1853, and Chinois and Chinoise (Chinese Man and Chinese Woman) at the Paris Universal Exposition of 1867. Cordier might have intentionally created an ambiguity

presentation of people from the Far East and of the Mongoloid race.

Previous scholarship on Cordier has largely debated whether to classify his busts as either fine art or scientific anthropological models, while also considering how he engaged with evolving notions of race. This paper aims to present how Cordier’s multidisciplinary interests in art and science conditioned the formal qualities of Chinese Man and Woman and their repeated displays and critical reception at the Paris Salon of 1855 and the Universal Exposition of 1867. Cordier was not interested in incorporating East Asian subjects into nineteenth-century French fine arts. These busts are parts of Cordier’s reduction of race and culture into stereotypes to support his abstraction of the universality of human beauty and the imperial prospect of the Second French Empire (1852-70).

Establishing and Articulating the Mongol Type

The mid-nineteenth century witnessed the rise of ethnography and anthropology as scientific studies which used strict methodology to classify human species into visually distinct and conceptually reasonable categories like races and types.4 The ambition to exhaustively record and understand humans and their lifestyles beyond Europe coincided with the colonial expansion of the Second French Empire under the reign of Napoléon III.5 Whether or not it was prompting the colonial agenda, the national scientific institute known as the French Museum of Natural History in the 1850s displayed sculptures and live casts of foreign individuals as visual documentations in its ethnographic gallery.

Cordier’s Chinese Man and Woman were originally a part of the museum’s commissions to complement the gallery with representations of Asian people. Cordier was an associate member of the Paris Society of Anthropology (Société d’Anthropologie de Paris) and had a taste for scientific realism. The subjects of Cordier’s busts were Mr. Chung-Ataï, a Qing dynasty tea merchant, and his family who had traveled to France from China. They appeared together in an earlier engraving in the magazine L’Illustration in 1851, dressed in traditional Qing attire. Because the Chinese family refused to pose for a live cast or be between race and ethnicity.

4. James Smalls, “Dressing Up/Stripping Down: Ethnographic Sculpture as Colonizing Act,” in Fictions of Emancipation: Carpeaux’s Why Born Enslaved! Reconsidered. edited by Elyse Nelson and Wendy S. Walters, 61-75, (New York, 2022), 62.

5. Smalls, “Dressing Up/Stripping Down,” 62.

photographed, Cordier was deemed the best artist to provide an almost scientific sculptural representation of these foreigners for the museum.6 Cordier provided a realistic depiction of their ethnic features by this method:

“start[ing] from some central point…to determine the slant of the medial line from the chin to the occipital bone; then I trace the arc of a circle, beneath which I determine the position of each feature, each depression, every landmark, and so on for all the lines, for all the contours, down to the most delicate crevice and protrusion.”7

In the case of Chinese Woman, Cordier accurately mastered the proportion and dimension of each facial feature even though the figure leans her head to the right, providing a difficult angle for observation. When the audience looked from the left side, the flatness of the woman’s profile and the reduced protrusion of the bridge of her nose became noticeable. These features were less visible when encountering her from the front. Cordier ’s scientific method of recording also enabled the audience in the Museum to discern her facial features from multiple angles. Unlike the two-dimensional photographs favored by anthropologists at his time, Cordier’s sculptures were three-dimensional and free-standing representations of their foreign sitters.

However, Cordier’s execution of the busts was not completely dictated by factual documentation of each physical detail of the body but was instead directed by his own ideas of human beauty which emphasized the uniqueness of each racial and ethnic type. Cordier acknowledged his fictional idealization having extracted characteristics of the entire race so as to “constitute an assembled type in which is united all the special [individual] beauty.”8

In the case of the Chinese couple, Cordier assembled biological features and salient cultural symbols that he considered to be representative of the Mongol race, distinct from black or white. The Chinese Man and Woman offer visual information such as clothes and hairstyles recorded by ethnographers. In Chinese Woman, the blossoming floral patterns

6. Barbara Larson, “The Artist as Ethnographer: Charles Cordier and Race in Mid-Nineteenth-Century France.” The Art Bulletin 87, (no. 4, 2005), 720.

7. Charles Cordier, “Representing Different Ethnic Types in Sculpture,” a presentation to the Paris Society of Anthropology, in Facing the Other: Charles Cordier (1827-1905) Ethnographic Sculptor edited by Laure de Margerie and Papet Édouard, (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2004), 27.

8. Charles Cordier, “Representing Different Ethnic Types in Sculpture,” a presentation to the Paris Society of Anthropology, in “Exquisite Empty Shells: Sculpted Slave Portraits and the French Ethnographic Turn,” 297.

on the silk clothing are highlighted with enamels of vibrant colors. Her intricately braided, swallow-shaped coiffure shows each strand of hair. Wearing elongated artificial nails, the woman seems to perform a Buddhist gesture with her right hand, while slightly revealing the folding fan in her left hand. He attached a pagoda behind the woman, associating her with Chinese architectural designs.

For the Chinese Man, Cordier juxtaposed the man’s long braid, a symbol of Qing dynasty feudalism, which dangles down his chest onto his right hand, with the pipe in his left hand, an indication of the import and consumption of opium under European imperial control.9 Cordier’s interest in both ethnography and ethnology provided the European viewers with an unprecedented opportunity to consider the cultural system constructed by the less represented race in France. The visual appeal of the Chinese couple serves Cordier’s own racial advocacy for the universality of beauty.

The mid-nineteenth century was a time when the topic of human races was hotly debated. During the same year that Cordier displayed Chinese Man and Woman at the Paris Salon of 1853, French anthropologist Gobineau announced in his “Essays on the Inequality of the Human Races” that the biological differences among different races predetermined the trajectory of civilizations and that the success of Western civilization showed the superiority of white people.10 To defy this hierarchical and Eurocentric model of race, Cordier incorporated the Chinese couple into the Museum collection in an effort to demonstrate the idea of the universality of beauty.” He asserted that “beauty is not the province of a privileged race.”11 As Cordier later exhibited these busts in the categories of “Mongoloid” as a race and “Chinese” as an ethnicity, he seems to have favored ambiguity in the overlapping categories to emphasize the interconnected nature of race and ethnicity.

The creation of a realistic representation of Chinese man and woman was motivated by his audacious, egalitarian racial philosophy which challenged the prevalent view held by self-proclaimed scientists such as Gobineau. Cordier’s intention to elevate the Mongol race

9. The pipe was later removed. See other examples of Chinese Man in Fig. 4.

10. de Margerie, 26.

11. See Charles Cordier to Count de Nieuwerkerke 1865, cited in Facing the Other: Charles Cordier (1827-1905) Ethnographic Sculptor, 28.

as a part of human universality and to praise its beauty was undermined by the contemporary bias against non-western people in museums. The Paris-Guide of 1867 described the entrance to the Anthropological gallery as “sinister” and Cordier’s Chinese Couple was displayed next to the “living monster,” the mold made of Saartjie Baartman, an enslaved African woman famous for her enlarged body parts. Despite the malicious alienation of non-white races into the category of “the Other” in the Museum, the intricacies in Cordier ’s depiction of the Chinese couple should be recognized as an attempt to advocate for the universal beauty in various human races through scientific observation and accurate representation.

Fitting Science and Industrial Techniques into Fine Arts

Cordier had a greater ambition for his Chinese Man and Woman busts than their silent display in the Museum. He viewed them not only as his idealized creation of the beauty of the Mongoloid race, but also as virtuosic vehicles for showing his creativity and technical prowess. Cordier combined the ancient technique of enameling with the contemporary French invention of galvanoplasty, a chemical treatment of metal to achieve a polished, shiny finish.

Cordier applied galvanoplasty to the man and woman’s skin areas to highlight the “smooth surface” and light-yellow skin color. Enameling was used to accentuate the intricacy of the floral motifs on the woman’s garment, hair ornament, and the Chinese decorative pattern leiwen on the pedestal. This revolutionary coupling of scientific subjects in Anthropology, with innovative industrial techniques and traditional sculpting aroused fervent criticism during the busts’ exhibition in fine art venues. When Cordier first showed the monochrome plaster model of the Chinese Man and Woman at the Paris Salon of 1853 one art critic Claude Vignon believed Asian figures only belonged to decorative art and rejected non-western figures altogether as legitimate subjects. Vignon dismissed Cordier’s work as fine art:

“We will thus not examine whether the Chinese Man of Mr. Cordier is more or less true and whether they are well or badly executed. To appreciate them, would be to accept them as a work of art, and we will not and that is what we will never do. Art is, according to us and also according to the general opinion, the true representation, but idealized, of natural Beauty…but the work of Mr. Cordier is only Ugly for the

sake of ugliness.”12

Vignon avoided defining art and beauty, and jumped to the conclusion that the Chinese figures were merely “Ugly for the sake of ugliness.” In so doing, he is apparently seeing white figures as the only ones to plausibly reflect beauty. Vignon accused Cordier of digression from white figures as a scheme to win attention.

In other criticism, the use of the industrial technique of galvanoplasty in Cordier ’s work also provoked aversion as galvanized metal reminded some critics of the valueless and vulgar mass-manufactured products. Art historian Amy Ogata notes that metal played a role in the realization of modernity in mid-nineteenth-century France. The production of an alloy removed the material from its own history and obscured the tradition to which it belonged.13 Therefore, the metal in Cordier’s work appeared to conservative academic viewers to be a departure from the traditional appreciation for beauty. The delicately-executed enameling also invited criticism, as the polychrome of variously colored stones generated visual disorder, he called Cordier’s work: “an association of motley materials, not a system of coloration based on laws.”14 Despite Cordier’s innovation in coupling science and industrial advancement in his execution of fine art, he faced opposition from contemporary critics: the Chinese Man and Woman were condemned both for their racial digression from traditional white figures and for their resemblance to both unrefined and tasteless industrial products and ornamental trinkets.

Personal Ambition Meeting a Changing Time

The Second French Empire, during which Cordier completed most of his works, was characterized by its rapid social and imperial advancement through industrialization. With the increasing domestic consumption and the expansion of overseas colonies, the beginning of the Second Empire was marked by aggrandizement of French culture over colonized societies.15 Cordier was an artist who worked outside the academy, and who traveled to and worked in French colonies. He enjoyed relative freedom from the social norms in France. He was able to achieve his personal and professional ambition in coupling high art and science.16

12. Vignon, 42.

13. Amy Ogata, “Making Metal Work,” West 86th 28, no. 2 (September, 2021), 306.

14. See Sault, 1863, cited in Facing the Other: Charles Cordier (1827-1905) Ethnographic Sculptor, 63.

15. Anne Higonnet, review of “Art and Politics of the Second Empire. The Universal Expositions of 1855 and 1867” by Patricia Mainardi, in French Politics and Society 6, no. 2 (1988), 69.

16. See Marshall A de Saint-Arnaud to Cordier, 1864, cited in Facing the Other: Charles Cordier (1827-1905)

It is important to consider Chinese Man and Woman in the social context of the Universal Exposition, where they were displayed. The mass French audience applauded their national prestige and colonial triumph. Chinese Man and Woman were exhibited in both the Paris Universal Expositions of 1855 and 1867. Unlike the exclusive Salon policy, the 1855 Exposition allowed visitors to pay a low price of 20 centimes on Sundays for a thorough visit; consequently, 20,000 people from various social classes visited each week to cheer and be amazed by both art and novel industrial products of their time and from around the world.17

Amidst all the exotic products at the 1867 Exposition, Cordier’s Chinese Man and Woman were situated not in the fine arts section, but in the category of Luxury Furnishings (Fig. 5). The lavish finish and ornate patterns of the busts fit into the consumerist atmosphere of the Exposition. Critic Claudius Lavergnue commented that the decorative metal busts were “more properly in the section reserved for industrial products.”18 Here, the Chinese couple as the subject matter of luxurious furnishing no longer manifested Cordier ’s pursuit of racial equality. Instead, the displaced presentation of ethnographical busts outside of their cultural context became a form of isolation and objectification, ready for the curiosity of “the Other” and the mass consumption of French people. Nevertheless, art historian Meredith Martin has commented on the Universal Exposition of 1867 as a “watershed moment” for Europeans to consider Asian art in a “culturally specific and politically nuanced way.”19 Indeed, Chinese Man and Woman might remind visitors of the particular type of tea service in the Chinese Pavilion at the Exposition. These busts’ cultural specificity was manifested by Cordier’s careful depictions of the physical details of the Chinese people and the symbols of their culture. However, the impact of these busts was still limited to a demonstration of Western authority in narrating the exoticized “Other” and didn’t entail a respectful appropriation of East Asian subjects into 19th century French sculptural art.

Conclusion

The mid-nineteenth-century French sculptor Charles Cordier’s Chinese Man and Ethnographic Sculptor, 28.

17. Patricia Mainardi, “Art and Politics of the Second Empire. The Universal Expositions of 1855 and 1867,” 69. 18. See Claudius Lavergne, cited in Facing the Other: Charles Cordier (1827-1905) Ethnographic Sculptor, 63.

19. Meredith Martin, “Staging China, Japan, and Siam at the Paris Universal Exhibition of 1867,” in Beyond Chinoiserie: Artistic Exchange between China and the West during the Late Qing Dynasty (1796-1911) edited by Petra ten-Doesschate Chu and Jennifer Milam, (Koninklijke Brill NV, 2019), 125.

Woman busts exemplified his dual interests in arts and science. Due to Cordier ’s experimental attempt at introducing racialized subject matter with contemporary industrial technology into the fine art discipline of sculpture, these busts were simultaneously considered in multiple categories and critically received in the Paris Museum of Natural History, the Paris Salon, and the Paris Universal Exposition. As a part of the collection in the anthropological gallery, Cordier’s works were characterized by what has been perceived as his racial sensitivity and pioneering interests in representing non-Western people with classicizing visual language, thus embodying the universality of human beauty in each race and ethnicity. His embrace of Chinese subject matter received strong criticism by some in the fine art academy environment, as at the Paris Salon. Claude Vignon, for instance, accused Cordier of attempting to use nonwhite figures to win attention and disrupt the classical, white ideal of beauty. Categorized as furnishing objects in the Universal Exposition, Cordier’s Chinese Man and Woman could be further understood in the context of the colonial prospect of the Second French Empire. By abstracting Chinese into a representative type for the mass audience at the Exposition, Cordier aimed to highlight the specific cultural practices of Chinese people. Despite some criticism from some in the art “establishment,” Chinese Man and Woman manifested Cordier’s marvelous coupling of art and science, challenging and plausibly initiating a reconsideration of the mid-nineteenth-century colonial understanding of human race and culture.

Figure 1. Charles Cordier, Chinoise (Chinese Woman), 1853, silvered, gilt, and enameled bronze. Private Collection.

Figure 2. Charles Cordier, Chinois (Chinese man), 1853, gilt, and enameled bronze. Art Gallery of Hamilton, Canada.

Figure 3.

Charles Cordier, Chinois (Chinese man), 1853, bronze. Musée de l’Homme, Paris. See the pipe in the man’s left hand.

Cordier’s Stand at the Universal Exhibition, 1867, Engraving, after the ext. Catalog 1987, Stuttgart.

Figure 4.

The Artistic Expression of the “Others”: Exchange between the Ottoman “East” and Italian “West” During

Jacklyn van der Colff

the Renaissance

Fueled by cross-cultural exchanges, the Italian Renaissance was a period marked by great artistic and intellectual innovation. While global trade prompted city-states such as Venice to gain extraordinary wealth and exposure to new ideas and commodities, encounters also illuminated the Eurocentric ideas present in Italian Renaissance society. Despite the ongoing conflicts between the Ottoman Empire and Italian city-states, the 15th and early 16th centuries were characterized by a fascination with imported exotica and the mysterious foreignism of the Orient. In eastern cities such as Damascus and Alexandria—both prior to and during their 16th c. Ottoman occupation—the mercantile nature of the relationship between the often dichotomized “East” and “West”1 required Italian merchants and diplomats to relocate, at least temporarily. The personal letters, diaries, political correspondences and inventory lists of Italian expats recorded the strife, rewards, and otherness of Eastern lands.

Artists and architects would also go on to introduce visual representations of the Ottoman and Mamluk Empires’ life and society to Italy. Often based on accounts brought back from voyages, depictions of Islamic motifs and figures in Italian pictures, as well as the use of sacred Islamic elements in Italian architecture, reached peak production in the late 15th century.2

Despite the interconnectivity of the Ottoman Empire and Italy, there was political unease and racial and religious intolerance present in Christian Italy that was manifest in Italian Renaissance painting. Depictions of the Eastern landscape and representations of Ottomans, also commonly (and derogatively) referred to as Moors, reflected and further

1. East and West are placed in quotations to indicate that in the context of this paper, the terms do not solely refer to geographic areas, but will instead refer to their Italian Renaissance conceptualization, which would have alluded to a dichotomized, conceptual divide based on perceived differences in religion, culture, and morals rather than physical distance.

2. Deborah Howard, “Venice, the Bazaar of Europe,” in Bellini & the East, ed. Caroline Campbell, Alan Chong, (London: National Gallery Company Limited, 2005), 29.

perpetuated the othering of non-Christian individuals during the Renaissance as a means of further promoting Western Christedom’s intermittent military essays for territorial domination in the East. Through the visual and anthropological examination of artwork featuring Eastern references and Ottoman figures, the non-dichotomous relationship between the Italians and the Moors, or the others, can be further examined—revealing not only the great crosscultural exchanges of commodities, knowledge, and friendship, but also the undercurrents of discriminatory “othering” and stereotyping embedded within the framework of Renaissance society.

Venice: Points of Tensions and Places of Trade

Venice had been importing luxury and essential goods from the East—including but not limited to spices, raw silks, pigments, and even calcined ashes for glass making—since at least the 8th century. However, it was not until the Quattrocento that the merchant city developed a strong monopoly over Eastern-Italian trade.3 Despite the papal ban prohibiting trade with Muslims enacted by Pope John XXII from 1320 to 1344,4 merchant accounts reveal that by 1420 Venetian ducats were accepted as a valid currency within the spice markets of Alexandria and Damascus.5 The interconnected social and economic relations between Italy and the East were solidified by the establishment of resident colonies in Alexandria, Damascus, and Aleppo as well as several territories in Greece. These resident colonies were mostly inhabited by Venetian merchants and diplomats, though they were also home to some merchants from other Italian cities.

The relevance of Eastern trade within Italian, and particularly Venetian, society, during the Renaissance is further illuminated by the prestigious status attributed to the role of the merchant. For young elite Italian men, the worldly and diplomatic nature of this occupation was seen as suitable preparation for a career in statesmanship and public life.6 In

3. Julian Raby, “The Serenissima and the Sublime Porte: Art in the Art of Diplomacy,” in Venice and the Islamic World 828-1797, ed. Philippe de Montebello (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), 94.

4. Deborah Howard, “The Mamluks,” in Venice and the Islamic World 828-1797, ed. Philippe de Montebello (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), 75.

5. Deborah Howard, “Trade and Travel,” In Venice & The East: The Impact of the Islamic World On Venetian Architecture 1100-1500 (New Haven: Yale University Press: 2000), 15.

6. Catarina Schmidt Arcangeli, “‘Orientalist’ Painting in Venice 15th-17th centuries,” in Venice and the Islamic World 828-1797, ed. Philippe de Montebello (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), 122.

addition, the financial promise of Eastern Mediterranean commerce attracted the offspring of many wealthy Venetian families such as the Zorzi, Contarini, and the Loredan.7 While commercial success reflected favorably upon the relationship between Italy and the East, especially in areas such as Galata where Venetians and Ottomans coexisted frequently, relations remained delicate as political tension and imperial turbulence marked the 15th century.8 Heightened by the fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans in 1452, tensions came to a head in 1463 prompting the First Ottoman-Venetian War. Despite the conflict concluding with Ottoman expansion into Venetian strongholds and Mamluk territories (1516-17), continued unease eventually led to the Second (1499-1503), Third (1537-1540), and Fourth (1570-1573) Ottoman-Venetian wars.

In Christian Contexts: Appearances & the Antichrist

While trade and diplomacy remained intact during the numerous periods of conflict, the imperial and naval strength of the Ottoman sultans created a degree of anxiety for western Christendom. With Sultan Mehmed II’s capture of Constantinople, a city that had once “served as a Christian role model for Venice,”9 the Ottomans achieved the status of not only a global power in Renaissance Europe but also of a Christian-conquering one. Despite Ivan Kalmar’s description of the Italians’ “existential anxiety about sublime power” exercised by the Islamic East, the inclusion of Eastern figures in Italian artwork is seen most frequently in the Christian genre of Adoration scenes.10 Towards the end of the Middle Ages, the belief that the Magi, or Wise Men, had originated from Persia,11 began to shift in favor of a more globalized perception. Now that the wise men were thought to have traveled from afar, Early Modern painters began to depict them in Eastern garb, identifying them as exotics within the Christian landscapes. By including figures whose attire defined them as distinctively global, artists may have intended to represent a world unified under God. However, simultaneously, the attire and accessories of the Eastern Wise Men included in Medieval Adoration scenes

7. Catarina Schmidt Arcangeli, “‘Orientalist’ Painting in Venice 15th-17th centuries,” 122.

8. Eric Dursteler, “Neighbors: Venetians and Ottomans in Early Modern Galata,” in Multicultural Europe and Cultural Exchange: In the Middle Ages and Renaissance, (Turnhout: Brepols Publishers, 2005) 33-49.

9. Howard, “Venice, the Bazaar of Europe,” 13.

10. Ivan Kalmar “Introduction: The Lord: God, King, Father,” in Early Orientalism: Imagined Islam and the Notion of Sublime Power, (Hoboken: Taylor & Francis Group: 2011), 1.

11. A. V. Williams Jackson. “The Magi in Marco Polo and the Cities in Persia from Which They Came to Worship the Infant Christ.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 26 (1905): 79–83. https://doi.org/10.2307/592877.

established a distinctive visual sense of ideological differentiation between the known West and the stereotyped others who populated the East. As encounters between the East and the West dramatically increased during the Renaissance period, these seeds of proto-orientalism12 would sprout in later artworks.

Within Gentile da Fabriano’s Adoration of the Magi (1423) (Fig. 1) for the Florentine Palla Strozzi, turbaned and elaborately dressed figures proceed towards the Christ Child who is shown traditionally seated on the Virgin Mary’s lap, receiving gifts from the three Wise Men. Behind the procession, the continuous narrative highlights the kings’ journey from the East, attended by a bustling crowd of followers whose heads are adorned with multi-colored turbans and intricately-patterned textiles (Fig. 2).

While the subjects of the composition itself reflect the lack of exclusivity of the Western and Eastern worlds even in religious contexts, Alexander Nagel identifies the intricate, linear patterning within the golden halos of the Christ child, Mary, and St. Joseph as Arabic pseudo-script.13 As most Italians could not read Arabic, Islamic calligraphy became an “exotic, decorative ornament for the Western observer” while other Islamic styles lost their spiritual significance as they “assumed a purely aesthetic framework in the perception of a non-Muslim.”14

While the attire and darker skin color of the Holy Family’s visitors would have been distinctly identifiable as Eastern or other, the exoticization of Mamluk and Ottoman society is also expressed by the inclusion of non-European fauna. The head of a snarling cheetah emerges from the turbaned procession, while monkeys adorned with jewels sit perched upon a camel to catch a glimpse of the Christ Child (Fig. 3). During the Renaissance, it was not unusual to include exotic animals in artwork; famous artists including Masaccio, Filarete, and Mantegna incorporated many of these lively creatures in their artworks.15

12. Ivan Kalmar in Early Orientalism: Imagined Islam and the Notions of Sublime Power (see note 10) coins the term proto-orientalsim in reference to exoticized imitation of the East before the 18th century, in Ancient and Medieval contexts.

13. Alexander Nagel, “Twenty-Five Notes on Pseudo Script in Italian Art.” RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics, no. 59/60 (Spring/Autumn 2011): 230, http://www.jstor.org/stable/23647792.

14. Deborah Howard, “Transmission and Propagation,” In Venice & The East: The Impact of the Islamic World On Venetian Architecture 1100-1500 (New Haven: Yale University Press: 2000), 42.

15. Heather Karellas, Images of the East in Renaissance Art, (Emory University, 2011), 24, http://history.emory. edu/home/documents/endeavors/volume3/heatherKarellas.pdf.

Fueled by elite Renaissance society’s obsession with collecting foreign artificialia and naturalia, 16 the inclusion of highly coveted exotica, 17 especially “Oriental” animals, in commissioned artwork reflects not only the Italian intrigue with the East but also highlights the prestigious status that was associated with the ownership of certain parts of it. Particularly in Florence, the giraffe became a prominent symbol of cross-cultural diplomacy and inherently a motif associated with the mysterious land of the East. The creature, featured in Domenico Ghirlandaio’s Adoration of the Magi (1486-90) (Fig. 4) for the Tornabuoni Chapel, was a famous gift to Lorenzo the Magnificent by the Egyptian Sultan via a visiting Mamluk ambassador in 1487.18 A giraffe had not been witnessed in the flesh by Italians since 46 B.C. when Julius Caesar triumphantly returned from Africa to Rome with the wondrous creature.19

Historically unfamiliar to Renaissance Florentines, the giraffe gave them an extraordinary glimpse into the exotic East, perpetuating the perceived otherness of the non-Christian world.20 Ghirlandaio depicts the giraffe in procession with turbaned figures; by associating the turban with the wild animal as symbols of the “East,” it is understood that the labels of ‘exotic’ and ‘otherworldly’ attributed to the giraffe were not exclusive to Eastern animalia, but were also associated with the turban and, more precisely, to those who wore it.

Depictions of Oriental figures in devotional artworks were not limited to celebratory scenes of Christian adoration. Even before the fall of Byzantium to the Ottomans in Quattrocento, Muslim figures were shown in scenes of martyrdom, “participating in the torture, mutilation, and execution of Christian saints.”21 Exemplified by Altichiero’s fresco of the Beheading of St. George (1378-84) in which a procession of armed persecutors and turbaned figures surrounds the fallen saint awaiting execution, Muslims were often vilified and even perceived as “alienated from God.”22 In the same way that Eastern figures were

16. In Italian Renaissance Cabinets of Curiosities, or Wunderkammer, man-made objects in the collection, such as works of art or antiques, were classified under the term artificialia; objects from nature were classified as naturalia 17. Exotica refers to plants and animals in a Renaissance collection.

18. Antonia Gatward Cevizli, “Representing the Ottomans and Their World in 1490s Mantua: The Lost “Ottoman Mode” in Mantuan Painting in Comparative Perspective,” I Tatti Studies in the Italian Renaissance 23, No. 1 (Spring 2020): 146, https://doi.org/10.1086/708219.

19. Christiane L. Joost-Gaugier, “Lorenzo the Magnificent and the Giraffe as a Symbol of Power.” Artibus et Historiae 8, no. 16 (1987): 94, https://doi.org/10.2307/1483302.

20. Joost-Gaugier, “Lorenzo the Magnificent and the Giraffe,” 94.

21. Sophia Rose Arjana. “Turkish Monsters,” in Muslims in the Western Imagination. (Oxford: Oxford University Press: 2015), 65.

22. Sophia Rose Arjana “Medieval Muslim Monsters” in Muslims in the Western Imagination. (Oxford: Oxford

celebrated for their foreignness from the western Christendom in Adoration scenes, this geographical distance was also applied combatively when convenient, as artists—and their often influential patrons—portrayed this distance from Europe, or in the words of Pope Pius II (1405-1464) “the fatherland [of Christianity,]”23 as a sign of heresy and barbarism.

While Pius II accused Muslims of being “wallowed in lust” and “addicted to prostitution and rape,” Martin Luther (1483-1546), the figurehead of the Reformation, labeled the Catholic Church “Turkopapalism,” in a critique, and reconfirmed the heretical connotation assigned to Islam in his comparison of the Pope and Muhammad to the “bloodhound and the devil.”24 These labels, both othering and demonizing, assigned to Islamic leaders, were consequently associated with their followers in the East. These derogatory markers became widely read as they were distributed through literary sources. Dante’s highly influential “Divine Comedy” (1308-21) places Muhammad in the Eighth Circle of Hell, reserved for the “Sowers of Scandal and Schisms.” Dante observes and records Muhammad’s and Ali’s damned fate, detailing their mutilation: “vedi come storpiato è Mäometto [Muhammed]! / Dinanzi a me sen va piangendo Alì, / fesso nel volto dal mento al ciuffetto.”25

Much later, Niccolo Nelli’s woodcut of the Turkish Pride (1571) (Fig. 5) illustrates the ideological consequences of denigrating Islam in three of the most defining aspects of the Italian Renaissance: humanist scholarship, art, and Christianity. Nelli ensures viewers can identify the profile of a man as distinctively Ottoman and distinctively ‘other ’ because he is depicted wearing an exaggeratedly large turban. The Muslim figure is shown in profile, a perspective associated with Imperial Roman and elite Italian portraiture, suggesting that he carries influence and respect; however, this illusion is shattered when the woodcut is turned 180 degrees, revealing a demon with prominent, grotesquely twisting horns and an animalistic mane of frightening hair.26 While associations between Islam and heresy were heightened University Press: 2015), 32.

23. Denise Gueniun, “The Abduction of Asia,” Early Orientalism: Imagined Islam and the Notion of Sublime Power, (Hoboken: Taylor & Francis Group: 2011), 42.

24. Gueniun, “The Abduction of Asia,” 59.

25. Dante, Alighieri, “Inferno: Canto 28” in La Divina commedia, ed. Gustave Doré, Eugenio Camerini, (Torino: Edoardo Sonzogno, 1880), 31-33.

“Behold how torn apart Mahomet is ! / Ali in tears moves on ahead of me, / cloven in his face from forelock down to chin.” Translated by Courtney Langdon, The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri: The Italian Text with a Translation in English Blank Verse and A Commentary, Cambridge University Press (London: 1918), 317.

26. Julian Raby, “The Serenissima and the Sublime Porte,” 91.

by political anxieties in the 16th century, the diversified appearance of Ottoman figures in Italian, and often Christian, artwork illuminates the tensions existing between Renaissance Italy’s apprehension towards Islamic power and its simultaneous reliance on the East as a commercial resource.

From the Western Imagination: Imperial Portraits & Perceptions

What is perhaps one of the most famous artistic encounters between the East and Italy occurred in 1479 when, at the request of Sultan Mehmed II, Gentile Bellini was sent to work for the Ottoman court. However, Bellini was neither the first nor the last Italian artist to work in Istanbul, as Mehmed had inquired about commissioning Italian artists, especially painters and bronze workers, as early as 1461.27 Similar to bronze medals, which possibly introduced Mehmed to a variety of Italian artists and styles,28 the portrait—an essential genre amongst Renaissance elites—would become a point of reference for Western ideas about the East. In fact, the portrait became the preferred genre of Orientalist painters by the 16th century.29 Unlike Gentile Bellini, who would go on to paint one of the most circulated portraits of the Ottoman ruler Mehmed II during the Renaissance during his fifteen months in Istanbul, the majority of artists who would create “Oriental” portraits would never set foot in the East. Relying primarily on the often-fictitious accounts of travelers, these portraits, primarily of Ottoman rulers, their family members, and harems, inhabited a space between attempted, but often othering, ethnography and full fantasia.

After the death of Mehmed the Conqueror in 1481, his successors and the courts of which they were a part continued to appear in Oriental portraits. As exemplified by Titian’s series of Ottoman portraits, the royal women of Istanbul became popular subjects for Italian artists. In his portrait of Sultan Suleiman’s (r. 1520-66) wife Hürrem, Titian paints a regal image known as La Sultana Rossa (Fig. 6). However, as Titian had never visited Istanbul himself, he had to supplement his second-hand knowledge of Ottoman dress with products of the European imagination. The Sultana dons a luxurious, velvet overdress and a strand of

27. Elizabeth Rodini, Gentile Bellini’s Portrait of Sultan Mehmed II: Lives and Afterlives of an Iconic Image, (London: Tauris & Company, 2020), 19.

28. Rodini, Gentile Bellini’s Portrait, 21.

29. Arcangeli, “‘Orientalist’ Painting in Venice,” 136.

elegant pearls. She is shown wearing an aigrette, an accessory associated with the harem, on her encrusted headdress. These rich accessories and regal garb display her royal status, but they lack authenticity. Heather Madar asserts that while Roxelana’s elongated and ornately jeweled headdress is meant to distinguish her as Ottoman, “[her] garb, which initially appears to be a plausible European interpretation of Ottoman dress, is extremely similar to clothing worn by other European women.”30 Furthermore, the portrait emphasizes her European attributes, depicting the Sultana with “...pale white skin, rosy cheeks, full red lips, and thin arched eyebrows”31 that contrast with her exoticized Ottoman-European costume.

Aside from the partial (or at times, complete) fabrication of the appearance of Ottoman women in Italy and other regions of Europe, Islamic women were often characterized as “sexual temptresses of hapless Christian men”32 before the creation of Titian’s portrait. In a letter (1473-74) to the aspiring merchant Benedetto Sanudo, his brother warns him to avoid the “numerous prostitutes infected with [syphilis]” 33 during his journeys to the East. Images of Turkish sultans, including Murad II and Bayezid, alongside their suggestively-posed harems, circulated throughout Western Europe in manuscripts and illustrated anthologies such as the Historia Imperatorum Regni, which featured drawings likely attributed to the Flemish Italian artist Francesco da Castello.34 Despite the evident interest expressed by Italians in understanding and learning more about the East, the repeated visual and written representations of Ottoman elites, especially women, in a sexualized fashion furthered Western narratives about both the sinful nature of Islam, as well as the difference between the idealized, chaste European woman, and the exotic, heretical ‘other.’

The perception of the relationship between Italy and the East during the Renaissance was heavily influenced by the circulation of the literature, art, and commerce that marked this globalizing period. Through the reevaluation of artistic representations of the East and especially the stereotypical portrayals of its Islamic citizens, the entanglement of curiosity, abundance, and innovation, but also fear, othering, and discrimination in Italian

30. Heather Madar, “Before the Odalisque: Renaissance Representations of Elite Ottoman Women,” Early Modern Women, vol. 6 (Fall 2011): pp. 1-41, https://www.jstor.org/stable/23617325.

31. Madar, “Before the Odalisque.”

32. Madar, “Before the Odalisque,” 2.

33. Howard, “Trade and Travel,” 18.

34. Madar, “Before the Odalisque,” 6-7.

Renaissance society are illuminated and can be further examined. The inclusion of Eastern figures in devotional works that sought to appreciate, but also in many cases villainize, the other shows that the people of that time were unable to discuss the relationship between the East and Italy as only negative or positive. The relationship between the Islamic world and Western Christendom expressed itself beyond politics and religion but inevitably infiltrated Renaissance ideologies and inherently Renaissance art. While the complex and often problematic portrays of the Early Modern East are not always apparent at first glance, it is essential to reevaluate the ways in which art was used as a mechanism of “othering” during the Italian Renaissance.

Figures 1, 2, & 3.

Da Fabriano, Gentile. Adoration of the Magi, Tempera on Wood,1423, Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy, https://www. uffizi.it/en/artworks/adoration-of-the-magi.

Figure 2.

Figure 3.

Figure 4.

Ghirlandaio, Domenico. The Adoration of the Magi. 1486-90. Fresco. Cappella Tornabuoni, Santa Maria Novella, Firenze, https://www.wga.hu/html_m/g/ghirland/domenico/6tornab/61tornab/5magi.html.

Figure 5.

Nelli, Niccolo, Turkish Pride, Woodcut, 1571, Biblioteca Communale, Mantua, in Venice and the Islamic World 8281797 ed. Philippe de Montebello, 91, New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007.

Figure 6.

Studio of Titian, La Sultana Rossa, 1550’s, Oil on Canvas, John and Mabel Ringling Museum of Art, the State of Art Museum of Florida, https://emuseum.ringling.org/emuseum/ objects/24004/portrait-of-a-woman.

China’s Ghost Cities

Leonard Zhu

Introduction

In the past three decades, foreign investment has caused housing units’ pricing in China to reach levels prohibitive for its rising middle and lower classes. Since the former Chinese Communist Party leader Deng Xiaoping’s implementation of the “open-door policy” in 1979, private investors from the West have rushed to purchase Chinese real estate to benefit from the expected growth of industry in the country’s urban areas. However, as China’s urban population continues to grow following an economically driven and government-sanctioned influx of domestic rural residents and “interurban relocators,”1 these urban areas—typically coastal and delta zone locations such as Shanghai, Guangdong, and Shenzhen—have become increasingly dense, leaving little room for blue-collar workers and young professionals to find stable living accommodations.

Chinese “inclusion” areas2 have been consumed by urbanization, making transit, commerce, and housing more available throughout metropolitan areas. However, much of this expansion has come at the expense of the farmers and villagers who once occupied these lands and must adapt to their new urban conditions. This form of expropriation—or rural gentrification—has contributed significantly to the prevalence of informal housing in major Chinese cities. Although the practices of informal housing and government-planned cities appear to have a goal of siphoning density away from urban cores, differing circumstances surrounding these practices lead to competition in accomplishing this goal.

Unlike other informal housing systems, Chinese residents affected by Tier I and II3 city expansion could maintain residency in their village homes. To streamline the land

1. Urban dwellers moving from one city to another.

2. Places that are occupied by villagers and, while not urbanized and not connected to urban centers by means of public transit, fall under the urban center’s domain.

3. China’s major Tier I and II cities include Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou (Tier I) as well as Shenzhen,

acquisition process, city governments looking to expand their urban reach have foregone the traditional fees for rural residents residing on encroached land to allow them to lease occupancy in their residences at a relatively low price. While this informal housing market has alleviated overdensity throughout Tier I and II cities, government-prompted urban migration, international economic growth, and increased life expectancy continue to raise densities and create problems in urban life.4

The critical distinction in discussing informal housing in China is that unlike the informal “urban village,”5 the Chinese “ghost” city does not enjoy the assurance of occupancy from being located within an urban core. A “ghost city” refers to recently developed urban areas currently suffering from vacancy rates that are significantly disproportionate to their respective occupancy capacities. Whereas “urban villages” enjoy the transportation, public health, and cultural benefits of locations near Tier I and II cities, ensuring sustained habitability regardless of distance from the urban core, the Chinese “ghost” city stands as an urban vanguard in its overwhelmingly rural surroundings.6 Thus, the Chinese “ghost” city must provide a level of utilitarian appeal (transportation benefits, employment opportunity, and public health infrastructure) as well as aesthetic appeal (cultural life, greenery and open space, and architectural substance) comparable to that of the “urban village.” The “ghost” city relies solely on these appeal factors to attract households, families, or investment. As China’s major cities continue to expand, turning more rural communities into “urban villages” that offer accessible, informal housing for urban-core residents, a distantly located “ghost” city loses its potential relocators.

Since the 1979 open-door policy, China’s urban population has increased fourfold, reaching 749 million people in 2014.7 Despite having enjoyed massive development under the policy, the exceptionally high concentration of urban residents creates housing Chongqing, and Fuzhou (Tier II).

4. Dongxiao Nu et al., “The Role of Informal Housing in Lowering China’s Urbanization Costs.”

5. Clusters of rebuilt or remodeled houses in areas that were originally rural villages but have since been overtaken by land expansion.

6. “Shanghai Areas and Densities,” Atlas of Urban Expansion (2015). http://www.atlasofurbanexpansion.org/ cities/view/Shanghai_Shanghai#:~:text=The%20Urban%20Extent%20of%20Shanghai,urban%20extent%20was%20 195%2C581%20hectares.

7. Shigeo Kobayashi, “The ‘Three Reforms’ in China: Progress and Outlook,” Japan Research Institute (September 1999). https://www.jri.co.jp/english/periodical/rim/1999/RIMe199904threereforms/.

accommodation crises in the nation’s coastal cities. The Chinese government has sought to redirect its incoming foreign investments towards developing inland cities designed to attract both urban-coastal populations and rural populations and deter expected migration to coastal cities.8 Today, these inland cities boast housing developments close to industrial factories and cultural venues but have shown little sign of life despite government attempts to promote residency by advertising and subsidizing the opportunity to live and work in a low-density developing urban environment.

In seeking remedies for China’s unique phenomenon of “ghost” cities, it is essential to consider the root causes of its paralysis in a housing market currently operating under high supply and high demand. Contrary to the expected return to balanced housing costs, this ongoing stasis in China’s “ghost” cities is exacerbated by a sustained rise of prices due to continued speculative investment in anticipation of China’s continued economic growth that “artificially boosts” the country’s GDP and then reinforces speculative behavior.9

Municipalities throughout China have seized the opportunity to build cities with the expectation of garnering investment from the nation’s growing middle and upper classes and, in turn, demonstrating a growth in local GDP that can bolster the career prospects of local officials.10 However, the implications of speculation in real estate have become apparent as many of these cities, including Kangbashi and Tianducheng, experience high vacancy rates despite their relatively robust land-leasing rates: an estimated 80% of apartment units in Kangbashi were sold as of 2016—twelve years after the beginning of construction—with an estimated 85% of homes in China being sold before their completion.11,12, Ownership patterns without occupancy give new developments their “ghost” city reputations and are symptoms of speculative investment where the upper and middle classes purchase secondary and

8. Zach Margolis, “Top Ten Facts About Overpopulation in China,” The Borgen Project (2 June 2019). https:// borgenproject.org/top-10-facts-about-overpopulation-in-china/. 9. Ibid.

10. Yongheng Deng, “Understanding the Risk of China’s Local Government Debts and Its Linkage with Property Markets,” National University of Singapore (18-19 Dec. 2015). https://www.imf.org/external/np/seminars/eng/2015/ housingchina/pdf/Session%203_YDeng.pdf.

11. Wade Shepard, “An Update on China’s Largest Ghost City—What Ordos Kangbashi is Like Today,” Forbes (19 April 2016). https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2016/04/19/an-update-on-chinas-largest-ghost-city-whatordos-kangbashi-is-like-today/?sh=46bca9c42327.

12. James Palmer, “Chinese Mortgage Boycott Gains Steam,” Foreign Policy (20 July 2022).

https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/07/20/china-mortgage-boycott-real-estate-crisis/#:~:text=More%20than%2085%20 percent%20of,and%20developers%20started%20to%20struggle.

tertiary homes to sell at a gain, not to occupy. While trends of speculation involving Chinese investors have recently occurred in Canada and the United States—New York and Vancouver are among the cities most heavily affected—the property taxes and vacancy taxes imposed upon owners, coupled with the Chinese government’s recent restriction of overseas real estate investment, have worked to isolate the matter within China.13

The question that arises from this survey of Chinese urbanization in recent years is: “Why does China, one of the world’s most economically developed and populous countries, have unoccupied ‘ghost cities’ despite suffering from the effects of overpopulation in major cities such as Beijing and Shanghai?” In this study, I will analyze the features of two such “ghost” cities, Kangbashi and Tianducheng, to diagnose the possible shortcomings in the urban design of the present-day “ghost” city.

Unlike the United States where American citizens are free to move residency across state lines, China has, for upwards of six decades, used a housing registration system known as the hukou system. It requires citizens to register under two categories: where they live, and whether or not they are agricultural workers.14 “Agriculturals” commonly live in rural villages and the “non-agriculturals” in its cities. Employment openings are often limited to those with local hukou status, barring entry for others. Most who desire to migrate from rural to urban localities within China must “present appropriate documents to the public security authorities” and must “satisfy the qualifications stipulated by the state and go through the official channels.”15

Overpopulation in Tier I and II cities has led to stringent government restrictions on migrations, but with ghost-city populations in China hardly exceeding one million residents, changes in household registration are much more accessible to the rural population. Though ghost cities can potentially attract citizens from high-density urban areas through their ease of access, they often fail to do so.

China created a housing surplus to address the high densities of its coastal urban

13. “Here’s How Chinese Real Estate Investors and NYC Broke Up,” The Real Deal (27 June 2019). https:// therealdeal.com/new-york/2019/06/27/heres-how-chinese-real-estate-investors-and-nyc-broke-up/.

14. Kam Wing Chan and Li Zhang, “The Hukou System and Rural-Urban Migration in China: Processes and Changes,” University of Washington (1996). https://csde.washington.edu/downloads/98-13.pdf 15. Ibid.

populations. With inland cities such as Kangbashi designed to accommodate nearly one million residents despite the nation’s ongoing record of fifty million housing vacancies, analysts believe that the Chinese government sought prospective foreign investment by building units without plans for rent stabilization.16 While the rental and ownership prices of Chinese housing units have reached unprecedented levels due to initial foreign purchasing and the domestic trends of speculative investment that followed, the barrier to growth that “ghost” cities presently face is not pricing, but rather the lack of vital utilitarian and aesthetic elements that would offer a lifestyle comparable to that of a robust coastal city.

The two cities under examination, Kangbashi and Tianducheng, are located along the peripheries of their respective “primary” urban centers, with Kangbashi located a twentyfive-minute drive to the east of Ordos City and Tianducheng a thirty-minute drive to the northeast of Hangzhou. Recent economic and urban growth in Ordos City’s coal industry and Hangzhou’s international trade, let officials assume that residents in these dense urban centers would seek to move to these newly-developed satellite cities.17, 18 However, housing listings in these cities have been high due to foreign investors’ exploitation of the units’ cheaper initial pricings, so many urban residents searching for a nearby move cannot afford housing in Kangbashi and Tianducheng.19

Unit pricing is, however, now less of a problem. China’s upper-class families have engaged in speculative real estate investment by buying out the rights to occupancy from foreign investors and leaving these units unoccupied, but the Chinese government has recognized the excess of vacant apartments in these cities and has offered subsidies to incentivize companies to move to these cities and bring in workers to occupy these units.20 Although enterprise subsidies could reduce high prices, subsidies rely on the willingness

16. Pearl Liu and Yaling Jiang, “Fifty Million Empty Flats Threaten to Plunge China’s Troubled Property Market Further into Crisis, Warns Think Tank,” South China Morning Post (14 Aug. 2022). https://www.scmp.com/business/ china-business/article/3188781/fifty-million-empty-flats-threaten-plunge-chinas-troubled 17. Guanwen Yin, “Administrative Urbanization and City-making in Post-reform China: A Case Study of Ordos City, Inner Mongolia,” pg. 895. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321059738_Administrative_urbanization_ and_city-making_in_post-reform_China_a_case_study_of_Ordos_City_Inner_Mongolia#pf6

18. Long Finance, “The Global Financial Centres Index 32,” September 2022. https://www.longfinance.net/media/documents/GFCI_32_Report_2022.09.22_v1.0_.pdf.

19. Ian Chiu, “Cities Lost in Limbo: Are China’s Ghost Cities Here to Stay?” January 11, 2022. https://uschinatoday.org/features/2022/01/11/cities-lost-in-limbo-are-chinas-ghost-cities-here-to-stay/. 20. Yin, supra note 17, at 897.

of companies to subsidize their workers’ housing. After all, Chinese companies often build dormitories for rural migrant employees and retailers and restaurant owners have accommodated their workforce with direct housing subsidies.21 However, if the city lacks utilitarian or aesthetic appeal, providing housing subsidies is a poor financial decision for companies aiming to grow their businesses. Unappealing cities deter companies and upperclass Chinese citizens from seeking expansion or relocation, leaving housing complexes unoccupied and surrounding urban areas empty.

Most newly developed cities are planned to evoke a sense of “urban appeal.” Kangbashi is designed to hold factories, energy plants, and coal mines, relying on a “utilitarian appeal” to attract industrial companies to the area. It is also designed to hold tourists and families seeking Mongolian culture to create a robust, recognizable sense of a regionally informed cultural identity. Tianducheng, the “Paris of the East,” is designed to hold tourists and domestic families seeking Western culture, relying on Parisian mimicry. While the cities contain elements that contribute to utilitarian appeal through safety and walkability, building convenience, and infrastructure conditions and aesthetic appeal through spaciousness, green space, and compelling cultural centers, they lack fundamental features needed to attract relocators successfully. Thus, Kangbashi and Tianducheng cannot recover from their “investor monopolies” on housing due to their inability to generate sufficient “urban appeal” to attract their targeted demographics.

Using a standardized evaluation method for “utilitarian” and “aesthetic” appeal provides an objective basis for urban design analysis. While fulfilling these criteria may encourage a city of prospective movers, each new city must compete with China’s Tier I and II cities—the origin of the majority of prospective movers. To attract domestic residents, new cities must convince groups that their quality of life would not suffer. It must also provide the opportunity for already-employed movers to find employment quickly, whether through an employer relocation or a new business, at an easily accessible workplace. Finally, the city must meet the standard for providing public institutions and facilities that allow for personal

21. Angel Gonzalez, “Starbucks to Help Pay for China Workers’ Housing,” January 11, 2016. https://www. seattletimes.com/business/retail/starbucks-to-help-pay-for-china-workers-housing/.

enrichment.

The utilitarian assessment criteria, derived from the approach to ethics developed by theorists Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, require a city to be evaluated by features promoting “the greatest happiness of the greatest number.” Public safety and convenient access, employment opportunity, and educational, health, and political infrastructure contribute to utilitarian appeal and are necessary for happiness. Relocators from Tier I and II cities would otherwise be disappointed.

Barbara Rubin and Brian J.L. Berry explain that the features of a city that contribute to its visual and cultural beauty are found in noncommercial, nonindustrial institutions, including “art museums, parks, religious and historical shrines, theaters, fine-arts architecture, and unified, monumentalizing plans.” Ratios of greenery to buildings, the spaciousness of streets between buildings, and novelty in architectural design and cultural symbolism contribute to a positive assessment.

China’s major Tier I and II cities are each held to a quality-of-life, employmentopportunity, and public-access standard. Since relocation comes at a significant cost to the individual, a new city must not only meet these standards but also offer a compensatory value to offset the resource expense to the individual. Fulfilling one appeal criterion may not be enough to sway an individual—there must be a cumulative utilitarian and aesthetic appeal.

Kangbashi

Kangbashi stands as a glimmering product of the region’s highly successful coal industry, experiencing rapid growth. Chinese local government officials have a vested interest in the construction of new urban sites, as “a local leader’s job performance evaluation is typically based on how well the local economy has been developed… which typically comes from land leasing.”22 The local government was quick to deem the area—consisting only of the former Ordos City, which has since been relocated and replaced by Kangbashi—unfit to meet its economic demands and, in 2004, decided to begin the development of a “new political, cultural[,] and financial core for Ordos City.”23 Recognizing the potential to lead

22. Yin, supra note 17, at 896. 23. Yin, supra note 17, at 895.

in developing one of China’s first major inland metropolitan areas, the Ordos government sought to accommodate the coal-mining industry and attract activity from other sectors to create a diversified economy, local comfort and convenience. An artificial lake in the north would increase local humidity levels in the cold, dry climate; a railway system would provide short commutes for the city of Kangbashi and export local goods and resources; and the town square would hold the city’s parks, government buildings, and cultural centers, allowing for walkability within centralized arrangements.

Sufficient utilitarian appeal would signal to businesses that the Kangbashi area offers a more advantageous production efficiency than that of denser cities. Despite opening schools, hospitals, and other utilities to accommodate the lifestyle needs of industrial workers, Kangbashi continues to suffer from a lack of industry because it does not have a metro system that connects the peripheral residential communities to the concentrated city center. Without the support of an inexpensive daily commute, transportation presents a significant obstacle to prospective laborers who cannot afford automobiles. The developers of Kangbashi and the new Ordos City have used the region’s vast flatlands to construct impressive, scenic parks that would seem to provide aesthetic appeal, yet “difficulty of access [and the] sheer size of plazas and parks” and “[the region’s cold,] harsh climate reduce people’s desire to spend extended time outdoors.” (Fig. 1).24

A strong aesthetic appeal would signal to businesses that Kangbashi has the potential to attract a consumer population. Despite the opportunity to capitalize on the vast flatlands by widening building spans and placements to create a spacious, relaxed architectural landscape complementing the city’s expansive parks, “urbanization [has] reshaped Ordos’ landscapes in a manner that… appears typical,’’ of coastal cities. Its vertically oriented, closely-spaced buildings recall Shanghai, with the city hall oriented towards concentrated landmark cultural centers.25 By emphasizing height instead of span, the Ordos and Kangbashi buildings evoke Shenzhen, which developed vertically to preserve its valuable coastal front for transport and 24. Max David Woodworth, “Frontier Boomtown Urbanism: City Building in Ordos Municipality, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, 2001-2011,” University of California, Berkeley (Fall 2013), at 52. https://escholarship.org/content/qt9cr46717/qt9cr46717_noSplash_69b27edfb6adf994727acfa3104a959f. pdf?t=odi7yx. 25. Ibid. at 97.

trade by sea. Replicative projects let local government officials transcend marginality by mimicking Shangahi’s or Shenzhen’s “architectural success,” this interferes with the creation of a distinct urban identity.

The same inspiration informs the Ordos design committee’s pursuit of monumentality in constructing cultural symbols. Genghis Khan Square, located in the city center, is punctuated by two oversized statues of horses that Genghis Khan rode during his conquest of northern China (Fig. 2).26 In the same square, sculptor He E’s “Proud Son of Heaven” massive sculpture group pays homage to Genghis Khan by portraying his ascent to emperorship as the uniting force of the Mongolian nomadic tribes (Fig. 2).27 In both instances, gigantism is meant to raise Kangbashi and the New Ordos City metropolitan area to the cultural status of older major cities. While the exaggerated features of these sculptures successfully portray the strength of the Mongolian empire, they “entailed the dispossession of local villagers.” The insensitive references to symbols of the Khan empire gave an impression of a “comprehensive urban branding scheme designed to remake the local landscape into a tourist-oriented celebration of Mongolian culture[,] despite Ordos’ relatively heterogeneous ethnic makeup.”28 The absence of a defined and characterizable cultural facility means there is virtually no tourism in Kangbashi aside from the few visitors who come to the area to use the empty cityscape as a film or photoshoot background. Without a defining cultural landmark or theme that can attract visitors or prospective residents, Kangbashi will continue to be China’s most widely recognized “ghost” city.

Tianducheng

Like Kangbashi’s peripheral location, Tianducheng is thirty minutes from Hangzhou, the capital of China’s coastal Zhejiang province. Tianducheng is not an inland”city, and its proximity to the sea and to the highly dense financial capital of Hangzhou makes its “ghost” city status an even greater mystery. Beginning development in 2007, a period of economic and reputational expansion through the construction of high-speed transportation lines and 26. “China on Four Wheels: Part 1.” BBC Two (9 Sept. 2012). https://bobcat.library.nyu.edu/permalink/f/ci13eu/ nyu_aleph006452444.

27. Liu Xuanyi, “Huge Bronze Sculpture Groups Stand Out in Genghis Khan Square in Ordos,” China Daily (4 Sept. 2016). https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/culture/2016-09/04/content_26692742_2.htm.

28. Woodworth, supra note 25, at 100.

the formulation of cultural centers, Tianducheng was projected to become China’s “greatest satellite city” for expected Hangzhou relocators and tourists.29 While Tianducheng’s proximity to the wealthy business center of Hangzhou led to a localized urban plan to attract China’s upper class—unlike Kangbashi which had targeted the blue-collar workers of manufacturing companies—the city’s housing market experienced the same sharp increase in property value following speculative investment. Many homebuyers in Hangzhou and nearby coastal cities such as Shanghai flocked to purchase rights to occupancy in Tianducheng, noting the city’s potential to become a national tourism destination.30

Unlike Kangbashi and New Ordos City, Tianducheng has a clearly defined cultural and aesthetic appeal. However, the premise of Tianducheng’s design places it in direct competition with its inspiration: Paris. Known as the “Paris of the East” before its “ghost” city reputation, Tianducheng was designed to provide Chinese citizens with a convenient cultural destination, hoping to offer an accessible alternative to faraway travel.31 To accomplish this, Tianducheng would have to provide a utilitarian appeal strong enough to attract a foundational resident population of wealthy families from Hangzhou and Shanghai and a tourist population that would welcome the convenience of traveling to Tianducheng rather than Paris. The city has not succeeded in either respect, as, despite its costly Western-style development. Ten years after the buildings’ completion, the city’s population was estimated at 2,000—most of whom were employees at a French-themed amusement park—out of the initial plan to accommodate 10,000 inhabitants.32

To attract a resident population, Tianducheng would have to offer respite from the overcrowding of nearby metropolises while maintaining the accessibility of daily institutions, but that has not been done. The city’s educational buildings are located along the paths

29. Daniel Sui et al., “The Development of Copycat Towns in China: An Analysis of Their Economic, Social, and Environmental Implications,” Lincoln Institute of Land Policy (Oct. 2017), at 16. https://www.lincolninst.edu/sites/default/files/pubfiles/sui_wp17ds1.pdf.

30. Sidney Leng, “Want to Sell Residential Property in China? Put Paris or Venice in the Name,” South China Morning Post (Nov 2017).

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2121536/want-sell-residential-property-china-put-paris-or-venicename?module=perpetual_scroll_0&pgtype=article&campaign=2121536.

31. Gulnaz Khan, “Photos of the Chinese Town that Duplicated Paris,” National Geographic (10 April 2018).

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/tianducheng-paris-of-the-east-replica#:~:text=On%20the%20 eastern%20coast%20of,to%20evoke%20classical%20European%20charm.

32. Sui et al., supra note 31, at 16.

leading towards the roundabout of the city center, which, in its embedded “town square” offering an unobstructed view of Tianducheng’s replica Eiffel Tower, would consistently hold a dense mass of tourists (Fig. 3). The potential for a congested daily commute to these institutions may be enough to divert relocation to Tianducheng. The city’s lack of subway infrastructure further decreases accessibility and discourages tourists from visiting altogether. A research team reported that Tianducheng was “far away from major highways and railroads” and that “it took [them] about 2 hours by public transit from Hangzhou Rail Station to get to Tianducheng.”33 The inconvenience of getting to Tianducheng from its closest major city may persuade tourists to travel to Paris instead.

While one might expect Tianducheng’s European constructions to attract domestic tourists, its urban and architectural design qualities interfere with its success in replicating Paris. Although the luxury residential buildings in Tianducheng are remarkably accurate in their imitation of Haussmannian architecture, the city streets leading to the “Arc de Triomphe” roundabout hardly reflect Haussmannian boulevards. Without this crucial element of Parisian urban planning, Tianducheng’s town center arrangement can only provide a one-dimensional view from Tiandu Road, limiting its characteristically Parisian sight to a single point of observation (Fig. 3). Furthermore, aside from the city’s visibly small, 1:3 scale construction of Paris’s Eiffel Tower, Tianducheng is distractingly punctuated with Chinese cultural symbols. For example, the decorative features lining the Tiandu Park in Tianducheng Resort—the city’s only hotel— incorporate distinct Chinese symbols in their designs, with fountain statues of seals featuring the heads of dragons.34 Tianducheng’s lack of Parisian boulevards and distracting Chinese elements interfere with the immersive, compelling visual experience necessary to attract tourists looking for a Parisian destination.

When comparing the underpopulation of Kangbashi—recorded at 30,000 out of a capacity of 1,000,000 in 201535—to the overpopulation of other industry-heavy inland cities such as Taiyuan with a density of 8,000 people per square mile—as opposed to Kangbashi’s 1,120 people per square mile—we see that Kangbashi is not empty due to limited demand

33. Sui et al., supra note 31, at 16.

34. Alesha Bradford and Jarryd Salem,“Tianducheng—China’s Strange City of Paris,” Nomadasaurus (15 Feb. 2021). https://www.nomadasaurus.com/tianducheng-chinas-strange-city-paris/. 35. Woodworth, supra note 25, at 79.

for housing and urban space.36, 37 Rather, its emptiness results from a lack of fundamental elements of utilitarian and aesthetic appeal in urban planning which critically obstruct its attempt to attract the diverse enterprise needed to draw relocators.

Similarly, Tianducheng’s failure to amass a resident population and generate tourism within the city can be attributed to its congested arrangement of institutional buildings and lack of infrastructure, as well as its shortcomings in creating a faithfully Parisian aesthetic. Despite targeting upper-class citizens in the major coastal financial capitals through a promise of overcrowding relief38 that had spurred the growth of illegal housing markets, Tianducheng’s inaccessibility has dramatically diminished its utilitarian appeal,39, 40, and offers only a onedimensional aesthetic experience.

Given the industrial and residential crowding of counterexample cities like Tianyuan and Hangzhou, Kangbashi’s and Tianducheng’s vacancies may not be products of excessive housing development, but rather are likely due to deficiencies in the utilitarian and aesthetic appeal— vital components of the ability to attract a targeted population demographic.

Given the deficient urban appeal of these Chinese cities and, thus, their limited populations, a change in the approach toward the urban planning of inland and coastaladjacent satellite cities is necessary. Rather than focusing on the potential for high-level reorganization or redevelopment in existing “ghost” cities—a prospect that would come at a great expense to local governments—attention should instead be directed toward the continued development of China’s future cities.

One city in particular, the Chenggong New District in the southern Yunnan province, has been continuously developing for nearly two decades. Despite its early start relative to those of Kangbashi and Tianducheng, the Chenggong New District shows promise in its flexible planning. Following an analysis of the performance of the previous plan’s built environment, updated development plans were released in 2015. The results in Kangbashi and

36. “China: Shanxi Prefectures, Cities, Districts, and Counties,” City Population (17 Nov. 2022). https://www. citypopulation.de/en/china/shanxi/admin/.

37. “Kangbashi District,” Wikipedia (18 Feb. 2023). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kangbashi_District.

38. Hangzhou has a metro population density of 1,600 persons per square mile (“Hangzhou,” Wikipedia (9 April 2023), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hangzhou), and Shanghai has a metro population density of 2,800 persons per square mile (“Shanghai,” Wikipedia (10 April 2023), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai).

39. “Hangzhou,” Wikipedia (9 April 2023). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hangzhou.

40. “Shanghai,” Wikipedia (10 April 2023). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai.

Tianducheng completely around this time likely influenced this examination, as the updated plan seems to have and addressed the various shortcomings of “ghost” cities. The problems identified in the Chenggong study, including the utilitarian deficiencies of car-oriented development (wide roads, massive intersections) and single-use commercial and residential blocks, as well as the aesthetic shortcomings of distantly-spaced buildings and large stretches of open land which “ma[de] streets lack [] human touch,” led to important shifts in approach that could help meet a target population of 1,500,000 people by 2035.41

In response to the rise of the “ghost” city reputation throughout newly developed cities in China, the Chinese national government has declared a shift in strategy for its fourteenth Five-Year Plan for urban development in 2021-2025. In this plan, the national government describes its intention to “giv[e] better play to the strategic guiding role of the national development plan” and “ensure that… spatial planning, special planning, regional planning, and other levels of planning are coordinated with this [national] plan.”42 The language in this Five-Year Plan notably departs from that of the national government’s 2011 Plan, which emphasized the local government’s role in facilitating urban development.43 The change represents an ongoing shift towards a more centralized government planning process for cities, as the municipal-level planning that had given rise to the present-day “ghost” cities of Kangbashi and Tianducheng has faced scrutiny by the media for being motivated by municipal government officials’ personal career advancement.

Although national government oversight in regional and local planning may stem the development of “ghost” cities in the coming years, the government will continue to face difficulties of underpopulation in cities such as Kangbashi and Tianducheng and overpopulation in nearby cities such as Taiyuan and Hangzhou, if the lack of utilitarian and aesthetic appeal in present-day “ghost” cities is the deterrent for prospective relocators. While the Chinese national government may have the power to relocate its citizens to these

41. Zhigao Wang et al., “Making a New District Center Using Eight Principles: Chenggong, A New Town Near Kunming, China,” The International Society of City and Regional Planners (2015), at 161. https://www.isocarpinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Review11_Making-a-new-District-Center-using-eight-Principles.pdf. 42. Chapter 19, Article LXIV, “14th Five-Year Plan for National Informatization,” Georgetown University Center for Security and Emerging Technology (13 May 2021), at 139. https://cset.georgetown.edu/publication/china-14th-five-year-plan/. 43. Chapter 35, Section 3, “12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015) for National Economic and Social Development,” Asia Pacific Energy (2011). https://policy.asiapacificenergy.org/node/37.

cities by legal force, employing an approach toward remedying the deficiencies in utilitarian and aesthetic appeal to attract relocators would be preferable. For this reason, it could be beneficial to perform additional case studies of similar structures for recently-developed cities considered to be “successful” by noting how they emphasize different architectural and city planning elements, thereby more effective in generating urban appeal by their utilitarian and aesthetic merits.

Figure 1. Qingchengshan Park in Ordos City.

2.

Figure

Horse statues at Genghis Khan Square (top), and sculpture group “Proud Son of Heaven” (bottom) at Genghis Khan Square. Source: Forbes (top), Business Insider (bottom).

Figure 3.

Changhuan roundabout, with tourist square and unobstructed view of Tianducheng’s “Eiffel Tower.” Source: The Mirror.

Redefining Womanhood: Representations of Female Sexuality in Venetian

Renaissance Portraiture

Lila Pearl Zinner

The industry of sex work was ever present throughout the Renaissance in Venice, though its legal regulation proved to be contentious. Public policy regarding the sex trade remained in a perpetual state of revision for a full century after its legalization in 1358. More permanent legislation was enacted in the latter half of the fifteenth century, and, by the turn of the cinquecento, the industry was successfully integrated into Venetian society. 1 In art, the beginning of the cinquecento in Venice was marked by the emergence of a type of portraiture known as Le Belle Donne, which depicted subjects previously unrepresented in Venice: beautiful and mysterious women whose sexual undertones disregard the expectations for women at the time. Giorgione da Castelfranco’s Portrait of a Lady of 1506, now located in Vienna and popularly known as Laura, is considered to be the first Bella (Fig. 1).2 His subject’s attire, attitude, and, most notably, partial nudity were distinct from any previous female presentations in Italian art. The painting’s ambiguity and multivalence continue to puzzle historians, it thus raised many questions, the identity and significance of his sitter the most pressing. Any convincing interpretation of Laura must take into account the correlation between the shift in the public opinion of courtesans in Venice and the emergence of Belle Donne images. Laura was both innovative and disruptive as it displayed the sexual autonomy of Giorgione’s female sitter at a time when it was taboo.

In the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, the Venetian government attempted unsuccessfully to eliminate the sex trade through criminalization. Unable to eradicate the industry, the Maggior Consiglio, or Great Council, legalized it in 1358.3 Historians have not identified a single impetus for this decision, though the law was enacted after a particularly disadvantageous decade in Venice, when the city faced multiple challenges. The Black Death plague devastated the population and strained the city’s finances, while simultaneous conflicts

1. Paula C. Clarke, “The Business of Prostitution in Early Renaissance Venice,” Renaissance Quarterly 68, no. 2 (2015): 422.

2. Luke Syson, “Belle: Picturing Beautiful Women,” in Art and Love in Renaissance Italy: ed. Andrea Bayer (New York, NY: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2008), 246.

3. Clarke, “The Business of Prostitution in Early Renaissance Venice,” 422.

with Genoa and Hungary exacerbated the city’s problems.4 As written in the legislation, the Great Council believed finding “a suitable location in Venice as a dwelling-place for prostitutes” was “necessary because of the multitude of people entering and leaving our city.” 5 The council hoped that legal prostitution would attract foreigners, especially merchants, as their presence stimulated the Venetian economy.

However, this decision did not have universal results. The Capisestieri, or district leaders, ignored their duty to procure a location for the brothel, and in 1360 the Great Council imposed a deadline, declaring that the sex trade was “absolutely necessary in this town.” 6

The municipal brothel found its home in San Matteo, in the western part of Rialto, the district was nicknamed the Castelletto. 7 Regardless of its legality, prostitution was still considered immoral and lowly. Prostitutes were only allowed to leave the Castelletto one day a week, although this rule was rarely followed. In 1416, the Capisestieri permitted them to roam freely in public, as long as they wore a yellow scarf that identified them as prostitutes. Disregarding rules seemed to be an effective way to garner more freedom; in 1423, the Venetian judicial committee, known as the Quarantia, enacted legislation to expand sex workers’ rights, though most of the clauses revoked previous regulations that the prostitutes had ignored. 8 As time went on, the sex workers seemed to garner more freedoms, in part due to their close relationships with members of the Capisestieri.

The sex trade in Venice differed from that of other Italian cities because the Venetian government attempted to eliminate male pimps; the management of public brothels was left to female matrons. 9 The government enacted this in an effort to reaffirm traditional gender roles, as the practice of men profiting from women’s labor subverted the long-held notion that men should support women. 10 Unfortunately, in the years following this decision, prostitutes were subjected to intense exploitation at the hands of their matrons. They were used as guarantees in their matron’s monetary agreements, and often fell victim to cyclical debt that prohibited them from escaping the industry. The Venetian government made a valiant effort to establish legislation that would eradicate this exploitation, but true liberation was achieved when the 4. Ibid. 423.

5. Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Maggior Consiglio, Deliberazioni, reg. 19, fol. 62, 29 June 1358. 6 Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Maggior Consiglio, Deliberazioni, reg. 19, fol. 73, 14 June 1360. 7 Clarke, “The Business of Prostitution in Early Renaissance Venice,” 422.

6. Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Maggior Consiglio, Deliberazioni, reg. 19, fol. 73, 14 June 1360.

7. Clarke, “The Business of Prostitution in Early Renaissance Venice,” 422.

8. Ibid. 427, 431.

9. Ibid. 431.

10. Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Signori di notte al civil, b. 1, fol. 47.

Venetian government created the second Castelletto in 1460, effectively overturning the century-old business model. 11 The new legislation prioritized the rights of the prostitutes: they had the freedom to live anywhere without supervisory patrons, and the government protected them from exploitative credit. Prostitutes became fully autonomous, and, subsequently, sex work became a much more lucrative occupation.

From 1358 to 1460, society’s attitude towards sex workers underwent a gradual, yet drastic shift. In the initial stages of the industry’s legality, the profession was widely regarded as immoral. In early legislation, Venetian government officials commonly referred to prostitutes as sinners, but they also extended sympathy to the women. 12 The prevailing belief was that these women turned to sex work because they were impoverished and vulnerable: young, naive, and susceptible to manipulation. In line with these beliefs, they assigned the young women the name mamola, which originally denoted a type of flower, though the most common term for prostitutes across Italy was cortigiane, or courtesans. 13

The sexual politics of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries in Venice were defined by a strict and pervasive dichotomy between men and women. As described by Lodovico Dolce in his translation of the work of Spanish humanist Juan Luis Vives, a sixteenth century courtier of the Renaissance was meant to exhibit “prudence, eloquence, expert skill in governing the Republic, talent, memory, ability and diligence... justice, liberality [and] magnanimity,” whereas a woman’s societal standing was governed by a single virtue: chastity. 14 Though a society characterized by disparate archetypes for men and women is even familiar today, an understanding of the physical manifestations of these standards must precede any analysis of the gendered dynamics of the sixteenth century.

Women had opportunities to work. Peasant women worked in the fields alongside their male counterparts, and middle class women managed businesses with their husbands. It was widely understood that women were only welcome in the workforce when they pursued the same jobs as their husbands. However, in Renaissance Italy, a woman’s value was determined solely by her chastity. A woman who worked was not esteemed for her dedication or courage. Rather, holding a job indicted a lower social class, as women of the nobility were tasked only with maintaining their homes. A woman remaining indoors became intertwined with virtuous

11. Clarke, “The Business of Prostitution in Early Renaissance Venice,” 458, 459.

12. Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Maggior Consiglio, Deliberazioni, reg. 19, fol. 62, 29 June 1358.

13. Clarke, “The Business of Prostitution in Early Renaissance Venice,” 433.

14. Anne Christine Junkerman. “The Lady and the Laurel: Gender and Meaning in Giorgione’s ‘Laura.’” Oxford Art Journal 16, no. 1 (1993): 49.

behavior; honorable women abided by their confinement. 15 In surviving artistic depictions of Venetian celebrations and ceremonies, both civil and religious, women are either dormant or wholly absent; when included, they remain removed from the festivities, distantly perched in the windows of buildings. Scholar Elfriede Regina Knauer provides multiple examples of this, such as Giovanni Mansueti’s Miracle of a Relic of the Holy Cross where the women peek out of the windows, Gentile Bellini’s Procession in the Piazza San Marco where they are tucked into the arcades of the Procuratie Vecchie, and Carpaccio’s Miracle of the True Cross at Rialto where they stand atop roof decks. 16 Though most women in Venice adhered to these customs, where there is a rule, there is always an exception. In Renaissance Venice, sex workers were distinctly isolated from these expectations.

As the sex work industry grew, Venetians’ tolerance and respect for courtesans grew alongside it. Even before they governed their own work, they were effectively integrated into Venetian society. The courtesans’ new financial stability allowed them to pursue education, and thus emerged a class of so-called unchaste women well-versed in literature, poetry, and theory. Cortigiane oneste became unrecognizable to the mamole of the fourteenth century; they were glamorous, accomplished, admired by educated men and, notably, the only women in Renaissance Venice who were able to support themselves. 17 They could afford luxuries so that, in 1543, the Venetian Senate imposed restrictions on their dress, asserting citing that they had become indistinguishable from the noblewomen. 18 Many of these women became very popular among the elite; their company was coveted by Venetian patricians. Foreigners traveled to Venice just to meet them. Veronica Franco, a cortigiana onesta from Venice, left behind an impressive body of literary work in which she exhibited mastery of a variety of genres. 19

The emergence of Le Belle Donne, or “female beauties,” in the visual arts coincided with this new increased status of deference for courtesans. 20 The description of a Bella Donna has been contested by many scholars; there is no canon for one, though they are most commonly distinguished from other women by the portrayal of their exposed skin. They appeal to the senses, especially the tactile, often including fur, draping fabrics, smooth skin,

15. Elfriede Regina Knauer. “Portrait of a Lady? Some Reflections on Images of Prostitutes from the Later Fifteenth Century.” Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 47 (2002): 101.

16. Knauer, “Portrait of a Lady? Some Reflections on Images of Prostitutes from the Later Fifteenth Century,” 101.

17. Margaret F. Rosenthal, The Honest Courtesan: Veronica Franco, Citizen and Writer in Sixteenth-Century Venice, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 2.

18. Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Senato, Deliberazioni, Terra, reg. 32., fol. 147.

19. Rosenthal, The Honest Courtesan: Veronica Franco, Citizen and Writer in Sixteenth-Century Venice, 2.

20. Syson, “Belle: Picturing Beautiful Women,” 246.

and billowing hair. The coalescence of implied movement, mysterious gaze, and deshabille creates portraits that are alluring and enthralling. The women are, however, unattainable; a painted woman can not be touched or smelled, and thus she remains just out of reach. She is eternally hypothetical: a desire forever unsatisfied.

Belle Donne are mysterious and seductive, but only by suggestion. This indecorous portrayal is so uncharacteristic of prior artistic representations of women that many believe the Belle are depictions of courtesans. Though their exposed skin and sometimes partial nudity would have been immodest and shameful for women at the time, there is nothing explicitly sexual within the portraits.

Giorgione da Castelfranco’s Portrait of a Lady, or Laura, the earliest known Bella, is one of the earliest instances of an eroticized woman in Renaissance art. This portrait is the archetype for the genre of Belle Donne. 21 Framed by laurel branches, the subject sits in three-quarters view, her gaze never meeting that of the viewer. A veil that loosely frames her hair drapes across her chest and around her exposed right breast. She wears a red cloak lined with fur; its billowing drapery suggests it is too big for her. Tailored outerwear was not worn by Venetian women as it shrouded their sartorial elegance; this garment’s fur lapel and lack of a collar are typical features of masculine attire. 22 Thus, the cloak draped around Laura is undeniably the property of a man. The name Laura stems not from Giorgione’s time but from the first reference to the portrait in an inventory of Bartolomeo della Nave dated 1636, where it was identified as “Petrarcas Laura,” referring to Francesco Petrarca, an early humanist and famous poet of early Renaissance Italy. 23 Laura was Petrarch’s beloved and is the subject of countless lyrics and sonnets in Petrarch’s body of work. The invocation of Petrarch made an otherwise promiscuous subject more dignified and respectable, even though Giorgione’s Laura does not resemble the blond, pale, and elusive Laura whom Petrarch discusses. 24 In fact, Laura seems to lack a certain elegance that was canonical for female portraiture at the time.

Sandro Botticelli’s Idealized Portrait of a Woman from the late fifteenth century exemplifies the norm (Fig. 2). The portrait is believed to depict Simonetta Cattaneo Vespucci, an Italian noblewoman likely born in 1453, as a Florentine castato declaration of 1469 affirms that she was 16 years old at the time of her marriage to Marco Vespucci. 25 The female subject

21. Ibid.

22. Junkerman, “The Lady and the Laurel: Gender and Meaning in Giorgione’s ‘Laura,’” 52.

23. Luke Syson, “Belle Donne,” in Art and Love in Renaissance Italy: ed. Andrea Bayer (New York, NY: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2008), 316.

24. Junkerman, “The Lady and the Laurel: Gender and Meaning in Giorgione’s ‘Laura,’” 51.

25. Ross Brooke Ettle. “The Venus Dilemma: Notes on Botticelli and Simonetta Cattaneo Vespucci.” Notes in the History of Art 27, no. 4 (2008): 3.

is turned to the right and between profile and three-quarters view, her gaze following this same direction. 26 Her ginger hair, likely a wig, is ornately styled with braids and cascading curls, adorned with decorative silver beads and red ribbon. A fishtail braid appears to extend from her back to her chest, forming a collar around her dress’s V-shaped neckline, which reveals a burgundy chemise. Her skin is pale, smooth, and supple; her features soft and idealized. Realistic texture is absent from not only her skin, but also from her eyebrows, eyelids, and lips.

Laura, in comparison to Botticelli’s Simonetta, is plain; her skin, though smooth, is dull. Her facial features are unpronounced; her eyebrows are faint, and her lips similarly muted, separated from the rest of her face only by a slightly darker hue. Laura’s hair is unkempt; a loose strand escapes from the veil and hangs before her ear. While Simonetta is sharp and unblemished, Laura is conspicuously austere and hardly idealized.

Palma il Vecchio’s Young Woman in Green Holding a Box of 1512, now located in Vienna, more closely resembles Petrarch’s Laura, with her soft pale skin and blonde tresses (Fig. 3). Her outer garment is untied, revealing her white chemise. Though not nearly as exposed as Laura, the chemise is deliberately provocative, and she, too, is depicted in deshabille. Palma il Vecchio’s young woman and Giorgione’s Laura both gaze toward the right, but the young woman sits frontally with only her head turned to the right. In her left hand she holds a small circular box. Following the conventions of female portraiture in the Renaissance, Palma il Vecchio’s portrait appeals to the tactile sense with her draped green garment, thin white chemise, cascading locks of hair, and her smooth, supple skin.

Scholar Philip Rylands proved that this portrait depicts a prostitute through a line of its entry where the sitter is referred to by the abbreviation “cara.a,” which is short for carampana 27 Carampana were prostitutes who lived in the parish of San Cassiano in Ca’ Rampani.

Jacopo Tintoretto’s Portrait of a Lady from 1588, now located in Worcester, Massachusetts, depicts one of the most famous cortigiane onesto, Veronica Franco (Fig. 4). In a letter to Tintoretto, Franco praises Tintoretto’s skill in depicting her likeness; she compares herself looking at the portrait to Narcissus looking into the pond. Like Laura, Franco is set before a black background and seen in three-quarters view, though she looks to the left side of her visual field. Franco’s left breast is slightly exposed, revealing only a sliver of her nipple. Her garment appears to be too big for her, though it is undeniably a woman’s gown. Her

26. Emanuele Lugli, “The Hair is Full of Snares: Botticelli’s and Boccaccio’s Wayward Exotic Gaze,” Mitteilungen Des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz 61, no. 2 (2019): 209.

27. Norman E. Land, “Veronica Franco, Tintoretto, and Narcissus,” Notes in the History of Art 22, no. 2 (2003): 25.

clothing and jewelry are far more dignified than those of Laura and the Lady in Green. Once again, the tactile sense is invigorated, here by the inclusion of lace, silk, and velvet, as well as smooth beads and pearls. Her hand clutches the blue fabric draped around her neck, though it does not imply movement.

Giorgione’s Laura is especially dynamic because of the implied physical movement: a convention that he is credited with introducing to Venetian portraiture. 28 The movement in this portrait is incomplete; the woman’s right hand grasps the lapel of her cloak, though the direction of this action is ambiguous. She could be pulling the garment to the right, revealing her breast, or pulling it to the left in an effort to cover herself. This action is thought to reveal the autonomy of the sitter; she controls how much of her body is accessible to the viewer. 29 Her implied movement forges tension between her and the beholder. If her hand is pulling the lapel to the left, in an attempt to cover her breast, the beholder ’s act of looking becomes voyeuristic, as he has caught a fleeting glimpse of something that was not meant to see. This ephemerality builds tension; the moment is just as opportune as it is transitory. 30 If her hand is moving the lapel to the right, Laura is not coy, but instead provocative and alluring. The tension here is intimate, with the beholder left to imagine the rest of their interaction.

This partial portrayal of female autonomy was a radical choice on the part of Giorgione; any degree of bodily independence in a woman of the Renaissance would render her unchaste. The autonomous dynamics are seen further in the masculine garment she wears. When she pulls it away, she reveals herself as a woman but, when she covers herself, she does so as a man would. Though this outward depiction of a sexually liberated female was new to Italian art, the emergence of cortigiane oneste had brought the concept of women’s sexual autonomy to the forefront of many Venetians’ minds.

Some scholars, such as Luke Syson, dismiss the courtesan theory and instead assert that the painting is an expression of female beauty and pleasure that was intended to represent the husband and his beloved. 31 Baldassare Castiglione defined love as a “certain desire to enjoy beauty” that was presumably common to husband and wife. 32 Thus, to Syson, the belief that the sitter’s partial nudity identifies her as a courtesan imposes modern connotations, because during the Renaissance, men were “accustomed to look at images of women with an

28. Junkerman, “The Lady and the Laurel: Gender and Meaning in Giorgione’s ‘Laura,’” 51. 29. Ibid., 55.

30. Ibid.

31. Syson, “Belle: Picturing Beautiful Women,” 250.

32. Ibid.

uncontaminated love.” 33 He says that a man viewing a woman’s nude portrait is not a voyeur, but almost certainly a lover. As evidence, he cites the iconography of the Madonna lactans or nursing Madonna, suggesting that a woman’s nudity was actually a symbol of chastity rather than an obliteration of it. 34 To assert that men looked at women, specifically partially undressed women, with the utmost love and appreciation is an unconvincing argument considering that, in the same text, Syson identifies Belle Donne as “bait for the erotic imagination.”

35 Syson believes that the subject of Laura is a bride and her veil is an obvious signal of this. Her exposed breast is not a sexual invitation, but a sign of “her readiness to receive love.”

36

To believe men purchased or commissioned portraits like Laura because they represented their chaste, modest wives instead of the fascinating cortigiane is a questionable claim based on the sitter’s appearance alone. Giorgione’s sitter has no jewelry and she wears a man’s cloak. A noblewoman would never expose her body or be caught in a state of sartorial disarray, let alone be forever memorialized like this. As the implied movement within Laura communicates a degree of bodily autonomy and, any chaste, respectable woman’s sexuality was circumscribed by her husband, no noblewoman would control her sexuality, and no nobleman would allow his wife to be depicted this way.

In about 1500, female sexual liberation began; at least some courtesans, formerly regarded as sinners, had now become educated, accepted members of Venetian society. While courtesans traversed the uncharted territory of being self-sufficient, educated women in Venice, noblemen were also navigating uncharted territory by engaging with these women.

Cortigiane oneste were rarities by supporting themselves, and were thus wholly separate from the men that nearly every other woman in the Venetian Renaissance relied on for monetary support. They read, wrote, and theorized: eager to cultivate their academic and intellectual endeavors. They were not lowly or immoral, they were beautiful and elegant, transcending gender roles and social classes with grace and poise. They were somehow everything other women could never be all at once, effectively liberating themselves from the suffocating patriarchy of Renaissance Venice, and, in doing so, redefining the ideals of womanhood that had dominated society for millennia.

Laura is Giorgione’s artistic manifestation of this upheaval of the standard. After all, Laura is the first Bella Donna. In creating a new style of portraiture, Giorgione did not follow

33. Ibid.

34. Syson, “Belle: Picturing Beautiful Women,” 250.

35. Ibid., 246.

36. Syson, “Belle Donne,” 316.

a canon. Laura is most likely a courtesan, but her depiction differs from the other portraits of the same subject because of Giorgione’s interest in mirroring the trends of liberation that echoed throughout the cinquecento. Laura’s degree of autonomy is more significant than that of later Belle Donne because she, like the cortigiane oneste, was the first of her kind. No one knew how to handle independent women in a society that was never meant to include them. Giorgione led the way in seeing women differently.

Figure 2.

Sandro Botticelli, Idealized Portrait of a Lady (allegedly Simonetta Vespucci), tempera on wood, 1475-1480, (Stadel Museum, Frankfurt am Main)

Figure 3.

Jacopo Palma il Vecchio, Young Woman in Green Holding a Box, oil on poplar wood, 1512-1514, (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna)

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Adelle Aba ’24 is an Art History major with a minor in Chemistry interested in the conservation of Central Asian and Islamic heritage. In addition to her work with Ink & Image, Adelle works as a Conservation Intern at Renee & Chaim Gross Foundation. She also volunteers for the Merchant’s House Museum and the Montclair Art Museum. Adelle hopes to pursue a Master’s Degree in Art Conservation and aid in the preservation of global heritage. She thanks her professors for their invaluable lessons and support throughout her academic journey.

Elizabeth Baltusnik ’24 is an Urban Design & Architecture Studies and Spanish double major interested in historic preservation and the intersection of identities in public space. In addition to her work with Ink & Image, Elizabeth is also an editor for Esferas, the undergraduate journal of the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, and works as an Internet Researcher at Gibney, Anthony, & Flaherty, LLP and as a Production Assistant for The Telsey Office. She thanks her professors for supporting her studies across her wide range of interests.

Emilie Meyer ’23 graduated with high honors from the Gallatin School of Individualized Study. Her major combined contemporary and medieval art history with feminist studies and psychoanalysis. As well as serving as Editor-in-Chief of Ink and Image, her senior year internship at the non-profit arts organization Carriage Trade furthered her interest in catalog design and archival research. Emilie received the 2023 Gallatin Dean’s Award to continue postgraduate research in medieval studies. She thanks the Department of Art History for indulging her enthusiasm and love of learning. Emilie currently works at Cabinet Magazine.

Rachel Nazar ’23 is an Art History and Journalism double major fascinated by the intersections of art and law. She is passionate about studying the rights of artists and their works. After graduating NYU, Rachel will attend law school with plans to focus on Intellectual Property and work with artists, artworks, museums, and more. She would like to thank each of her Art History professors during her time at NYU for encouraging conversation surrounding legal and ethical controversies in all areas of art.

Celia Pardillo-Lopez ’24 is an Art History and French double major specializing in the Italian Renaissance. In addition to her work at Ink and Image, she is currently working on her senior honors thesis for the Art History department, which will focus on reformulating the discussion surrounding female artists of the Italian Renaissance. Celia would like to thank Professor Geronimus for his constant support, mentorship, and patience.

Meghan Watters ’24 is an Art History major with a minor in History, specializing in Ancient History, its material culture, and how it has been collected and received through time. In addition to Ink & Image, Meghan is a 2023-2024 Humanities Fellow, a member of the Fine Arts Society, and works for the Art History Department as a Library and Tech Assistant. She is also planning to write an honors thesis concerning the depiction of ancient material culture in Renaissance portraiture. Meghan hopes to pursue a Master’s in Art History. Meghan would like to thank her friends and family for their encouragement, and would especially like to thank Professor Geronimus, Professor Hopkins, Akeem Flavors, and Audrey Christensen-Tsai for their guidance, support, recommendations, and for making Meghan’s experience as a student in the Art History department truly unforgettable.

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Ian Beard ’24 is a Mathematics and Art History double major. He has worked at multiple galleries in New York including Tchotchke Gallery and Dienst + Dotter. As well as this, he is a math tutor for NYU Courant. While having cultivated a personal taste and interest in collecting art, he plans to pursue mathematics in his postgraduate career. His fields of interest include number theory, abstract algebra, and combinatorics with applications in computer science and cryptography. He would like to thank Professor Dennis Geronimus for his wisdom and encouragement while writing his contribution.

Dustin Chen ’24 is an Art History, Classics, and Philosophy triple major in the College of Arts and Science. His studies focus on the art in global network from Antiquity to the Early Modern period. Previously he completed an independent research titled “Currency, Architecture, and Territory: The Iconography of the Euro in Numismatics” in the Dean’s Circle program. He is now writing his honors thesis in Philosophy which concerns peer disagreement, self-doubt, and higher-order evidence. He would like to thank Art History Professor Meredith Martin for her mentorship and generous encouragement.

Jacklyn van der Colff ’23 is an Art History and Anthropology double major specializing in the Italian Renaissance & Early Modern periods. While currently interning at a public relations firm for the arts, Jacklyn serves on the E-board of the Fine Arts Society and has a gallery background working with contemporary art and antiques. She is also interested in the intersectionality of art history and issues of cultural heritage, law, and provenance. She would like to thank Professors Dennis Geronimus and Kathryn Smith for their continuous support, as well as Professor Bruce Edelstein for his guidance throughout her research journey in Florence, Italy.

Leonard Zhu ’23 is an Urban Design and Architecture Studies major and a Law and Society minor who is interested in exploring issues related to housing rights. In addition to authoring “China’s Ghost Cities,” for Ink & Image, Leo serves as an Executive Editor for the NYU Undergraduate Law Review. Following graduation, Leo looks to continue his studies at Duke Law School, where he will earn his Juris Doctorate. Leo thanks Professor Jon Ritter and the Ink & Image team for their guidance and contributions to his piece.

Lila Pearl Zinner ’24 is an Art History major. She is especially passionate about revitalizing the incredibly rich, but largely overlooked history of women in art. When she is not studying in Bobst Library, Lila is a nanny to the coolest 2-and-6-year-old kids in New York City. She is deeply indebted to Professors Dennis Geronimus and Shelley Rice for their guidance in developing this research. She would also like to thank her parents, Cecelia and Eric, for their unwavering support and masterful advice.

New York University

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Undergraduate Research Journal Spring 2023 | Volume 15