Northwestern Art Review | Issue 20: Power

NA R POWER ISSUE Nº20

ISSUE Nº20 | POWER

2020 - NAR - 2021 EXECUTIVE BOARD Co-President Flannery Cusick, ‘21 Co-President Katharina Nachtigall, ‘21 Secretary Mina Malaz, ‘21 Treasurer Idil Kara, '21

STAFF Vitoria Fara, ‘23 Eli Gordon, ‘22 Ellie Lyons, ‘24 Grace Shi, ‘23 Kallista Zhuang, ‘24 Katy Kim, ‘23

COVER. Niblack Thorne, Narcissa, “E-20: French Library of the Louis XV Period, c. 1720,” Miniature Room, Mixed Media, 1932-1937, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Dear Reader, In March of 2020, as Katharina and I were stepping into our roles as the new Co-Presidents of the Northwestern Art Review, the Covid-19 Pandemic swept the globe. A flurry of transitions to all-online learning, instruction, and meetings halted our progress at releasing an issue of our annual journal for the 2020 calendar year.

To make up for this, NAR staff and leadership worked twice as hard throughout this past Winter and Spring; we contacted applicants for our 2020 journal selection to offer their inclusion in this issue; we solicited submissions from more colleges and universities than ever before; we spent countless meetings poring over said submissions and selecting only the most gripping, enlightening, and exciting undergraduate scholarship for the longest final issue NAR has ever published.

After fifteen months of a global pandemic, mandatory quarantines, economic shutdowns, border restrictions, and an unprecedented upset of the lives of students everywhere, we quickly arrived at the theme of “Power” for its reflection of the past academic year and unification of the body of work we have assembled.

In this year’s selections, undergraduate students toiled with everything from Baroque Papal commission trademarks to the sexual imperialism of Asian and Asian American women during the Vietnam War. As Editor-In-Chief of this issue, I could not be more excited for readers to see what our selections have in store.

This issue could not have been published without the invaluable aid and support of our Board and Staff.

Thank you to Mina, Grace, Kallista, Katy, and Idil, as NAR couldn’t have gotten here without you. To Vitoria, Eli, and Ellie, we wish you the best of luck on the Executive Board in the year to come. And to Kat–my favorite Co-President–we did it!

Flannery Cusick Co-President

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LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT Dear Readers, As you read the 2020-2021 NAR Journal, we invite you to consider the collection of essays in the context of this year’s theme: power. Throughout the submissions review process, we became aware of how each author grappled with the notion of power, and its exercise by individuals, monarchies, papacies and the Western world at large. While these essays may converge in theme, they certainly range in subject matter. Within this issue, you will find essays that grapple with Bernini’s Baldacchino and the role of the papacy during the Baroque era, as well as those that discuss the perpetuation of Asian stereotypes by institutions such as Playboy.

It is through the tireless work by our submission authors, and the entire NAR team that this journal is made possible and I therefore would like to offer my sincere thank you to all for making my role as Co-President so effortless. A special mention also to my other Co-President Flannery - I couldn’t have done it without you!

The late release of this year’s journal is due to the undeniable disruption we have all faced throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, which made much of NAR’s programming near to impossible. I therefore wish to offer further gratitude to our members for being eager to meet every week, despite the undeniable Zoom fatigue we now know too well. Coronavirus aside, the timing of this journal’s release also coincides with the end of my time at Northwestern. Reflecting on the last four years, it is clear that NAR has played a significant role in my college experience. I will truly miss chatting and learning from the rest of the team. Good luck to the new executive board, and enjoy yourselves!

Katharina Nachtigall Co-President

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TABLE OF CONTENTS 03 EDITOR’S LETTER

04 PRESIDENT’S LETTER

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Bernini’s Baldacchino as a Baroque Papal

The Ornamental Oriental: How Playboy used

Commission Trademark - Kelsey Carroll,

China Lee to Perpetuate Asian Stereotypes During

Northwestern, ‘24

the Vietnam War, Kelli Reitzfeld, University of Southern California, ‘21

11 Emory Douglas’ Revolutionary Art as the Pedagogy

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of the Oppressed - Siyuan (Alice)Zhao, University

Naturalism, Scale, and Devotion in “The

of Pennsylvania, ‘21

Entombment of Christ” - Elizabeth Dudley, Northwestern University, ‘24

15 Traditional Analysis of “Western” as an English

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and Chinese Terminology in Art Historical

Virtue in Bodies: Jacques-Louis David and Beyoncé

Discipline - Barbie Kim, School of the Art Institute - Lilia Destin, University of Southern California, '23 of Chicago, ‘21 51 25

Iconoclasts in China - Lingran Zhang, University of

A Royal Taste in Exoticism: The Imperial Court of

Washington in St. Louis, '21

Maria Teresa in Vienna - Jingxian Jin, Washington University in St. Louis, ‘23 57 Ekphrasis in Jacques-Louis David's "Madame du Pastoret and Her Son" - Katharina Nachtigall, Northwestern University '21

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BERNINI’S BALDACCHINO AS A BAROQUE PAPAL COMMISSION TRADEMARK Kelsey Carroll, Northwestern University, 2021

During Pope Urban VIII’s reign over the

Catholic Church between 1623-1644 , Gian Lorenzo Bernini found patronage in Rome creating paintings, architecture, and sculpture for Urban’s family, the Barberini, depicting their wealth and glory. In what can be seen as Bernini’s culminating work of art denoting the power of the papacy and the pope’s own birthright, the Baldacchino combines complex formal elements with a new emphasis on emotion and dynamism to produce a work that alone, calls upon all facets of the “Baroque” era, while continuing to broadcast political support for the reigning religious leader.

The Baldacchino, constructed between 16241633, stands nearly 100 feet tall2 centered in front of the altar in St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City. Bernini cast each of its four spiral, or Solomonic, columns with bronze from five wood segments using the lost wax technique, allowing for careful detailing. Under Pope Urban VIII’s order, the pope sent workmen to dismantle the portico of the Pantheon in an attempt to use its bronze to assemble the Baldacchino3. Although there are conflicting accounts about just how much of this bronze made its way into the construction of the monumental structure–because much of it was needed to create cannons and other “new armaments for the protection of the papal state”4 –the act of dismantling the Pantheon itself aligned with the Church’s stance against polytheism, given the Pantheon has roots in pagan worship5. Rather than wrapping the columns in twisting vines common in antique spiral columns, Bernini takes artistic liberty by instead enveloping the columns with laurel branches and bees, both symbols of the Barberini family6. Atop the four colossal columns stand four life-size angels on the corners of a thick cornice, guarding four “serpentine brackets” leading toward the orb and cross marking the top of the monumental structure7. The orb and cross motif has been used as a symbol of the Church’s power since Constantine’s rule over the area8. Combined with the laurel wreaths, bees, and various forms of the Barberini family crest at the base of each column, Bernini elevates the family’s status to one of immense power in the Church, almost hinting at the idea that

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the Barberini are instrumental to the magnificence of the Church, given their symbols are what holds up the symbolic forms of Christ. Additionally, the columns’ forms were inspired by the spiral marble columns found in Old St. Peter’s before its reconstruction by Carlo Maderno and Donato Bramante, which are thought to have been removed from the Temple of Jerusalem by Constantine9. The combination of these elements not only visually bridges Giacomo della Porta’s dome above with the marble floors below, but also bridges the papacy’s power centuries ago with its contemporary power10.

Although Bernini’s Baldacchino is a clear display of Pope Urban VIII’s fascination with the arts, two other popes during the seventeenth century commissioned works to legitimize their rule in similar ways.

As “Baroque popes,” Pope Paul V (r. 1605-1621) and Pope Innocent X (r. 1644–55) commissioned works

by Bernini, Carlo Maderno, Pietro da Cortona, and Francesco Borromini11. However, when compared, the Baldacchino exhibits a wealth of Baroque elements that strengthen its ability to display papal power in a way that the three other artists’ papal commissions do not. The Baldacchino stands out as a visual declaration of papal supremacy and the Church’s power that challenges the same elements in the works of other artists at the time.

In the wake of the Counter-Reformation which lead many patrons to stray from the Church and diminishing the pope’s influence over Rome, Baroque popes starting with Paul V strove to revive the Church through projects that would visually appeal to citizens and encourage them to join the Church.

Following the Council of Trent spanning 1545-1563, the Catholic Church developed policies to oppose the Protestant Reformation and reject the excessive ornamentation and frivolity of Mannerist works. The Church encouraged artists to strive toward directness and accuracy in their work as a way of implementing a new form of rigid orthodoxy for Catholic artists.

Although Baroque architecture still displays a level of ornamentality and complexity, all excessiveness is directed toward emphasizing the glory of the papacy

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Figure 1. Bernini, Gian Lorenzo, “Baldacchino di San Pietro,” Bronze, 1623-1634, St. Peter’s Basilica, Vatican City.

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and Christ’s power, rather than the directionless and absurd architecture and decorative additions of the Mannerists.

Under a commission for Pope Paul V in 1606, Carlo Maderno completed the east façade of New St. Peter’s in 1612, and today it still stands as a symbol of the Catholic Church’s authority similar to the Baldacchino. Its triangular pediment and text-filled entablature perched atop Corinthian columns strongly resembles the façade of Maderno’s Santa Susanna, a building whose “drama” Paul V admired and what eventually influenced his decision to commission Maderno to revive St. Peter’s12. Acting as a “symbolic seat of the papacy,”13 Maderno built off of both Bramante’s and Michelangelo’s prior plans for the building’s form and façade, leaving St. Peter’s lacking the vertical directionality common in Baroque architecture, and explicitly obvious in Santa Susanna on which Maderno quasi-based its design14. Maderno’s plan for St. Peter’s façade called for two tall bell towers on either end, detached from the lengthy horizontal façade and framing Michelangelo’s attic form. However, after Paul V forbade the creation of the towers, fearing their immense weight, the building now only presents a “lumpish façade,” leading to an incomplete and horizontal appearance15. Maderno’s addition of two pilaster-bound segments on either side of the façade break away from Michelangelo’s Greek cross plan16, and although they add unnecessary horizontality, they also emphasize the Baroque elements of the façade through their windows with segmental pediments. They also serve to highlight the increasing rhythm of columns, as they double as the façade

moves toward the center. Conceptual challenges aside, St. Peter’s façade still fails in reaching the level of Baroque appearance as fellow papal commission, the Baldacchino, specifically in its ability to recall papal power. Both pieces exhibit the orb and cross motif, directly identifying them as Catholic works aimed at promoting the Church in times of turmoil. However, where St. Peter’s has its rhythmic colossal columns topped by Paul V’s papal coat of arms in the attic form, the Baldacchino places the keys and crown of the papacy in the hands of cherub figures reaching toward the Christ symbol, a much more direct visual tie between Christ and the papacy. By framing the altar, an “elaborate sculpture representing the throne of Saint Peter,”17 the Baldacchino produces a sense of immediacy, allowing the viewer to see at once the goal of the structure and its intended use. Contrastingly, a viewer must stand incredibly far from St. Peter’s in order to see its dome and cupola, lessening its ability to heighten onlookers’ religious experience.

Succeeding Paul V’s reign as pope, Pope Urban VIII took the Church throne and commissioned Bernini to create works such as the Baldacchino. At the same time, Pietro da Cortona served Urban as an artist, creating the Triumph of the Barberini ceiling fresco in the Gran Salone of the Palazzo Barberini in Rome between 1633-1639. As another Baroque papal commission, Cortona’s piece is comparable to the Barberini in its level of excess and ornamentation. Cortana fills the Triumph of the Barberini with clustered bodies in all areas of the fresco, whether they be mythological, allegorical, or Christian. In the center of the ceiling, elevated by a quadrature appearance creating an architectural extension upward, is Divine Providence bestowing eternal life upon the Barberini family, who are depicted through the papal keys and crown, heraldic wreath, and bees. The figures surrounding the wreath below Divine Providence are also said to be Charity, Hope, and Faith18. When combined with the statuesque forms intertwined with its architectural elements, and the figures outside the architectural frame reminiscent of Michelangelo’s sibyl figures in the Sistine Chapel, the fresco takes on elements of Classical iconography common in the Renaissance period that the Baldacchino does not. Although hidden in the chaotic nature of its brightly colored and visually overwhelming appearance, the Triumph’s subject matter honors the current pope while overarchingly presenting it under a guise of antique-like figures. In this way, the Baldacchino is again superior in displaying

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Baroque tendencies, despite lacking a large number of figures and movement. Even while lacking what would seem to be a crucial Baroque element, Bernini perfectly conforms to the Council of Trent, using his limited number of angels and cherubs to highlight the religious experience, rather than muddling the work with mythical and allegorical figures that don’t directly and clearly serve to praise the Church. In this way, Bernini’s “restrained” extravagance better represents the Baroque.

Following the papacy of Urban VIII, Pope Innocent X shunned Bernini and the “excesses of the Barberini pope.”19 As another Baroque papal commission, Innocent commissioned Francesco Borromini to design the façades of the Church of Sant’Agnese in Agone, as part of his development of the Piazza Navona20. In an attempt to compare this building to the Baldacchino, it becomes apparent that Sant’Agnese is drastically more similar to the façade of St. Peter’s by Maderno. By shunning Bernini, Innocent seemingly shunned many creative and experimental approaches to art seen across Rome through Bernini’s work under both Pope Urban VIII and Innocent’s successor Pope Alexander VII21. Sant’Agnese contains paired Corinthian columns and pilasters underneath a curving entablature, as well as a mix of triangular and segmental pediments common of Baroque churches.

With its inset windows, protruding cornices and tall bell towers flanking the center portal22, Sant’Agnese very literally contains elements that Maderno hoped to implement in St. Peter’s, achieving Baroque verticality. In comparison to the Baldacchino, both structures exhibit the dynamism, theatricality, and emotion many artists during the Baroque period attempted to display, both in painting and architecture23. By refraining from

a flat façade and instead developing a building that seems to pulse back and forth, Borromini compliments the rounded forms of the dome above and the repeated oval decorations above the center portal doors. The swelling nature of the building is similar to the flowing and twirling nature of the columns in the Baldacchino, which also introduce a sense of movement and activity to such a weighty structure. With its orb and cross motif repeated three times, Sant’Agnese immediately tells the viewer it is a religious building, in the same way the Baldacchino’s repeated use of bees tells the viewer the structure honors the Barberini family.

By directly applying standard Baroque architecture principles of the colossal and ornamental, Innocent X’s commission can be viewed as a prime example of Baroque architecture. Contrastingly, the Baldacchino represents the Baroque artist’s inner creativity, allowing Bernini to create something definitively different through its combination of Constantinian forms and innovative curves.

In the context of papal commissions from Pope Paul V, Pope Urban VIII, and Pope Innocent X, Bernini’s Baldacchino stands alone as a structure that combines the key facets of Baroque art: political representation, excessiveness, and dynamism. Standing well above onlooker’s heads, the Baldacchino quite literally draws the eye heavenward, while simultaneously grounding itself in its massive, solid stature as a dominating, immovable centerpiece in the presence of the altar in St. Peter’s basilica. In comparing the Baldacchino to papal commissions across papacies, it is clear that the structure’s specific combination of size, material, and location give it the potential to display the most dominant components of art during this period of the seventeenth century.

Figure 2. Maderno, Carlo, “Facade di San Pietro,” 1614, St. Peter’s Basilica, Vatican City.

Figure 3. da Cortona, Pietro, “Allegory of Divine Providence and Barberini Power,” Fresco, 1633-1639, St. Palazzo Barberini, Rome.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

Kelsey Carroll is a first-year student at Northwestern University double-majoring in Art History and Journalism.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Bauer. “Bernini and the Baldacchino: On Becoming an Architect in the Seventeenth Century.”

Architectura. 26, no. 2 (January 2, 1996): 144–165.

Dixon, Susan M. Italian Baroque Art Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2008.

Huemer, Frances. “BORROMINI AND MICHELANGELO, II: SOME PRELIMINARY THOUGHTS ON SANT’AGNESE IN PIAZZA NAVONA.” Source (New York, N.Y.) 20, no. 4 (July 1, 2001): 12–22.

Gardner, Helen, and Fred S. Kleiner. Gardner’s Art through the Ages Fifteenth edition, [Backpack edition]. Boston, [Massachussetts: Cengage Learning, 2015.

Lees-Milne, James. Saint Peter’s; the Story of Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Boston: Little, Brown, 1967.

Mezzatesta, Michael P., and Rudolf Preimesberger. “Bernini family.” Grove Art Online. 2003; Accessed 31 Oct. 2020. https://www-oxfordartonline-com.turing.library.northwestern.edu/ groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/ oao-9781884446054-e-7000008287.

Morris, Kathleen. “A Chronological and Comparative Study of Contemporary Sources on Gian Lorenzo Bernini”. ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 2005.

Sorabella, Jean. “Baroque Rome.” metmuseum.org, October 2003. https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/baro/hd_baro.htm.

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ENDNOTES Gardner, Helen, and Fred S. Kleiner. Gardner’s Art through the Ages Fifteenth edition, [Backpack edition]. Boston, Massachussetts: Cengage Learning, 2015, 701 2 Gardner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, 704.

3 Gardner, Gardner’s Art Through the Ages, 705.

4 Morris, Kathleen. “A Chronological and Comparative Study of Contemporary Sources on Gian Lorenzo Bernini”.

ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 2005, 19.

5 Gardner, Gardner’s Art Through the Ages, 705 6 Bauer. “Bernini and the Baldacchino: On Becoming an Architect in the Seventeenth Century.”

Architectura. 26, no. 2 (January 2, 1996): 153 7 Gardner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, 705 8 Gardner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, 705.

9 Mezzatesta, Michael P., and Rudolf Preimesberger. “Bernini family.” Grove Art Online. 2003; Accessed 31 Oct. 2020. https://www-oxfordartonline-com.turing.library.northwestern.edu/ groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/ oao-9781884446054-e-7000008287.

10 Gardner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, 705 11 Sorabella, Jean. “Baroque Rome.” metmuseum.org, October 2003. https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/baro/hd_baro.htm.

12 Gardner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, 703 13 Gardner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, 703 14 Lees-Milne, J. (1967). Saint Peter’s: the story of Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Boston: Little, Brown. 241 15 Lees-Milne, J. Saint Peter’s. 242 16 Lees-Milne, J. Saint Peter’s. 238 17 Gardner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, 705 18 Dixon, Susan M. Italian Baroque Art Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2008. 204.

19 Gardner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, 701 20 Sorabella, Jean. Baroque Rome.

21 Sorabella, Jean. Baroque Rome.

22 Huemer, Frances. “BORROMINI AND MICHELANGELO, II: SOME PRELIMINARY THOUGHTS ON SANT’AGNESE IN PIAZZA NAVONA.” Source (New York, N.Y.) 20, no. 4 (July 1, 2001): 14 23 Sorabella, Jean. “Baroque Rome.”

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Figure 1. Douglas, Emory, “Afro-American solidarity with the oppressed people of the world,” ink on paper, 1969.

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EMORY DOUGLAS’ REVOLUTIONARY ART AS THE PEDAGOGY OF THE OPPRESSED Siyuan (Alice) Zhao, University of Pennsylvania, 2021

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s the Black Panther Party’s revolutionary artist and Minister of Culture, Emory Douglas’ role was to “visually articulate the revolutionary ideology and program of the party”1. His art reached its audience through the distribution and circulation of the BPP newspaper. Throughout the Revolution, Emory Douglas’ art served the pedagogical function by helping black Americans gain consciousness of their oppressed conditions and unveil their political agency to participate in revolution. In this paper, I will start with providing an artistic analysis of Douglas’ artworks. I will then discuss their engagement with Paolo Freire’s ideologies in “Pedagogy of the Oppressed” while establishing their political impact during the revolution.

In his art published by the BPP’s newspaper, Douglas most notably frequented the use of heavy black lines, photomontages, and bright colors. To begin with, his use of heavy black lines and bold patterns allude to traditional African art, “which relied on abstract symbolism and stylized representation”2. In fact, the heavy contour of figures was central to art from the Négritude Movement, an anti-imperialist movement that focused on the returning to African cultures and traditions. In particular, I notice a similarity between Douglas and Negritude’s leading artist Gerard Sekoto’s techniques of painting portraits. For example, despite the different purposes of these paintings, both Sekoto’s Blue Head series from the 1960s and Douglas’ Revolutionary poster from 1969 have dark bold contours to the figures’ facial features as well as a single bright color for the background.

By using powerful black lines, Douglas followed “an African American aesthetic that would serve black liberation’s cause”3 and visually connected “African Americans to the rest of African dispora”4. In Douglas’ portraits, the boldness of the black lines could be interpreted as a symbol for the unity and resolution among black Americans in fighting against oppression. In fact, many contemporary artists are working in a similar fashion to paint portraits. For example, Jordan Casteel, whose solo exhibition is currently on view at the New Museum, paints figures around her studio in Harlem. Viewing Casteel’s exhibition a few weeks ago, I was immediately struck by the similarities in the artistic quality of her work with Douglas’. Her use of contours and abstract patterns immediately conveyed to me the strength of the subjects she portrayed.

Through photomontages, Douglas often contrasts white and black living conditions and combines images in ways that generate new meanings. The combination of his drawings with images from popular media allowed him to create “striking works that had an impact that photographs alone could not produce”5. For example, in his poster from September 11th, 1971, he collaged the silhouettes of a black soldier, a black man screaming, and a black woman injecting drugs, all with the background of the American flag. By condensing these photos in one image, he encourages the viewers to collectively consider them and to reflect on the broader conditions of African Americans in the society. In addition, with his frequent addition of a singular bright color to the black and white imageries, his art functions as an effective form of political propaganda by catching the viewer’s attention.

Notably, many of Douglas’ posters followed the Revolutionary aesthetic that were also represented in Vietnamese and Chinese Communist Party(CCP)’s propaganda. This way,

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Figure 2. Sekoto, Girard, “Blue Head Series,” oil on canvas, 1961.

Douglas was able to use his art to emphasize the BPP’s dedication to Third World solidarity as well as global anti-colonial struggles.

In this section, I will discuss the pedagogical function of Douglas’ art and the ways they visually echo Freire’s ideas in “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”, including the crucial steps to take in the process of Revolution and correct forms of Revolutionary leadership.

To begin with, Douglas’ art played a crucial role in helping the public gain awareness of their oppressed conditions. Just as Freire suggests, the oppressed, “whose task it is to struggle for their liberation together with those who show true solidarity, must acquire a critical awareness of oppression through the praxis of this struggle”6. One way Douglas accomplished the goal of consciousness-raising was through the juxtaposition of various images. For example, in his photo collage of a published on July 28th, 1970, captioned “Few Black Folks Die of Old Age – Few Have the Time and None Got the Opportunity!”, he ironically draws attention to the inequality between black and white living conditions in the society. By contrasting the images of black men’s struggle with a white family’s pleasure, Douglas invites the reader to

consider the photographs in relationship to each other.

He alludes to the causal relationship between white material enjoyment and the exploitation of black labor.

In this image, the white family’s “modern” life was only made possible through the rough fieldwork black workers carried out under capitalist system of exploitation. Furthermore, white modernity only existed due to the comparison to their “backward” counterpart.

Therefore, Douglas’ juxtaposition of the two images also alludes to the historically double-sided coin of whiteness and blackness in America – the former cannot be separated from the latter.

Apart from Douglas’ use of juxtaposition to raise consciousness of black Americans’ continued oppression, he also introduces new perspectives on interpreting popular culture to reshape public perceptions. In the same photomontage, the image of the white middle-class family seems to be taken from an advertisement at the time. However, Douglas decontextualized this image, and then re-contextualized it in a way that serves the cause of the Revolution. In his photomontage, the image of the family became a symbol of white middle-class guilt for endorsing the capitalism system of exploitation. This particular photomontage reminds me of the slaughterhouse scene from Solanas and Getino’s “The Hour of the Furnaces”, where the movie rapidly switches between scenes of slaughtering animals and white material indulgences. The slaughter of animals serves as a metaphor for the exploited working class in underdeveloped countries, thus asserting that the world of material pleasures and fantasies at the imperial core was built from exploitation of Third World resources.

Another example that showcases Douglas’ reinterpretation of popular perceptions is his frequent portrayal of children that suffer from hunger and loneliness.

Although the media often used children as a symbol of innocence and happiness, Douglas unveiled the cruel reality that the right to a happy childhood for black children was deprived from them. This way, the image served to awaken the public and built a cause for revolution. Similarly, while the oppressors commonly used the gun as a repressive weapon, Douglas demonstrated that it would be a more powerful tool of self-defense among black Americans.

Another way Douglas’ art is pedagogical is by helping people recognize the need for a revolution.

By galvanizing anger in people, his art creates the possibility for rebellion. For example, the poster of a woman with a rat refers to the vast dehumanizing

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living condition among black Americans. However, this exact dehumanization is the artist’s intention to call for a change and prevent people from succumbing to the legacy of colonial oppression. As Freire mentions, “one of the gravest obstacles to the achievement of liberation is that oppressive reality absorbs those within it and thereby acts to submerge human beings’ consciousness”7. The words in the Douglas’ drawing states, “Black Misery! Ain’t We Got a Right to the Tree of Life?” By posing this rhetorical question, the image helps the viewer recognize the need to fight for their freedom.

In addition, Douglas provided hope to the people that a better future was near. With images titled “The Storm is Passing Over! The People’s salvation is Going to Come!”, he affirms that the Revolution is bound to yield a positive outcome. As Morozumi comments, “Emory’s resolve is simply his confidence in the people even in this repressive era of shrinking democratic space”8. The poster that resonates with me the most is the one to the left that shows the transformative stages of the growth of a child. In fact, the minimalist reddish background reminds me of sunrays, which could have been a metaphor for the bright

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Figure 3. Douglas, Emory, “We Shall Survive Without a Doubt,” ink on paper, 1971.

future ahead of the child.

In order to create a climate for Revolution, Douglas also helps the public break down the authority of the oppressor. A common example is his portrayal of the police as pigs. This particular representation echoes Freire’s idea that “the oppressed must see examples of the vulnerability of the oppressor so that a contrary conviction can begin to grow within them”9.

Regarding revolutionary leadership, Freire suggests that “the only effective instrument is a humanizing pedagogy in which the revolutionary leadership established a permanent relationship of dialogue with the oppressed”10. This idea was embodied by the BPP’s motto - “All Power to the People”. By providing programs such as the Free Breakfast for School Children Program, the “Vanguards of Revolution” maintained a close relationship to the masses and were able to keep up with their most urgent needs. Douglas executed the party’s motto by giving a voice to common people such as housewives, field workers, children, and soldiers through his art. As Douglas explains, “there are those in the community who feel strongly but may not be able to act in that way so you capture that in the artwork. The art is a language, communicating with the community”11. By vividly portraying real life subjects, Douglas shortened the distance between the viewers and the subjects represented in them, making these images more intimate and relatable. Through painting the vulnerability of his subjects, from people shedding tears in desperation to those suffering from incarceration, Douglas especially highlighted the universality of the struggle among black Americans and make the people seen.

Finally, the impact of Douglas’ art was made possible by both its wide accessibility and distribution.

On one hand, as Douglas mentions in the interview panel titled “Black Power Afterlives: From The Black Panther Party to Black Lives Matter”, people who are not literary are able to understand the meanings behind the work, thus being able to participate in the broader Revolutionary Movement. In the words of Douglas himself, “the masses of black people aren’t readers but activists”12. On the other hand, since his work was published through the BPP’s newspaper, it was able to reach a larger audience due to the low economic cost of the newspaper’s production and circulation. Indeed, as Solanas and Getino mentioned in “Towards a Third Cinema”, in order for Revolutionary media to effectively reach its audience, “production,

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distribution, and economic possibilities for survival must form part of a single strategy”13.

In this paper, I have discussed the artistic qualities of Emory Douglas’ propaganda art, and examined his techniques in relationship to supporting the political message of the Black Panther Party. His art serves the pedagogical function that accords with Paolo Freire’s “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”. The messages Douglas was able to send to the audience through his posters were especially valuable since people that were not literary understood them. Although Douglas’ artistic expressions tampered the language, they were able to instill Revolutionary ideas that were just as powerful as those expressed by speeches and literatures.

FROM THE PEDAGOGY OF THE OPPRESSED TO A LUTA CONTINUA: THE POLITICAL PEDAGOGY OF PAULO FREIRE.” Paulo Freire, 2002, 133–58. https://doi. org/10.4324/9780203420263-13, 64.

10 Ibid, 68.

11 Russonello, Angelica McKinley and Giovanni. “Fifty Years Later, Black Panthers’ Art Still Resonates (Published 2016).”

The New York Times. The New York Times, October 15, 2016. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/16/arts/fifty-years-later-black-panthers-art-still-resonates.html.

12 Gaiter, Colette. “What Revolution Looks Like: The Work of Black Panther Artist Emory Douglas.” Essay. In Black Panther - the Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. Rizzoli International Publicat, 2013, 95.

13 Getino, Octavio, and Fernando Solanas. “Toward a Third Cinema.” TRICONTINENTAL 14 (October 1969).

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Siyuan (Alice) Zhao is a third-year at University of Pennsylvania double-majoring in Art History and Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (PPE).

ENDNOTES 1 Morozumi, Greg Jung. “Emory Douglas and the Third World Cultural Revolution.” Essay. In Black Panther - the Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. Rizzoli International Publicat, 2013, 130.

2 Gaiter, Colette. “What Revolution Looks Like: The Work of Black Panther Artist Emory Douglas.” Essay. In Black Panther - the Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. Rizzoli International Publicat, 2013, 97-98.

3 Gaiter, Colette. “What Revolution Looks Like: The Work of Black Panther Artist Emory Douglas.” Essay. In Black Panther - the Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. Rizzoli International Publicat, 2013, 96.

4 Ibid, 96.

5 Gaiter, Colette. “What Revolution Looks Like: The Work of Black Panther Artist Emory Douglas.” Essay. In Black Panther - the Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. Rizzoli International Publicat, 2013, 105.

6 “FROM THE PEDAGOGY OF THE OPPRESSED TO A LUTA CONTINUA: THE POLITICAL PEDAGOGY OF PAULO FREIRE.” Paulo Freire, 2002, 133–58. https://doi. org/10.4324/9780203420263-13, 51.

7 “FROM THE PEDAGOGY OF THE OPPRESSED TO A LUTA CONTINUA: THE POLITICAL PEDAGOGY OF PAULO FREIRE.” Paulo Freire, 2002, 133–58. https://doi. org/10.4324/9780203420263-13, 51.

8 Morozumi, Greg Jung. “Emory Douglas and the Third World Cultural Revolution.” Essay. In Black Panther - the Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. Rizzoli International Publicat, 2013, 126.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Morozumi, Greg Jung. “Emory Douglas and the Third World Cultural Revolution.” Essay. In Black Panther - the Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. Rizzoli International Publicat, 2013.

Gaiter, Colette. “What Revolution Looks Like: The Work of Black Panther Artist Emory Douglas.” Essay. In Black Panther - the Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. Rizzoli International Publicat, 2013.

“The Hour of the Furnaces (1968) Part 1: Neocolonialism and Violence Subs Eng/Ita/Fra.” YouTube. YouTube, January 17, 2012. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQOXKoMHOE0.

Getino, Octavio, and Fernando Solanas. “Toward a Third Cinema.” TRICONTINENTAL 14 (October 1969).

Russonello, Angelica McKinley and Giovanni. “Fifty Years Later, Black Panthers’ Art Still Resonates (Published 2016).”

The New York Times. The New York Times, October 15, 2016. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/16/arts/fifty-years-later-black-panthers-art-still-resonates.html.

Sekoto, Gerard. “Blue Head, 1961 - Gerard Sekoto.” www. wikiart.org, January 1, 1961. https://www.wikiart.org/en/ gerard-sekoto/blue-head-1961.

Black Power Afterlives: From The Black Panther Party to Black Lives Matter. YouTube. YouTube, 2020. https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=TCD1kMUgVss. “FROM THE PEDAGOGY OF THE OPPRESSED TO A LUTA CONTINUA: THE POLITICAL PEDAGOGY OF PAULO FREIRE.” Paulo Freire, 2002, 133–58. https://doi. org/10.4324/9780203420263-13.

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TRANSNATIONAL ANALYSIS OF “WESTERN” AS AN ENGLISH AND CHINESE TERMINOLOGY IN CONTEMPORARY ART HISTORICAL DISCIPLINE Barbie (Kung Lim) Kim, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, 2021

A

sections will illustrate the geographical ambiguity of “Western”s’ definitions and the unwitting misuse of the term without any intellectual consideration.

The intention of this paper is not to resolve any issue nor to make any conclusive definition of “Western.” It is necessary to acknowledge that the term “Western” has no definitive definition. The term is frequently being used with default assumptions.

Furthermore, contextualizing and understanding the complexity of the term “Western” is needed in order to distinguish “Western” art from other geographical categories.

Any definition of the term “Western” should not particularly be accounted as incorrect. The incoherent definition of the term is the result of the varying responses made under different discourses. However, there is the risk of creating false cultural and historical assumptions, if the definition is not unified within historical context. Harrison’s book Art History: The Key Concepts published provides a series of dictionary definitions of art historical terminology. In the book Harris indicates the complex sociopolitical shift even within the general understanding of the term “Western. ” Harris points out that the term“ has a history of change and struggle located within it and competition between the United States and the Western European countries has characterized this history since 1776 as much as the decisive moment of collaboration.”3 This highlights how the definition of the term “Western” shifts drastically even within the more commonly agreed geographical borders of Europe and Euro-America .

The online encyclopedia, Wikipedia defined “Western” art, as “The art of Europe, encompasses the history of visual art in Europe.”4 This definition provided by Wikipedia cannot be regard as a reliable academic source since the quote has no footnote indicating sources, however is a great example that reflects the general misunderstanding, as well as the unwitting misuses, in defining the term “Western” within art history. Considering the high usability and accessibility of Wikipedia, by protracting “Western”

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s globalization contributed to the awareness of “Western” tendencies within the discipline of Art History, the term“Western” has become an increasingly mentioned issue. Art historian James Elkins argues in his book, Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History that, “all possible narratives... that appear to the reader as art history is Western.”1 Furthermore, art historian Hans Belting similarly claims that, “art history...was a local game that worked only for Western art and only from the Renaissance onwards.”2 Whether one agreed on art history as a “Western” discipline or not, this critical influence of the term “Western” is evident. While the discourses continue to ignite theories and arguments, the term itself was rarely elaborated with any specification. Geographical, historical or sociopolitical context was infrequently mentioned. “Western” is often automatically assumed as a geographical indication of Europe or Euro-America. This assumption is reinforced in a contemporary setting where globalization has deeply impacted the historiography of art history. Consequently, “Western” is being criticized by default.

Despite the debates in art historical discourse, the term “Western” is rarely being elaborated. This paper will present an analysis of the term “Western” within art history discipline in two sections. The first section will be mainly referring to texts by art historians Belting, Elkins, and Jonathan Harris. The section will only remain as an introductory survey on the term “Western” in art history discipline. As a result, readers will see that the definition of “Western” is never agreed upon art history discipline.

The second section of the paper will be focusing on the reception of the term “Western” in Chinese art history scholarship by examining the discourse prompted by Chinese translation of Belting’s Art History After Modernism and Elkins’ Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History. Through examining the translation and incoherent use of the term “Western,” I purpose this leads to rejection against the term “Western” in Chinese art history scholarship. Both

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art as European, it is creating a general assumption and degrading any discourse of the cultural and historical context the United States has engaged in post-World War II. Belting illustrates that post Second World War, the United States had led the way in cultural as well as in other matters.5 This clarifies the dominant influences of the United States in contemporary art historical discourse. If one takes texts by art historians such as Elkins, Harris, and Belting as references, the term “Western” within art history is more commonly understood as “Euro-American” in a contemporary art historical setting. However, this common reference is also incoherent and flawed.

Harris’s concept reflected the geographical complexity when defining the term “Western.”As he elaborated that, “though in one sense Western has a very clear meaning—that is, the world seen from a United States and Western European perspective— from another position it is as confusing as its supposed opposite: the east or eastern.”6 This concept of the term “Western” is being limited to Western Europe, reflecting the main contradictions and issues being raised. Hence Harris’s concept emphasizes the inconsistency and lack of a unified geographical agreement when mentioning the term. This specification is inconsistent and often neglected by the art historians who weigh “Western” as Euro-American. Belting points out in his book Art History After Modernism that “the unity of Western Art, which has become uncertain, gained its common profile from the contrast to that of East European art.”7 As mentioned, there is a neglecting distinction between Western-Europe and Eastern-Europe. Thus, not specifying this difference leads to creating assumptions and generalization of European art.

Effectively discarding Eastern Europe can lead to delivering flawed information and re-enforcing exclusivity. It is crucial to recognize this neglect of Eastern-European art, and the generalization of “Western” as Eurocentric further diminishes the cultural and national value of each country. Belting signifies that, “for the greater part of the twentieth century, East and West (Europe) had no shared art history.”8 Belting further elaborated that, “we usually ignore the degree to which we have imposed a Western view on the East by recognizing only Eastern traditions and by writing art history such as to exclude Eastern Europe.”9 Hence, when conducting a larger geographical or cultural discourse within art history, this assumption and generalization ultimately risk discarding socio

political historical context.

Incoherence continues with what can be accounted as “Western” even within the discourse of Western-Europe. Harris further specifies that “Western Europe, too, has had a fractured history: global imperialism during the nineteenth century and first half of the twentieth was much more a matter of different European countries(principally Britain, Germany, and France) struggling for supremacy…”10 This leads to the relationship between German Art and the idea of ‘Western.” Belting reveals in his book The Germans and Their Art: A Troublesome Relationship the traces of the idea “Western” swallowing nationalism.

He indicates that “the topic Western or ‘Occidental art’(meaning European art in a western tradition), and not German art, has become the fashionable scholarly subject in the last fifty years in Germany.”11 How Belting considered German art as separate from general “Western” art showed the term’s need for specification.

Especially because the term “Western” itself implies the exclusion of Germany. As Oxford English Dictionary indicates, one of the definitions of “Western” is “designating the countries of Western Europe and North America that opposed Germany in the First World War (1914–18) and Second World War (1939– 45).”12 This particular definition of “Western” further reinforced the exclusion of Germany as “Western.”

This exclusion needs to be mentioned especially when conducting an art historical discourse regarding the specific period or regions. Considering how the definition of the term “Western” changes depending on the geographical subjects, the lack of specification of what is speculated as “Western” will unnecessarily disregard historical context and cause political controversies regarding geographical territories.

Art history as a discipline has arrived at a moment of self-critical re-examination. Art historian Katherine Manthorne, in her article Remapping American Art, reflects that, “The discipline of art history is in the process of reinventing itself to take mobility and the intersections with the global into better account.”13 Manthorne’s studies show the critical issues between globalization and nationalism. While globalization gains more academic attention compared to nationalism, art historians begin critiquing the “Western” influences in art history is evident. Elkins indicates how deeply “Western” the discipline of art history still remains. He states that, “the overwhelming majority of art historians think in terms of major Western periods and mega periods.”14 This marks the rising awareness

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of a unified methodology which many have labeled as “Western” within art historical studies. However this critique of “Western” can cause flawed communication due to the lack of specification of what regarded as “Western” in these discourses. Harris speaks of the flawed cultural inconsistency of the term “Western” as follows:

Recent historical analysis shows that the supposed origins of this tradition in Greek sculpture for instants had antecedence in Egypt (African) visual representation in that what is called the Italian renaissance drew extensively on sources from the region now identified as the Middle East.15

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If following Harris’s theory, the regional label has shifted in a different time period, therefore what is being categorized as “Western” requires a revisit.

Although art historians have been critically attempting to point out the issues of the term ‘Western,” this self-reflection of the discipline has many limitations. As Belting acknowledges that “we are still so much involved in an internal view on Western art that we have little in looking at it from the outside and treating it as a history more defined by a cultural space (the West) than by a dividing time pattern.”16 While the rooted “Western” influences will not be easily disassociated, the need for contextualizing the term “Western” remains. In fact the impossibility of disregarding “Western” should emphasize the need to investigate the complex definitions of the term itself.

Belting illustrates that, “willingly or not, we are confronted with the dissolution of the universal significance of Western art and historiography.”17 Consequently, not addressing the issues in definitions and predispositions of “Western,” is to risk colonialism within the term to expand. In addition, without specification of “Western,” it can easily lead itself to unnecessary socio-political conflicts within and beyond art history discipline. One example will be how Chinese art scholarship has been responding to the idea of “Western-Centrism” in the recent decades.

While it is agreed in the “Western” art history scholarship that art history is influenced by globalization shifting its approach, it will always be “Western” to an extent. Many Chinese art historians had expressed their disapproval. Art history will always be in the process of breaking the “Western” predisposition.

However, it should not be blindly categorized as an issue but rather an observation. Accordingly, without

specifying and contextualizing the term” Western” and its issues, the situation will not be improved or eventually solved. The definition of “Western” will lead to various consequences, including forming rejection against “Western” in other region’s art history scholarship, hence for a more informed discourse the specificity is required.

To breakthrough limitations, it is critical to expand the conversation beyond the “Western” region.

The issue of “Western” in art history expands beyond the Western scholarships. In this section, I will extend the analysis to the reception of the fluid term in Chinese art history scholarship.18 I will be focusing on two books: Belting’s Art History After Modernism and Elkins’ Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History, to examine how “Western” is translated in the region’s scholarship. Additionally, to draw articles from Chinese art history scholarship in conversation with the subject of the two books, I will also address the translator’s approaches which influence the narrative of the books. In this section, through discussing the translation and incoherent use of “Western” in Chinese art history scholarship, the reader will see the rejection of “Western” and challenge the ideology of “Western-centrism” in art history.

To analyze how the term “Western” is translated, it is important to first map out the multiple translations of “Western” in Chinese and the histories of these relative terms. Chinese art history scholarship has a distinguished division in translating “Western” to both term “西洋”(xīyáng, Western or Occident) and “西方” (xī fāng, Western). These terms embody the history of shifted geographical and cultural understanding of “Western” in Chinese.

The words “西洋”(xīyáng, Western or Occident) and “西方” (xī fāng, Western) have shifted throughout the history in Chinese language. The ideology of“西洋”(xīyáng, Western or Occident) as an indication to “Western” countries was frequently used in late Ming dynasty. During this period, following the Ming treasure voyages, the Ming dynasty began to have more frequent foreign interactions .The term“ 西洋”(xīyáng, Western or Occident) has been used to contrast “东洋”(dōngyáng, Japan or East Ocean) and “南洋”(nányáng, Southeast Asia), therefore separates from the limits of only “Western” and “non-Western.”

The history use of “西方” (xīfāng, Western), can be traced back to late 19th century to early 20th century.

For example Chinese philosopher Zhang Taiyan(章 太炎, also know as Zhang Binglin, 1869-1936) has

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wrote in 1900 that, “what is considered as Legalist is the same as what the West called politician, limited by the law.”19 The subtle differences between the two possibilities of translation reveals that “Western” in Chinese is still a fluid ideology indicating a vague and general cultural region.

In art historical context, both 西方 and “西 洋”(xīyáng, Western or Occident) have been used to refer to “Western.” For “西洋”(xīyáng, Western or Occident) , the word “洋”(yáng, forgien or ocean ) emphasized on the idea of “foreign” in “Western,” and is used in a more traditional art history discourse . For example, the use of 西洋画 ( xī yáng huà, Western paintings) in early 20th century Chinese art history discourse: the term 洋画 ( yáng huà, Foreign Western paintings) and 西画 ( xī huà, Western paintings) were terms frequently used by artists collectives including The Storm Society (决澜社); or 西洋美术史 (xī yáng měi shù shǐ, Western History of Art) as a common title of general art history textbooks. On the other hand,“ 西方” (xī fāng, Western) is more commonly used to reference “Western” in a modern and contemporary setting. For example, in case of Belting and Elkins, the translations use the term “西方艺术”(xī fāng yì shù) to indicate “Western” art. The term “西方艺术”(xī fāng yì shù, Western Art), even though translates the same in “Western” art is almost only applied to Modern and contemporary art history discourse. However the indication is drastically different. In addition, the conversation of “西方艺术”(xī fāng yì shù, Western Art) often relates to the conversation of “Western-Centrism” over the recent decades in Chinese scholarship. Therefore, to have a productive discourse in the cross-regional debate, a clear understanding of the term “Western”’s condition is necessary. By looking at Belting and Elkins texts in Chinese and their reception in Chinese scholarship provides a better context of whether “Western” is understood the same as it was in English scholarships. Additionally, to consider if “Western” is engaged in the same conversation in different regions.

Chinese art historian Shao Yiyang suggests in her article Wither Art History? that, “art history as a discipline first appeared in the People’s Republic of China in the 1950s”; the Modern Western art history and theory which was introduced with the reform policy in China, grew in popularity amongst the younger generation since the 1980s.20 Chinese art historians have been making an effort to engage the conversation with “Western” art history scholarships. Wang

LiXiang, the lead publisher of Shanghai Paintings And Calligraphy Publishing House, drafted the introduction of Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History that advocates the publisher’s aim to bridge Western Art history studies. Wang advises that,

Many research outcomes and methodologies of Western art history largely inspired Chinese and foreign scholars’ new research pathways to Chinese art history. However, amongst the practice of the methodologies, because of the significant difference in the development background in Chinese and Western art, the conclusion and analysis from the materials are not convincing.21 Elkins’s book is being considered a reflection of “Western” perspectives on Chinese art history. Elkins focused on the concern of “the differences between text we produce in North America and western Europe, at the beginning of the twenty-first century, and the text that was produced in China starting almost twenty centuries earlier” and ultimately concludes that art history is “Western.” However, many Chinese scholars disagree with such claims and argue against the “Western-centrism” in the discipline. This leads to a rejection of “Western” theory before a clear examination of the ideology of “Western” itself.

In the book Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History, Elkins defined “Non-Western” as “every country outside France, Germany, Italy, England, the United States, and intermittently--Scandinavia.”22 This is an example demonstrating specificity, this definition also shows the limitation in what “Western” is indicating when mentioned in “Western” art history scholarships, yet this is often not being stated in the conversation revolving around “Western.” This leads to an issue of reacting to “Western” and “Western-centrism” without really understanding the contexts. Elkins’ text and theory regarding Chinese Landscape painting is more circulated amongst Chinese art history scholars because of the relevance and arguments.

Elkins made the argument that “Chinese tradition is apt to be understood in Western terms because it is simpler or narrower than our own.”23 Furthermore, Elkins suggests that, “Western art, in this view, has a richness of historiography and critical literature, and a diversity of media, schools, and styles, that is deeper, or at least border, than the Chinese tradition.”24 This statement ignited a need to claim cultural ownership

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as “Westerns.”

He HuaiShuo further manifests that “Non-western world — especially Asian countries — were under Western-Centrism’s erosion, contamination, temptation, and domination, and have agreed that the culture of “Western” imperialism as the word standard, even the ‘advanced’ culture.”32 This statement demonstrates apparent generalization when portrayed “Western” as an imperialistic neocolonial force when he uses “Western” as a synonym with the United States. This generalized claim risks discarding any socio-political differences between “Western” regions.

I consider He HuaiShuo’s article as an example of Chinese scholarship failing to conduct a conversation and criticism because of the lack of discussions in understanding the cross-cultural context of the terminologies. The article appears defensive against “Western”influence and implies it as a neocolonial force.

This makes it difficult to communicate across-regions and nations. As He Huaishuo emphasized that “China is one of the countries that has the oldest culture, the United States only has 200 years.”33 Many Chinese scholars including the ones mentioned in the paper repeatedly emphasize the richness of Chinese arts and culture and the five thousand years of history behind it. Moreover, they exhibit a tendency to diminish the shorter history of the U.S in order to make a case against “Western.” This ultimately leads to the rejection towards “Western” influences amongst Chinese scholars.

The rejection of “Western” raises the question of ownership of methodologies in art history. I argue that this is the reason for rejection of “Western” amongst Chinese scholars. Elkins mentioned in his book that, “one question enthuses and another publication is whether it makes sense to continue to speak of a field called ‘art history’, or if there are now ‘art histories’ in different regions of the world.”34 Art history can be labeled as “Western” if considering what is qualified as art history is what follows the methodologies that were labeled by “Western” scholarship. As Elkins hypothesizes, if there are reasons to continue trying to understand how art history is “Western,” then “any such attempt will remain within Western art history, and if an account succeeds in throwing off Western assumptions it will no longer be recognized as art history.”35 Following Elkins’ hypnosis, I question if one can claim that “Western” art history scholarship is more influential because of the reinforcement of the idea of “Western-Centrism”?

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and rejection over the term “Western” within Chinese scholarship. One example is Chinese art critic and painter He HuaiShuo(何怀硕, 1941-)’s response article titled 善意的文化偏见 ——回应詹姆斯·埃尔 金斯先[Well Intended Cultural Prejudice—Response to Mr. James Elkins]. While He HuaiShuo’s response was to Elkins article A New Definition of Chinese Ink Painting published in 2012, the ideology of the article is closely related to the book Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History. Elkins himself has addressed the issues and push backs in the introduction of the latest version. Nonetheless, he indicates that, “It (the book) involves another decade of adjustment…but the argument is intact.”25

In He HuaiShuo’s article focus on the United States’s leading position in the “Western” world. He HuaiShuo heavily criticized the “Americanized ‘’ idea of Western-Centrism and the Western-Centric globalization in art.26 He HuaiShuo underlines that “Global art is no longer the umbrella term for multinational and multi-dimensional art, but it is a one dimensional artistic movement leading by the Western modernism, and clearly and directly calling it global art(some time “international” or modernism).”27 Such an accusatory approach to the term “Western” however risks creating an authoritarian approach of “Western.”

He HuaiShuo considers literature and art from “Western’s “Modernism” represses others while magnifying themselves, becoming the “global trend.”28 He asserts that, “Western has an authoritarian position in art, especially the U.S with strong national power, forming cultural imperialism, and later developed as American way of “contemporary” art.”29 Here, He HuaiShuo exhibits further inconsistencies such as blurring “Western” and “American” and diminishing the cultural differences between the “Western” countries as well. The article displays a defensive response despite stating that his intention is to, “not only create conversation with professor James Elkins, but can also alarm Chinese art world to realistically reflect.”30 He HuaiShuo implies that, “other than their own “well intention and passion,” Americans completely overlook, neglect, sometimes even contempt or despise other different cultures without admitting or understanding the value of cultural difference , not giving it respect.”31 The criticism heavily focuses on the United States while referring to “Western.”

By doing so, He HuaiShuo not only diminishing the difference between the United States and Western Europe, the two main geographical area being viewed

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The circulation of terms “Western” and “Western-Centrism” is inseparable from the conversation revolving globalization in Chinese scholarship . Art history professor at the Nanjing Art Institute, Chang NingShen(常宁生, 1955-), discussed “Westernized” influences on Chinese contemporary art under globalization in an article titled 全球化与中国当代艺术 [Globalization and Chinese Contemporary Art].

Chang considers “Western” countries are the ones in leading positions on politics, economy, technology, and military.36 Consequently, Chang argues that the “Western” countries have also received the world’s attention for culture and arts, resulting in creating “an illusion that Western Art is at a place leading the global art’s developing trend.”37 In his article, Chang specifically indicated the “non-Western” countries as the “third world countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America.”38 The generalization of considering all “non-Western” countries as “third world countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America” highlights Chang’s unwitting delivery of the complexity of socio-political definition of “third world countries” and “Western,” thus weakening the challenges to the idea of “Western-Centrism.” Chang’s article presents an example of how understanding the term “Western” will critically influence the Chinese scholarship’s conversation in globalization.

To examine the relationship between the term “Western” and globalization in Chinese scholarship, Belting’s text served a critical role because of the inclusion of the voice of the translators. Both translators Lu YingHua (卢迎华) and ,Su Wei (苏伟) expressed their interest in Belting’s idea of “world art” history which promoted the translation project. As Lu and Su both received their art historical training in the “Western” region, and have been working in a cross regional environment, they expressed an urgency and need for Chinese scholarship to be engaged in the conversation of globalism.

The Chinese translation of Art History After Modernism [现代主义以后的艺术史] published in 2014 includes the translators’ own interpretation and opinion on each of Belting’s chapters. After each chapter the translators added their insight on the text and expanded Belting’s “Western” theory with lenses from Chinese art historians. As the narration is targeted to the Chinese reader, Su and Lu presented statements in combining cross-cultural and neo-colonial theory. However both Lu and Su appeared contradictory.

Lu designates “Western world” as a long term “mystified enemy” (虚假敌人) of the Chinese. Lu purposes that, “the essence of this problem is no longer a matter of East and West, nor a problem of geopolitical division… our confusion will no longer be answered in the West…” Lu’s investigation yielded no conclusion as no alternate solution was provided.39 Nor is there any further elaboration on the idea of “Western” as “mystified enemy” (虚假敌人). On the other hand, Lu later signals in the book that, “One can say that Chinese contemporary art has been favored by the West since the end of 1980s, and choose to grow under this attention, also being categorized as a product of Western cultural colonialism.”40 Furthermore, Su notes that,

“Western” is the representative example showing how the infinite possible definitions of terminologies can reshape art history discourse.

The term embodies a history of shifted perception of a region that many treated as a centrific force in art history.

Cultural forms outside the social systems of Western Europe and North America have increasing

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become an issue with the intensification of globalization in the past two decades….When some areas consciously or unconsciously become footnotes to colonization or post-colonization, those cultural regions that have been selectively excluded and ignored become the unfortunate survivors.41 By stating so, both Lu and Su addressed the neocolonial forces of “Western” culture on Chinese art, this is contradicting Lu’s earlier statement of viewing “Western world” as a mystified enemy by arguing the “Western” influences as a neocolonial force.

In addition to the contradiction, the two translators shift the geographical idea of “Western” to Euro-American, Western Europe and North America.

By not clearly stating “Western” in the context with specificity Lu and Su both risk showing indiscreetness by failing to show understanding of socio-political history in cross-regional art history discourse.

Different from Su and Lu emphasizes on neocolonialism of the “Western” influences in globalization. He Huaishuo’s attempt to define and address the issue of global art represented Chinese scholarship’s denial of “Western-centrism.” He Huaishuo also criticized the globalization of art and proposed his definition of global art as an “umbrella term indicating multi-dimensional art that represents a varied tradition and style.”42 This proposal is similar to Chang’s argument that, “The development of world art and the continuous innovation of artists do not simply follow the linear development trajectory described by the evolutionary model, nor do they continue to unify with the development model of Western art.”43 Chang also claims that since the 1980s, Chinese artists including Cai GuoQiang (蔡国强, 1957- ), Gu WenDa (谷文达, 1955- ), Xu Bing (徐冰, 1955- ), Huang Yongbing ( 黄永砅, 1954-2019) etc...have become a population of long term residents abroad whom have already blended into the Western mainstream.44 Chang states that both of their artistic language and subjects are all coming from the “Western” mainstream discourse.45 All mentioned scholars actively discussed the heavy “Western” influences on China without elaborating on specifying those influences effectively neglecting the difference within the regions. This illuminates the same issue mentioned earlier of how the generalization of “Western” leads to overlooking national differences, and in this case, reinforcing the rejection of “Western” in Chinese art history scholarship.

Chang’s argument applies to art historians as

well. In translators of both Belting’s Art History after Modernism, and Elkins’s Chinese Landscape Paintings As Western Art History are all art historians or art critics who have received their art historical training in “Western” institutions located in Western European countries, Australia, and the United States. As Shao indicated that “modern art history in China emerged in the early twentieth century, influenced by the Western model.”46 She further advocates a need for “art historians around the world to find their own voice within the main forums of international art history and theory.”47 No matter how one defines the discipline, art history is a discipline that requires articulation of language. When conducting art historical discourse the terminologies we use submerged into the subconscious, reflecting our environment and training as art historians.

“Western” is the representative example showing how the infinite possible definitions of terminologies can reshape art history discourse. The term embodies a history of shifted perception of a region that many treated as a centric force in art history. It is necessary to step out of such intuitive use of the term “Western” and engage an investigation to specify and consciously acknowledge the history behind it. Only so, it will allow both scholarships to bridge a common ground in cross-national discourses.

Barbie (Kung Lim) Kim is a fourth-year student at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago studying Art History and Fine Arts.

ENDNOTES James Elkins.,Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History.( Hong Kong;London;: Hong Kong University Press, 2010), 9.

2 Hans Belting, ”The Global Art World: Audiences, Markets, and Museums.”(Germany:Hatje Cantz, 2009), 45.

3 Jonathan Harris, Art History: The Key Concepts. (London; New York;: Routledge, 2006), 337.

4 “Art of Europe.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, November 23, 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Art_of_Europe.

5 Hans Belting, Art History After Modernism. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003), ix.

6 Harris, Art History: The Key Concepts, 337.

7 Belting, Art History After Modernism, 53.

8 Ibid, 54.

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ISSUE Nº20 | POWER 9 Ibid.

10 Harris, Art History: The Key Concepts, 336-337.

11 Hans Belting, “The Germans and their Art: A Troublesome Relationship”, (New Haven [Conn.]: Yale University Press,1998), 34.

12 “western, adj., n.2, and adv.”. OED Online. December 2019. Oxford University Press. https://www-oed-com. proxy.artic.edu/view/Entry/227911?rskey=twv2ZS&result=3&isAdvanced=false (accessed December 16, 2019).

13 Katherine Manthorne. “Remapping American Art.” American Art 22, no. 3 (2008). doi:10.1086/595811, 112.

14 James Elkins, 2002. Stories of Art. (New York: Routledge), 19.

15 Harris, Art History: The Key Concepts, 337.

16 Belting, Art History After Modernism, 169.

17 Harris,.Art History: The Key Concepts, 337.

18 Every translation in the section of the paper will be an author translation, original text in Chinese will be included in the footnote to better contextualize the message the text is trying to deliver.

19 Yu Zhong 喻 中.Zhu hu Ding Lü: Zhang Tai Yan Dui Fa Jia De Chong Shu 著书定律:章太炎对法家的重述 .Gan Su She Hui Ke Xue Yuan甘肃社会科学院, 2017:118-124, 119. Orgnial text: “故法家者流，则犹西方 所谓政治家 也，非胶于刑律而已.”

20 Yiyang Shao . “Wither Art History? Wither Art History?” The Art Bulletin 98, no. 2 (2016): 147-50. Accessed November 18, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43948872, 147.

21 Wang, Lixiang 王, 立翔 “Cong Shu Zong Xü 丛书总序.”

Foreword. In Elkins, James, Xi Fang Yi Shu Shi Zhong De Shan Shui Hua 西方艺术史中的山水画, (Shanghai: Shanghai Shu Hua Chu Ban She上海书画出版社), 2019, 1–3. Originaltext: “近百年来，西方艺术史研究多种成果 和方法，巨大启迪了中外学者对中国艺术史新路径的研 究…不过在这些方法实践中，因中西方艺术发生母体和 发展背景存在重大差异，而使堆材料的取舍分析和得出 的结论并不能够完全令人信服。” 22 James Elkins, Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History. (Hong Kong;London;: Hong Kong University Press, 2010), 11.

23 Elkins, Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History, 49.

24 Ibid, 49.

25 Ibid, 6.

26 Huaishuo He 怀硕 何. “Shan Yi de Wen Hua Pian Jian —— Hui Ying Zhan Mu Si·Ai Er Jin Si Xian Shen 善意的 文化偏见——回应詹姆斯·埃尔金斯先生.” Mei shu yan jiu (Beijing, China), no. 2 (2013): 41–42.41.

27 Ibid, 41.

28 Ibid.

29 Ibid.

30 Ibid.

31 Ibid. Orginial text: 美国人除了自己的“善意与热心”之

外，完全忽视、漠视，有时甚至是轻视、鄙视其他不同的文 化， 也不承认、不懂得文化差异的可贵， 应予尊重。) 32 Ibid.Orginial text: 近百年来，非西方世界，特别 是亚洲 各国长期受到西方中心主义 观点 ( 爱德华·赛义德称为文 化帝国主义。当代当以美国为代表的侵蚀、 熏染、诱惑、 支配与宰制，已相当程度认同这种西方帝国主义文化为 普世标准，甚至是“先进”的文化。) 33 Ibid, 42. Orginial text: “中国是文化最悠久的国 家之一， 美国才二百多年。” 34 Elkins, “Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History”, 49.

35 Ibid. 6.

36 NingSheng Chang 宁生 常. “Quan Qiu Hua Yu Zhong Guo Dang Dai Yi Shu全球化与中国当代艺术”Mei Shu Bao 美术报, January 28, 2012.

37 Ibid. Orginial text: 一种西方艺术也处于领导国际艺术 发展潮流的错觉...

38 Ibid. Original text: 亚洲，非洲，拉美第三世界国家...

39 Hans Belting, Xian Dai Zhu Yi Zhi Hou De Yi Shu Shi 现代主义之后的艺术史. Translated by Wei Su 伟 苏 and Yinghua Lü迎华 卢,(Beijing: Jin Cheng Chu Ban She 金城 出版社), 2014, 150. Original text: “...问题的本质也不再是 东西方的问题，不是一个地理政治划分的问题... 我们的迷 茫将不再应该在西方找到答案...”

40 Ibid, 174.Original text: “可以说中国当代艺术次从80年 代末起得到了西方的青睐，并且在这种关注和选择下成 长，也称为西方文化殖民的产物之一。” 41 Ibid, 154. Original text: “西欧和北美社会体制之外的文 化形态近二十年来随着全球化进程的加剧与来越来越为 一个问题。当有些区域自觉不自觉地成为殖民或者后殖民 的注脚之后，那些被选择性的排除和忽略掉的文化地域 就成为不幸中的幸存者。” 42 He, “Shan Yi de Wen Hua Pian Jian “善意的文化偏见”, 41 Original text: “国际艺术”应该就是种种各有传统，各有 风格的多元艺术的合称。 43 Chang “Quan Qiu Hua Yu Zhong Guo Dang Dai Yi Shu 全球化与中国当代艺术”. Original text: .世界艺术的发展和 艺术家的不断创新并不是简单按照进化论模式所描述的 线性发展的轨迹前进, 更不是以西方艺术的发展模式为指 向不断趋向统一。 44 Ibid.

45 Ibid.

46 Yiyang, Shao. “Wither Art History? Wither Art History?”, 148.

47 Ibid, 148.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

Chinese Sources Belting, Hans. Xian Dai Zhu Yi Zhi Hou De Yi Shu Shi 现代主义之后的艺术史[Art History After Modernism].

Translated by Su Wei 苏 伟 and Lu Yinghua卢 迎华. Beijing: Jin Cheng Chu Ban She 金城出版社, 2014.

Chang, Ningsheng 常, 宁生. “Quan Qiu Hua Yu Zhong Guo Dang Dai Yi Shu全球化与中国当 代艺术.” China: Mei shu Bao 美术报, January 28, 2012. https://kns.cnki.net/kcms/detail/detail. aspx?FileName=MESH201201280070&DbName=CCND. Elkins, James. Xi Fang Yi Shu Shi Zhong De Shan Shui Hua 西方艺术史中的山水画 [Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History]. Translated by Li Yiqin李 伊晴.

Shanghai: Shanghai Shu Hua Chu Ban She上海书画出版 社, 2019.

He, Huaishuo 何, 怀硕 “Shan Yi de Wen Hua Pian Jian —— Hui Ying Zhan Mu Si·Ai Er Jin Si Xian Shen 善意的文化偏见——回应詹姆斯·埃尔金斯先 生.” Mei shu yan jiu (Beijing, China), no. 2 (2013): 41–42.

Wang, Lixiang 王, 立翔 “Cong Shu Zong Xü 丛书总序.”

Foreword. In Elkins, James, Xi Fang Yi Shu Shi Zhong De Shan Shui Hua 西方艺术史中的山水画, Shanghai: Shanghai Shu Hua Chu Ban She上海书画出版 社, 2019, 1–3.

Yu Zhong 喻, 中. Zhu Shu Ding Lü: Zhang Tai Yan Dui Fa Ji 著书定律:章太炎对法家的重述”. Gansu: Gan Su She Hụi Ke Xuể Yuan甘肃社会科学, 2017:118-124.

23

BIBLIOGRAPHY English Sources “western, adj., n.2, and adv.”. OED Online. September 2020. Oxford University Press. https://www.oed.com/view/ Entry/227911?rskey=NybAxz&result=3&isAdvanced=false (accessed November 24, 2020). “Art of Europe.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, November 23, 2019. https:// en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_of_Europe.

Belting, Hans. The Germans and their Art: A Troublesome Relationship. New Haven [Conn.]: Yale University Press, 1998.

Belting, Hans. Art History After Modernism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003.

Belting, Hans, Andrea Buddensieg, Emanoel Araújo, Internationales Forschungszentrum Kulturwissenschaften, and Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie Karlsruhe, “The Global Art World: Audiences, Markets, and Museums.”Germany: Hatje Cantz,2009.

Capistrano-Baker, Florina H. “WHITHER ART HISTORY? Whither Art History in the Non-Western World: Exploring the Other(‘s) Art Histories.” The Art Bulletin 97, no. 3 (2015): 246-57. Accessed November 18, 2020. http:// www.jstor.org/stable/43947739.

Elkins, James. Is Art History Global?. Vol. 3;3 , London;New York;: Routledge, 2007.

Elkins, James. Stories of Art, New York: Routledge, 2002.

Elkins, James and Jennifer Purtle. Chinese Landscape Painting as Western Art History. Hong Kong;London;: Hong Kong University Press, 2010.

Harris, Jonathan. 2006. Art History: The Key Concepts.

London;New York;: Routledge.

Mattos, Claudia. “WHITHER ART HISTORY?: Geography, Art Theory, and New Perspectives for an Inclusive Art History.” The Art Bulletin 96, no. 3 (2014): 259-64.www. jstor.org/stable/43188880.

Manthorne, Katherine. “Remapping American Art.” American Art 22, no. 3 (2008): 112-17. Accessed November 20, 2020. doi:10.1086/595811.

Yiyang, Shao. “Wither Art History? Wither Art History?” The Art Bulletin 98, no. 2 (2016): 147-50. Accessed November 18, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43948872.

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Figure 1. Probably made by Adrien Faizelot Delormec. Chest of Drawers (Commode). c. 17501765. Oak, black lacquer with raised chinoiserie decoration, gilt metal mounts, marble top.

Overall: 89.6 x 128.3 x 81.9 cm.

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland.

Figure 2. Made by Jean Henri Riesener.

Drop-front secretary (Secrétaire en armoire). c. 1783. Oak veneered with ebony and 17th-century Japanese lacquer; interiors veneered with tulipwood, amaranth, holly, and ebonized holly; gilt-bronze mounts; marble top; velvet (not original). Overall: 57 × 43 × 16 in (144.8 × 109.2 × 40.6 cm). The MET, New York.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

A ROYAL TASTE IN EXOTICISM THE IMPERIAL COURT OF MARIA TERESA IN VIENNA

Jingxian Jin, Washington University in St. Louis, 2023

The reader must imagine the reflected brilliancy of the azure-colored meadows of lacquer, the glitter of the gilded foliage, and lastly, the rainbow-like colors repeated by hundreds of prisms, and flashing like diamonds of the finest water.

— Karl Dieter von Dittersdorf, The Autobiography of Karl Von Dittersdorf

G

Figure 3. Dog-shaped Box on a Low Table. c. Japanese Edo period, late 17th–mid-18th century. Wood covered in lacquer. Box, 3 ¾ x 6 5/16 x 4 ½ in.; table, 2 3/8 x 9 1/16 x 5 in. Musée national des Châteaux de Versailles et de Trianon. Photo: Thierry Ollivier. © RMN–Grand Palais/ Art Resource, NY

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littering memories of the 24th September, 1754 could not be separated from the climax of the night, the one-act opera Le Cinesi (The Chinese Women), as Dittersdorf clearly titled the rest of this event in his autobiography, Chinese Opera. Lavish objects were displayed on the stage with Le Cinesi on that night, such as lacquers, wood cabinets with gilt decorations, and Bohemian glasses, which Dittersdolf commented “quite in the Chinese taste ”.1 In September 1754, Emperor Francis I and Empress Maria Theresa, with other Austrian royal families, paid a ceremonious visit to Scholosshof an der March, residence of Prince of Saxe-Hildburghausen2. The four-day event was broadly announced and carefully prepared for the royal families, including the opera Le Cinesi, which had a special bound to Empress Maria. Avid collector of chinoiserie art as she was, the Empress acted in the first public manifestation of this story for palace entertainment 19 years ago3. Young Maria sang as Lisinga, one of the three elite Chinese ladies who were killing their time through discussing and evaluating their represented styles of performing oprea------serious, pastoral and comic. However, no agreement was made and together the ladies decided to dance a ballet, “che non fa pianger, non secco e non offende” (which does not cause tears, does not bore and does not offend)4.

The political meaning contained in Empress Maria’s patronage of exotic objects, intertwined with the gender issues in the 18th century Austria court, not only reflected the Empress’ personal taste in exoticism, but also revealed her ambition to lead the Habsburg Monarchy to stand erect in Eurasian continent. Containing objects presented in rich materiality and commissions to artists all over Europe, Empress Maria’s collection of chinoiserie art created a glorified evolving Asian fantasy around her court, localized the foreign elements over time, and demonstrated the inclusiveness

within her Enlightened Absolutism reign.

“Workers in lacquer ”5 were identified by Dittersdolf at first sight. Lacquer was one of the most esteemed and sumptuous materials in the Western chinoiserie in the 18th century. It appeared in various types of objects ranging from tiny boxes, to large furnitures, and to wall decorations. The Coromandel lacquer (fig. 1) were usually imported from Henan Province in China and shipped through the Indian Coast6. Chinese craftsmen inscribed narrative figures and scenes on them, creating the otherworldly illusions in the eyes of westerners. The finest ones came from Japan, which often had glossy black surfaces decorated with elegant raised gold patterns (fig. 2)7.

Due to the rarity of lacquer, European designers and craftsmen prudently selected and cut off small scenes from imported lacquer panels and screens. Accordingly, more economical imitations of lacquer flourished. Vernis Marint from France and lacca povera (poor man’s lacquer) from Venice achieved their fame throughout Europe.

Empress Maria had a partiality for the lacquer and appreciated this material from its nature. “All the diamonds in the world are nothing to me. Objects made in India8, especially lacquered woods… are the only

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Figure 4. Franz Messmer. Empress Maria Theresa in Widow Costume, ca. 1770. 67 x 42.5 cm. Oil on canvas. Belvedere Museum, Vienna.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

The chinoiserie at the Vienna court was deeply influenced by foreign European taste. In Schonbrunn Palace, on the other side of a shared bedroom13 next to the Vieux Laque Room, is the Porcelain Room, the private study and game room of the royal couple and their children. The walls were decorated with 213 blue ink drawings contributed by the royal family members. These were copies of the French artist Jean Pillement’s design (fig. 5) for the court during his travel to Vienna from 1763 to 1765. A few copies of Boucher’s creations and an engraving after Watteau’s chinoiserie figures were also presented in this room.

The exquisite details and fine lines of these copies supported the oral tales at Schonbrunn that Pillement was tutoring the royal members in carrying out these chinoiserie drawings14. Different from the Porcelain Trianon at Louis XIV’s court, the Porcelain Room was the result of the internalization of chinoiserie. In the Vienna court, the exoticism is not a flaunting way to show off their wealth, but a modest way to practice and preserve their shared virtues. Through the hand of the royal members, the chinoiserie at court imperceptibly shaped the Viennese domestic atmosphere of creating chinoiserie art. On the national scale, the Habsburg manufacturing school and the Du Paquier 27

things that give me pleasure.”9 The luster and impermeability of the lacquer enchanted the Empress and she utilized her beloved lacquer in family issues to express her genuine concerns and blessings. Maria Theresa willed her cherished collection of lacquer boxes to her youngest daughter, Marie-Antoinette, the queen of France. These tiny exotic boxes travelled to Versailles, carrying a mixture of personal attachment and political implication (fig. 3). Moreover, after the sudden death of her husband Francis I in 1765, Empress Maria refurbished the Study of Francis I in Schonbrunn Palace and turned it into a lacquer room Vieux Laque Room. Wishes to longevity and immortality were poured into Empress Maria’s choice of lacquers, as well as her aspiration to an eternal dynasty. As her father didn’t have any male descendants, Maria became the Empress of Austria and suffered from domestic political turmoil since her early reign.

She carefully crafted the image of an Empress with masculine characteristics. Different from the delicate flowers in the blue-and-white porcelains, lacquer possessed the metaphorical qualities of solid seriousness10 and profound wisdom. Savvy as the Empress is, she was very concerned with the bankruptcy of the court, and often acquired lacquer from the inheritance of her father and from informal exchanges with noble members. Her appreciation to governance with sobriety and modesty was deeply connected with traditional Confucius ideology which were documented in the books on China that her ancestors collected in the imperial library since the 17th century11. The grandeur of the Vieux Laque Room brought deceiving fantasies to every viewer, implying the steady power of the nation and the importance of recovering the global trades. Empress Maria’s political aspirations were demonstrated through her insightful recognition and utilization of this exotic material.

Versatile as it was, lacquer inspired Empress Maria’s textiles as well. For the Empress, the impression of lacquer was one crucial aspect of public images she promoted for herself. Ever since the death of her husband Francis I, Maria has always had herself portrayed as a widow in black (fig. 4). Echoing with the misty brown background, the smoothy black velvet of her dress resembled the lustrous dark tone of the lacquer. Strength of the lacquer could be conveyed regardless of the size and material. In portraits like this, Empress Maria was not wearing any jewelry but decorated with “lacquer”. Indeed, Empress Maria appreciated lacquer heart and soul, but more importantly, the promotion of lacquer objects and illusions to lacquer enhanced the surrounding aura of the Empress and brought glorification to her reign12.

Figure 5. Jean Pillement. Figure from ‘Etudes De differentes figures Chinoises inventees et dessinees par J. Pillement, No. 2’, published London, c.1758. 20x 14cm. Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

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lost their meanings once they were separated from the original context. The context of the chinoiserie in Le Cinesi should be together with the Bohemian glasses (fig. 7), a distinctive type of glasses from near the land of Austria. Political conflicts between Bohemia and the Habsburg Monarchy arose ever since the early years and Bohemian’s demand for autonomy became more and more robust in the second half of the 18th century. Bohemian people were not satisfied with the Bohemian Diet in 1749, which stated the indivisible and centralized governance of the Habsburg Empire over the Lands of the Bohemian Crown. Bohemian

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Figure 6. Du Paquier Factory. Vases with coiling dragon. ca.

1725. Hard-paste porcelain with raised decoration painted with colored enamels over transparent glaze. Largest: 6 1/2 in. (16.5 cm). The MET, New York.

factory performed the same internalization and cultural confusion15 processes. Their production of laque de Vienne and porcelaine de Vienne (fig. 6) aimed to imitate the refined ones from Asia, and to compete with the general European imitation trend16. From the Porcelain Room for private leisure to the Vieux Laque Room for grand displays, the exoticism in the Schonbrunn Palace rises from privacy to authority. The hallucinating exoticism in the Vienna court kept spaces for royal intimacy but invited the outsiders to enter.

The Habsburg Monarchy established their tangible status through their fostering of local elite craftsmanship and gradually reinforced their intangible power among their European and Asian counterparts.

The 1754 Le Cinesi was deeply connected with the court of Empress Maria through the introduction of Silango, the ladies’ brother who just travelled back from Europe. With a casual European manner, he broke into the ladies’ rooms and interrupted their privacy.

In Chinese culture, no man is allowed to enter ladies’ inner court. The new version of the opera brought differences that caused tensions of conflicts between the East and West costumes, gender recognitions, and conventions. However, there was one type of objects often ignored in the discussion of this one-act opera, the Bohemian glasses17. The existence of exoticism objects

Figure 7. North Bohemian, Zenker Hut. Lidded cup with two hunting scenes. ca. 1720/30. Discolored glass, ground, cut, polished details. H. 32 cm, d. 10.2 cm. Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien, Kunstkammer.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW refers to the large area including the East and South Asia. were craving for their own Czech identity and inde- 9 Yonan, “Veneers of Authority,” 653. A quotation derives pendence18. In this opera setting, the Bohemian glassfrom a letter the empress wrote to Prince Joseph Wenzel es appeared as the localized background that set off Liechtenstein. the brilliance of the chinoiserie objects. However, the 10 Sund, 97-117.

Chinese objects are so distant from Austria that the 11 Gerd Kaminski and Else Unterrieder, Von Österreichern Bohemian glasses appeared relatively close. Foreign und Chinesen (Vienna: Europaverlag 1980), 28. objects in the past were turned into familiar domestic 12 Yonan, “Veneers of Authority,” 652-672. objects, so did the land of Bohemia to the Habsburg 13 Maria and Francis I’s shared bedroom, later occupied by Monarchy. Through the juxtaposition of exoticism Napoleon. Today it is named Napoleon Room. beliefs and objects, Empress Maria’s political goals of 14 Maria Gordon-Smith, “Jean Pillement at the Imperial Court expanding the boundaries and consolidating control of Maria Theresa and Francis I in Vienna (1763 to 1765)” in over the lands were well understood and celebrated Artibus et Historiae 25 (2004), 193. by the nobilities at court.

15 Yonan, “Veneers of Authority,” 665.

Privacy and publicity, feminine and masculine, the 16 Jennifer Milliam, “Single Title Reviews, Empress Maria court of Maria Theresa presented an exquisite blend of Theresa and the Politics of Habsburg Imperial Art by Michael tastes in exoticism, conveying the Empress’s absolute Yunan (review)” in Eighteenth-Century Studies 46 (2013), power in the patriarchal society. Music and visual art 576. went together to celebrate the peaceful ambience of 17 Dittersdolf’s response to the display of these objects: “…but the country. Viennese artists incorporated ingenuity their chief brilliancy depended on prismatic poles of glass, into their reflections to various cultures circulating in which had been polished by Bohemian craftsmen, and were the 18th century. East and West meant here, colliding carefully fitted into one another in empty places, previously the harmonic convergence that inspired later artists soaked in color oils. ” for centuries. In response to the enlightenment revo- 18 Jaroslav Pánek, Oldřich Tůma, A History of the Czech lution, Maria Theresa strived to lead the country with Lands (Prague: Karolinum Press, 2009), 207-253, 287-311.

Of Imperial Self: The Austrian Contexts Of Metastasio’s China Operas.” Eighteenth Century Music 13, no.1 (2016): 11-34.

Jingxian Jin is a second-year student at Washington Dittersdorf, Karl Dieter von. The Autobiography of Karl Von University in St. Louis with a double-major in Art HisDittersdorf, Dictated to His Son. London:R. Bentley, 1896. tory and Economics and minors in Art and Philosophy.

Gordon-Smith, Maria. “Jean Pillement at the Imperial Court of Maria Theresa and Francis I in Vienna (1763 to 1765).”

ENDNOTES Artibus et Historiae 25, no.50 (2004): 187-213.

1 Karl Dieter von Dittersdorf, The Autobiography of Karl Von Kaminski, Gerd, and Else Unterrieder. Von Österreichern Dittersdorf, Dictated to His Son (London: R. Bentley 1896), und Chinesen. Vienna: Europaverlag, 1980.

70.

Loppert, Max. “Gluck’s Chinese Ladies: an Introduction.”

2 Price of Saxe-Hildburghausen was the Generalfeldmarschall The Musical Times 125, no.1696 (1984): 321-323+325. (general field marshal) in the Habsburg Monarchy.

Milliam, Jennifer.

“Single Title Reviews, Empress Maria 3 Max Loppert, “Gluck’s Chinese Ladies: an Introduction” in Theresa and the Politics of Habsburg Imperial Art by The Musical Times 125 (1984), 322.

Michael Yonan (review).”

Eighteenth-Century Studies 46, 4 Jen-Yen Chen, “Maria Theresia And The ‘Chinese’ Voicing no.4 (2013): 575-577.

Of Imperial Self: The Austrian Contexts Of Metastasio’s ChiMorley, John. The History of Furniture: Twenty-five Centuna Operas” in Eighteenth Century Music 13 (2016), 14. ries of Style and Design in the Western Tradition. New York: 5 Dittersdorf, 70.

Little, Brown and Company, 1999.

6 Judy Sund, Exotic, A Fetish for the Foreign (London: PhaidPánek, Jaroslav and Oldřich Tůma. A History of the Czech on Press Limited 2019), 97-117.

Lands. Prague: Karolinum Press, 2009.

7 John Morley, The History of Furniture: Twenty-five CentuSund, Judy. Exotic, A Fetish for the Foreign. London: Phaidries of Style and Design in the Western Tradition (New York: on Press Limited, 2019.

Little, Brown and Company 1999), 280.

Yonan, Michael E. “Veneers of Authority: Chinese Lacquers 8 Michael E. Yonan, “Veneers of Authority: Chinese Lacquers in Maria Theresa’s Vienna.” Eighteen-Century Studies 3, no. in Maria Theresa’s Vienna” in Eighteen-Century Studies 3 4 (2004): 652-672.

(2004), 653. Noted by Yonan, India is a general term here that

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an inclusive political balance between absolutism and relative tolerance. The spirits of humanity shone in the BIBLIOGRAPHY 18th century history, reflecting the varnished lights of Chen, Jen-Yen. “Maria Theresia And The ‘Chinese’ Voicing the rococo art it left.

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THE ORNAMENTAL ORIENTAL: HOW PLAYBOY USED CHINA LEE TO PERPETUATE ASIAN STEREOTYPES DURING THE VIETNAM WAR Kelli Reitzfeld, University of Southern California, 2021 CHINA DOLL, LOTUS BLOSSOM, GEISHA. EXOTIC, DRAGON LADY, LITTLE BROWN FUCKING MACHINE POWERED BY RICE.

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T

he “Asian Mystique” is not new, nor is it accidental. It is not harmless, natural, or scientific. It is, however, just one of many tools in the “vast control mechanism of colonialism, designed to justify and perpetuate European dominance.”1 This “fantasy of the exotic, indulging, decadent, sexual Orient [has led to Westerners perceiving] women of Asian heritage as docile and subservient.”2 From 17th century French novelist Flaubert, who publicized that “[Oriental women] never spoke for herself,”3 to 1970’s sexologist Howard S. Levy, who advertised that “[Japanese women were trained to] cater to male sexuality and egotism through her inculcated desire to please,”4 to the present-day, slew of “Japanese school girl,” “Asian teen,” and “Torture”5 pornography, these limited (but canonized) sources of Asian representation serves two purposes. First, to otherize Asian women6, and second, to “maintain the supremacy of the dominant class.”7 Thus, the stereotype of Asian women being a glorified, hypersexual plaything for Western men continues to echo through space and time—especially during the Vietnam War when an Asian woman’s “only utility to Westerners came from their sexual submission.”8 Moreover, American soldiers’ struggle with masculinity and conformity during the War called for a resurgence of the Asian fetish. And Playboy picked up. In August 1964, Playboy debuted China Lee, the first Chinese-American and woman-of-color Playmate model. This paper will specifically focus on her Playboy spreads to analyze and contextualize these sexist and racist stereotypes and argue that her inclusion in Playboy August 1964 and April 1965 were far from a progressive step towards diversity. Instead, China Lee’s photoshoots and corresponding literature preyed off the widespread sexually imperialistic mindset towards Asian/American women during the Vietnam War. In both her images and texts, Playboy deliberately highlighted her Eastern heritage and minimized her Western upbringing by subtly integrating callbacks of prejudice ideas against, and photographs of, Asian prostitutes. As a result, Playboy villainized

Lee’s nudeness, and thus perpetuated the stereotype of the exotic “Mysterious Orient,” which made her (and thereby other Asian women) just obtainable enough to Western men.

VIETNAM, WHERE EAST MET WEST

Before delving into Playboy and China Lee’s problematic photoshoots, it is first crucial to establish how deeply rooted the hatred and desire for Asian women was during the Vietnam War. Between 19551975, the United States shipped almost three million soldiers to Vietnam, and their presence made Saigon “an icon of the sex tour industry,”9 infamously dubbing it the “American Brothel.”10 One reason why the sex industry blossomed was because within these tightknit groups of men, masculinity was proved and determined through sexual performance. Much like how he would earn his manhood though combat, “sexual violence against women [also functioned] as the fundamental ‘tool of war.’”11 Preparators didn’t feel guilty though. “Asian women could not be raped because she ‘enjoyed’ the sexual conquest,”12 they said; prostitution in Asia was justified because Asian societies were “less developed and sophisticated, and therefore inferior,”13 they argued. This attitude resulted in grim consequences. Rape and sexual violence against Asian women were tolerated, encouraged even, because of how rampant—how causally—it occurred.”14 Local sex workers repeatedly reported “being treated like a toy or a pig by American soldiers [who required them to do] ‘three holes’ (oral, vaginal, and anal), [which] reaffirmed the Westerner’s perception of Asian women as sex objects.”15

The photographs that came from South East Asian brothels depicted this oppression in two eerie ways. First, images like Gillies Carnon’s The Vietnam War (fig. 1) portrayed a grinning Vietnamese prostitute sitting on the lap of a blank-faced solider. She was so eager, so excited, so honored to kiss a Western man that she was blurry from moving too fast for the camera to capture. Meanwhile, his indifference to her implied that 1) these “sexual Oriental” women were so plentiful and willing that her extreme lust for him was just “business as usual,” and 2) he was in control.

He was in power. He did not need to “woo” women

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MAGAZINES AND MAGAZINES: PLAYBOY AND THE VIETNAM WAR-ERA ATTITUDES

Playboy’s role in perpetuating this sexually imperialistic mindset was nothing to scoff at. But because of the magazine’s suggestive subject, many critics dismissed it as just another masturbatory aid. From there, Playboy gained the notorious reputation of “entrapping young American men [in a state-of-mind] where bachelorhood [was] a desired state and bikini-clad girls [were] overdressed, where life [was] a series of dubious sex thrills.”22 This sentiment mirrored the larger societal culture war between many American soldiers and conservative religious/civil leaders. These leaders “warned of the social dangers of moral laxity”23 that accompanied the “[beguiled] promise of indulgent and unabashed pleasure [overseas that caused young men to] throw off their work ethic.”24 Here, not only did moral conservatives highlight and make mainstream the stereotype that “promised” men sex from Asian women abroad, their perception

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here, like he presumably would with “picky” or “good moralled”16 women in the States because of how desirable he was to Asian women. The lack of Westerners used to be a cornerstone in “picturesque views of the Orient,”17 but now that he could be seen in the same photograph as her, she was obtainable—conquerable. And, in this image, the woman was a mere prop to communicate this overarching, Western-dominating message.

Second, in Nik Wheeler’s American GIs and Vietnamese Prostitutes (fig. 2), an Asian woman’s “submission” and “hypersexuality,” as well as Saigon’s rape culture was reinforced. In this photograph, he surrounded her with a power stance—notice his visible muscles, lunged leg, and arm on the wall. Even if she was there willingly, she could not easily leave. Meanwhile, she passively “allowed” him to grope her breast, as her arms were to her sides and her posture slightly stiff. He knew his hand-positioning was crude though—one could tell by his boyish smirk, the woman’s uncomfortable side-eye to the camera, and the un-intimateness of the publicly occupied space. Her smile was a bit off too, even disingenuous compared to the woman in fig. 1, as though she was silently screaming for Wheeler to help. Then, the backside of her hand subtly and politely pushed the G.I. back near his thigh—hidden to not arouse anger in the men (especially given her inherently lower status and assumed consent) and impersonal to not arouse him. This incorrectly assumed consent was likely why neither him nor her were looking at each other and why his eyes were exclusively glued to her breast, only acknowledging the parts of her he had interest in. Still, despite her awkward body language and a perverted hand on her breast, the two people in the foreground continued their conversation as normal, and the two G.I.s outside smiled as they watched their fellow solider grope a Vietnamese woman. They found it entertaining that he used her like an object with which to take “humorous” photos.

What these two photos had in common was its “attempt at documentary realism,” a symptom of Orientalism.18 These photographs were made to look like the “readily-available sexuality” of Asian women were factual and definite. Especially considering the Vietnam War was the first televised and widely photographed war, cameras were a symbol of news and objective truth. As if, American soldiers had tapped into a novel and legitimate resource that they were enthusiastic to share back home. Consequently, these images, amongst a plethora of artifacts, enabled American men to bring “back to the United States their stereotypes of Asian women as ‘cute, doll-like, and unassuming, with extraordinary sexual powers;”19 This “became an expectation White men had of all women of Asian descent.”­20 As a result, half a century after the war subsided, “several million tourists from Europe and the United Stated visited Thailand annually, many of them specially for its sex industry”21—an industry that continues to boom today because of the same dangerously outdated stereotype against Asian women.

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Figure 1. Gillies Caron, The Vietnam War (US soldier with Vietnamese prostitute), 1967, gelatin silver print.

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Figure 2. Nik Wheeler, American GIs and Vietnamese Prostitutes during Vietnam War 1969, 1969, gelatin silver print.

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also villainized these women too. Moral conservatives implied that it was her fault, her promiscuity, her evil seductiveness—not his disgusting violence—that would ultimately lead to his reduced work ethic and the eventual downfall of America.

Moreover, moral conservatives also blamed Playboy for propagating and promoting hypersexuality during tense wartimes. They protested that the magazine’s message would discourage men and women from “[fulfilling] their traditional duties as husband and wife [and] the country would lack the stability necessary to battle the Soviets.”25 Consequently, America found itself in a “crisis of masculinity.”26 Meanwhile, men faced social pressures to conform to the traditional pre-war wife/ kids/picket fence status quo when many wanted to experiment with their masculinity via the casual sex—which was uncoincidentally synonymous with Asian prostitutes—that they read about in Playboy.

However, the truth about Playboy’s following was much more complex. The nude models only accounted for a sliver of Playboy’s early popularity. Instead, its success among soldiers was largely contributed to the fact that the adamantly anti-war magazine gave dissatisfied and frustrated soldiers an outlet to vent about Vietnam.27 By luring men somewhat by nude photos but mostly through recognition, validation, and camaraderie, Hugh Hefner’s publication was able to connect with American soldiers in Vietnam and helped them understand society, culture, and politics in ways that appealed to them. In other words, the magazine provided a much-needed escape into affluence and extravagance and consumerism and mobility and gentlemanliness outside of service.28

In return, their loyal following elevated Hefner’s “girlie mag” into a dependable tastemaker, an authoritative teacher-of-life, and a role model of sorts. Thus, Playboy was not a trivial pornographic publication; men looked to Playboy for guidance in such uncertain and masculine-confused times.

So, when “Playboy denounced conformity… [and espoused] the virtues of embracing sexuality”29 to men who learned to yearn for Hefner’s “revolutionary” sex-filled bachelor life, Playboy’s message was deeper than just intercourse. It was a lifestyle of reclaiming his powerful masculinity through multiple facets of life. With unnerving detail, Gentleman’s Quarterly (GQ)’s article titled “Oriental Girls” described how Western men used Asian women as a “lifestyle” to restore their toxic masculinity:

When you get home from another hard day on the planet, she comes into your existence, removes your clothes, bathes you and walks naked on your back to relax you…She’s fun you see,

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Left: Figure 3. Pompeo Posar, Miss August (China Lee Centerfold), 1964, offset lithography.

Figure 4. Pompeo Posar, China Doll, 1964, offset lithography.

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and so uncomplicated. She doesn’t go to assertiveness-training classes, insist on being treated like a person, fret about career moves, wield her orgasm as a non-negotiable demand…She’s there when you need shore leave from those angry feminist seas.

She’s a handy victim of love or a symbol of the rape of third world nations, a real trouper.30

Therefore, China Lee’s nudes in the August 1964 issue was less about surface-level sexuality.

Rather, it stood for the systemic oppression against “well-trained” Asian women, which made men feel dominant “in the home, workplace, and the world”21 though sex. His obsession with Asian women was likely “motivated by an antifeminist backlash in men who wished to return to traditional gender roles supposedly exemplified by the demure, obedient Asian woman.”32 On top of that, her soft features and shorter stature was “the perfect complement to the exaggerated masculinity of the White man.”33 At any rate, Playboy’s inclusion of an Asian-American woman, given the social climate, made China Lee—and other Asian/American women—a part of that “taboo” and “degenerative” rhetoric that much of society condemned.

CHINA LEE IN PLAYBOY’S AUGUST 1964 ISSUE

Hugh Hefner framed China Lee’s addition in the August 1964 issue as progressive—he declared that he “bucked social convention and chose to include any woman who met the Playboy ideal of beauty, no matter their race.”34 Although, this did not explain why he chose China Lee, a Chinese-American model, specifically at this exact point-in-time, before, for example, Jennifer Jackson, the first Black (and second woman-of-color) Playmate who appeared in the March 1965 issue.

While, “the conflation of Asian women with sexual availability was [already] firmly established in many readers’ mind”35 and on-brand with Playboy, upon deeper investigation, the answer was a bit more political.

As previously mentioned, many American soldiers used Playboy as a morale booster—a much needed pick-me-up after it became clear that the Vietnam War was a “civil war, a nationalist movement, or an isolated Communist insurgency with no ties to the People’s Republic of China or the Soviet Union.”36 However, tensions escalated in Vietnam, climaxing when Congress passed the

Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which granted Lyndon B. Johnson the ability “to bomb North Vietnam without a formal declaration of war.”37 During this time, many men already lost hope after they sacrificed everything for a seemingly unwinnable war few even wanted to participate in. So, when the government provoked the war further, it was demoralizing. This was where China Lee came in. Playboy provided these dispirited men with China Lee’s centerfold (fig. 3) that he could masturbate to whenever and however he wanted, for “the connection between sexual possession and murder [would give him] absolute enjoyment.”38 The logic was identical to why there was so much sexual violence in Saigon: “the [sexual] conquest of Asian women correlated with the conquest of Asia itself.”39 Thus, if these soldiers could not feel direct satisfaction and pride from defeating communism in Northern Vietnam (and indirectly People’s Republic of China) in real life, fig. 3 could at least provide him with a substitute that instantly gratified. That is to say, regardless of the War’s outcome, in his head, he won.

Figure 3, China Lee’s centerfold, is also worth formally exploring. Her pose and backdrop were uncannily close to the prostitute’s in fig. 2 to remind the viewer that Lee was powerless to his control. Like in fig. 2, she was pinned against a wall, but in this photo and unlike the other, her demeanor was much more relaxed. This told the viewer that she didn’t need a G.I. to threaten her from leaving because she wasn’t going anywhere nor would she (hypothetically) stop the viewer from touching her. Then, Posar, the photographer, invited the viewer in to stand next to her, allowing him to grope her like the G.I. in fig.2, by skewing China Lee to the left and leaving an empty space to the right. He would see that her breasts were in clear view; however, there was still some mystery.

There was a miniscule air of secrecy between her hips and pelvis—only hidden by an unsecured cloth she tenderly grasped with her fingertips, just barely out of reach of him. This maintained the distant “Mysterious Orient” stereotype: that Asia and Asian/Americans were forever foreigners who Westerners would never completely see or understand all of. Similarly, the translucent curtain in the background, too, made some objects (like the circular lighting fixture in the back) recognizable, yet what was beyond top-secret no matter how many gleaning peaks and glances Westerners Right: Figure 5. Pompeo Posar, Untitled (China Lee Bunnies of Chicago), 1964, offset lithography.

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took. That way, he could imagine the “Orient” and Asian women to be anything he wanted them to be.

However, the literature attached to China Lee’s Playboy centerfold certainly didn’t mitigate any stereotypes either. First and foremost, her spread was titled “China Doll,” (fig. 4) a blanket slur used against (submissive) women of any Asian ethnicity. Although China Lee was of Chinese descent, she and her eight siblings were born-and-raised in Louisiana. She was of American nationality and identified at such; however, Playboy made sure to highlight her “Chineseness” when they called her “China Doll” and an “Oriental charmer”40 in the article’s subtitle. Both these “nicknames” were bizarre because even though her chosen stage name itself was rather derogatory already, the writer still did not call her by her preferred name as though she was subhuman (like the GQ excerpt suggested). Instead, they made her generic, identity-less by using offensively vague terms like “Oriental” when her ethnicity was literally in her name. In contrast, when Jennifer Jackson, the first Black model, got her spread the next year, “Playboy [got] praise because ‘not once was there mention of [Jackson’s] race… [and she thought] it was a blessing to see her treated as another citizen and human being.”41 Hence, this racist treatment was solely due to Lee’s Chinese heritage. Even though there are horribly pejoratives towards Black women like ‘Jezebel,’ Playboy opportunistically capitalized on the Vietnam War and the resulting heightened sexual imperialism of the “Mysterious Orient.”

Furthermore, the author of Lee’s accompanying literature tried to justify Playboy’s overt Orientalism by “insisting on [including a] plethora of authenticating details, especially on what might be called unnecessary ones.”42 Thereby, he reframed the “would-be” racism into an educational read—as though China Lee spoke for all Asian/Americans. First, he quoted China Lee saying, “Though I was born in America, my folks still follow Oriental ways: They speak the old language, read the old books, and follow old customs”43 to reiterate how “the Oriental world [was] a world without change, a world of timeless, atemporal customs and rituals, untouched by the historical processes that were ‘improving’ Western societies.”44 Not only had the notion of “old” and “the Orient” been used to justify White-man’s-burden type of (sexual) imperialism in Asia, the author also included it because it qualified her “Americanness.” She noted that she was raised in the United States, and presumably had gone through the same American school system, brought up on the same American cultural references, and for all intents-and-purposes was as American as her Western reader. However, that clashed with her “Asian” look and messed with the “Asian aura” market appeal,

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so by mentioning her parents’—not her— othering behaviors, some of the mystery was preserved. China Lee had been “successfully” exoticized. Her public perception was likely to be sufficiently Asian to perform the submissive sexual acts that Western men sought after, yet just American enough to conform into society as the bring-home-to-your-parents type woman—the best of both worlds.

Another peculiar way the author brought in China Lee’s parents as an attempt to otherize her was when he mentioned that she was the only one “not now in the Oriental restaurant line.”45 In addition to reinforcing the impression that “Oriental” people did not “evolve” by remarking her whole family worked the same job, this was also a subtle allusion to the bar girls in Vietnam that American soldiers often frequented.

In Vietnam, it was a well-known fact that “restaurants” were used as a cover for brothels.46 Subsequently, because Lee’s parents operate in “old Oriental” ways, it was plausible that these soldiers connected the “restaurants” he knew in Vietnam with the Lee’s business. Thereby, this (incorrectly) reaffirmed his assumption that China Lee was just like any other Asian prostitute they had encountered in the War. Still, returning to the point that Orientalism often included unnecessary details to appear credible, it’s objectively weird that this article—that prefaced her nude centerfold that men would masturbate to and fantasize about—mentioned her family at all. Her parents, nonetheless.

Then, later in the August 1964 issue of Playboy, China Lee emerged again in “The Bunnies of Chicago” feature (fig. 5) as the only nude model on the page. It’s kind of uncomfortable to look at. She looked out of place. But that’s what Playboy wanted their viewers to think. From her spread earlier, the reader learned that she came from an environment where “men [dominated] and females [were] forced into the background,”47 such that “for a Playmate like China Lee, rebellion meant taking her clothes off for a national men’s magazine.”48 So when men felt “wrong” for enjoying China Lee’s nudity, him and her shared a “dirty little secret.” This set of images brought back an exciting sense of upheaval on both sides. White men were still pressured to conform and settle down with a White wife (as interracial marriage had yet to be legalized) and she defied her family by posing nude and not working at the restaurant.49 That’s how the magazine “invited [viewers] to sexually identify with, yet morally distance himself from, his Oriental

counterpart within the objectively inciting yet racially distancing space.”50 It maintained his perceived Western dominance (for HE is the one who needed the distance to save face) and her “Oriental inferiority.”

In conclusion, Playboy cultivated a sense that Lee and the viewer both knew it was wrong to indulge in such (interracial) pleasures. However, this made her “Oriental” sexuality and life that much more tempting and within reach to Western audiences. And, that’s

Figure 6. Artist Unknown, Untitled (Kanaka), n.d., offset lithography.

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exactly the counterculture lifestyle Playboy promoted.

Playboy also sold this obtainable “Orient” and the forever foreigner stereotype in their August 1964 issue though advertisements, such as “Kanaka” (fig. 6), which capitalized on the new kitschy appreciation for Asian and Polynesian culture during the war.51 Interestingly, the name “Kanaka” actually did specify a locale, even if the ad itself didn’t. Kanaka translated to “a person of Hawaiian descent”—not some faraway exotic place the customer was let on to be. Just like when Playboy called China Lee “China Doll” and an “Oriental Charmer” despite her ethnicity clearly stated in her stage name, Kanaka substituted Hawaii for “islands” and “Polynesian” for what—at this point—was an American state. Symbolically, like China Lee and other Asian-Americans, no matter how “American” they may be, they would perpetually be exoticized and mythicized because of their Asian/ Pacific Islander heritage. China Lee’s spread and ads like these made sure to keep the “Orient” distinct, yet conveniently at an arm’s reach, which maintained the mysticism and perpetuated the exotic stereotypes of the other.

CONCLUSION

Playboy did not create the stereotype of submissive, sexually available Asian women—that would be attributed to the centuries of justifying Western imperialism. However, Playboy did perpetuate it. The

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CHINA LEE IN PLAYBOY’S APRIL 1965 ISSUE

China Lee made one more return to Playboy in April 1965 for their “Playmate Playoffs,” a competition in which three models vied for the title “Playmate of the Year.” As the first Chinese-American and woman-of-color, Lee’s name on the ballot may seem like a step towards recognition and representation, but Playboy’s sexually imperialistic ways did not change much from the year prior. For one, her name was written in a very subtle Wonton font, to communicate her quietly reserved stereotypical persona—despite her famously talkative, outgoing, and social attitude.

In contrast, the names of the two other White candidates were much livelier and louder and flamboyantly demonstrated her unique personality.

Then, on China Lee’s “campaign page,” she was quoted saying, “a vote for me would serve notice to the entire world that the popular image of the shy and retiring Oriental female is long overdue for a change.”52 However, given the two photos Posar took of China Lee (fig. 7), that stereotype was very much perpetuated. She didn’t want to be associated with being “shy,” but her reserved smile and the minimal lighting on her face in both images said otherwise.

She was hidden, likely for Playboy to preserve that “long overdue” mystery of Asian/American women.

And, her expression was seductive but not excitable.

In the image on the left, she used the couch to coyly conceal her breast. And in the larger photograph to the right, her body was bashfully turned, to not give away her entire self. Even though China Lee was celebrated for being personable and her career in adult modeling was illustrative of her confidence, Playboy, once again, used her stereotypical “Asian-ness” to construct a more “palatable” narrative.

Finally, China Lee had one final request: that her winning “would be to show every young Oriental girl how silly it is to hide her beauty for tradition’s sake,”53 which was ironic considering her face was enveloped by darkness. But to a larger point, China Lee said she wanted to use her fame and platform to elevate the self-esteem of young Asian women all over the world and show them that they were beautiful too.

She had a point—given Playboy’s and Western society’s historic obsession with blond-haired-blue-eyed models, the implied “inferior ugliness” was instilled into Asian/Americans like Lee. At any rate, China Lee had forgone her American nationality to highlight her Chinese heritage (though she did not particularly identity with it) in order to promote a legitimate, and unexpectedly wholesome, point.

However, there was something unsettling here. Playboy’s main audience wasn’t young Asian/American females looking for role models; Playboy’s main message wasn’t necessarily for social justice. So, when Playboy conveyed her morals surrounded by her pornographic nudes, the delivery was off—as though telling Asian/American women they were only beautiful if they posed naked for a world-wide gentlemen’s magazine. In other words, were of sexual use to Western men. Having known China Lee’s desire to redefine the Asian stereotype and having read her wish, then finding out she wasn’t crowned “Playmate of the Year” also checked another box of Orientalist erotica: that her “nakedness was more pitied than censured.”54 One couldn’t help but feel sorry that she exposed her curves to express a virtuous objective in a not-so-virtuous competition—presumably to tell young Asian/American women things she wished she was told growing up—only to fall flat.

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magazine used China Lee to bandwagon off the simultaneous hatred and lust for Asian/American women during the Vietnam War by constantly reminding the reader of her Chinese heritage and undermining her Western upbringing. Her spread was used to legitimize the “exotic Oriental” prejudice that penetrated everyday life for women of Asian descent, and her photographs operated as a proxy for American soldiers to feel masculine at the expense of said women. However, it’s hard to argue that Lee’s spread paved the way for progressive change and diversity. Since Playboy began in 1953, the publication would go on to only feature eight other Asian/American Playmates, each spread exhibiting similar, more grotesque, more flagrant symptoms of exoticism, Orientalism, and Western sexual imperialism of Asian/American women than the one before. Despite China Lee’s attempt to tackle these racist and sexist stereotypes, when Playboy purposefully stressed her Chinese heritage, the magazine only mainstreamed, and made obtainable, the “Mysterious Orient.” Lee was not a trailblazer, but rather a victim, for it seems like this outdated, age-old stereotype is not going anywhere.

Kelli Reitzfeld is a fourth-year student of Business Administration, Art History, Public Policy, and Law at the University of Southern California. Reitzfeld is also a first-year graduate student of Architecture at USC. ENDNOTES Linda Nochlin, “The Imaginary Orient” in The Politics of Vision: Nineteenth Century Art and Society (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1991), 34.

2 Carrie Pitzulo, “Introduction” in Bachelors and Bunnies: The Sexual Politics Playboys (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2011), 6.

3 Edward Said, “Introduction” in Orientalism (New York, NY: Pantheon Books, 1978), 6.

4 Howard S. Levy, “Introduction” in Oriental Sex Manners (Holborn, London: New English Library Limited from Barnard’s Inn, 1972), 7.

5 Sunny Woan, “White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence” (Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice, 2008), 292.

6 Robin Zheng, “Why Yellow Fever Isn’t Flattering: A Case Against Racial Fetishes” (Journal of the American Philosophical Association, 2016), 408.

7 Woan, “White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence,” 279.

8 Woan, 300.

9 Woan, 281.

10 Amanda Boczar, “Uneasy Allies: The Americanization of Sexual Polices in South Vietnam” (The Journal of American-East Asian Relations, 2015), 220.

11 Woan, “White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence,” 285.

12 Woan, 286.

13 Woan, 285.

14 Woan, 285.

15 Woan, 286.

16 Pitzulo, “Introduction,” 6.

17 Nochlin, “The Imaginary Orient,” 36.

18 Nochlin, 33.

1

Woan, “White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence,” 292.

20 Woan, 292.

21 Woan, 284.

22 Elizabeth Fraterrigo, “Introduction” in Playboy and the Making of the Good Life in Modern America, (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2009), 1.

23 Fraterrigo, “Introduction,” 2.

24 Carrie Pitzulo, “The Pulchritudinous Playmates” in Bachelors and Bunnies: The Sexual Politics Playboys (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2011), 60.

25 Pitzulo, “Introduction,” 3.

26 Pitzulo, 3.

27 Amber Batura, “The ‘Playboy’ Way: ‘Playboy’ Magazine, Soldiers, and the Military in Vietnam,” (Liden, Netherlands: Brill, 2015), 225.

28 Batura, 223.

29 Batura, 222.

30 Woan, “White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence,” 279.

31 Pitzulo, “Introduction,” 3.

32 Zheng, “Why Yellow Fever Isn’t Flattering: A Case Against Racial Fetishes,” 405.

33 Woan, “White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence,” 279.

34 Batura. “The ‘Playboy’ Way: ‘Playboy’ Magazine, Soldiers, and the Military in Vietnam,” 229.

35 Batura, 229.

36 Batura, 232.

37 Batura, 229.

38 Nochlin, “The Imaginary Orient,” 43.

39 Woan, “White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence,” 282.

40 ­ “China Doll” in Playboy vol. 11 no. 8 (New York, NY: 19

41

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Figure 7. Pompeo Posar, China Lee, 1965, offset lithography.

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ISSUE Nº20 | POWER Playboy Press, 1964), 68.

41 Batura, “The ‘Playboy’ Way: ‘Playboy’ Magazine, Soldiers, and the Military in Vietnam,” 230.

42 Nochlin, “The Imaginary Orient,” 38.

43 “China Doll,” 68.

44 Nochlin, “The Imaginary Orient,” 35-36.

45 “China Doll.” 68.

46 Boczar, “Uneasy Allies: The Americanization of Sexual Polices in South Vietnam,” 216.

47 “China Doll,” 68.

48 Pitzulo, “The Pulchritudinous Playmates,” 61.

49 “China Doll,” 68.

50 Nochlin, “The Imaginary Orient,” 45.

51 Pitzulo, “The Pulchritudinous Playmates,” 60.

52 “Playmate Playoffs” in Playboy vol. 12, no. 4 (New York, NY: Playboy Press, 1965), 112.

53 “Playmate Playoffs,” 112.

54 Nochlin, “The Imaginary Orient,” 44.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Batura, Amber. “The ‘Playboy’ Way: ‘Playboy’ Magazine, Soldiers, and the Military in Vietnam.” In The Journal of American-East Asian Relations, 3rd ed., 22:221–42. Lieden, Netherlands: Brill, 2015.

Boczar, Amanda. “Uneasy Allies: The Americanization of Sexual Policies in South Vietnam.” The Journal of American-East Asian Relations 22, no. 3 (October 1, 2015): 187–220.

Fraterrigo, Elizabeth. “Introduction.” In Playboy and the Making of the Good Life in Modern America, 1–14. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Levy, Howard. Oriental Sex Manners. 1st ed. Holborn, London: New English Library Limited from Barnard’s Inn, 1972.

Nochlin, Linda. “The Imaginary Orient.” In The Politics of Vision, 1st ed., 33–59. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1991.

Pitzulo, Carrie. “Introduction.” In Bachelors and Bunnies: The Sexual Politics of Playboys, 1–70. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2011.

Playboy. New York, NY: Playboy Press, August 1964.

“Playmate Play-Off.” Playboy, 115-122. New York, NY: Playboy Press, April 1965.

Said, Edward. “Introduction.” In Orientalism, 1–28. New York, NY: Pantheon Books, 1978.

Woan, Sunny. “White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence.” Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice 14, no. 2 (March 1, 2008): 275–301.

Zheng, Robin. “Why Yellow Fever Isn’t Flattering: A Case Against Racial Fetishes.” Journal of the American Philosophical Association 2, no. 3 (October 3, 2016): 400–419.

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R

Elizabeth Dudley, Northwestern University, 2024

eligious art is a pillar of early modern European art. It chronicles the power and purse of the Renaissance papacy, the bitter divide of the Protestant Reformation, and the revival of the Catholic Counter-Reformation. Even as artistic style changed from Gothic to High Renaissance to Mannerism to Baroque, the desire to convey religious messages through art remained present. Religious subjects allowed artists to display technical skill and spiritual depth. One such example of this is Luisa Roldán’s sculpture The Entombment of Christ, which demonstrates Roldán’s precise technique in representations faithful to reality, known as naturalism, framed by a pious narrative. The Entombment of Christ surpasses the spiritual and emotional power of previous works such as Michelangelo’s Pietà to embody the artistic desires of the Counter-Reformation through the sculpture’s naturalism and intimate scale.

Understanding the religious aspects of The Entombment of Christ requires understanding Christianity in Europe and its relationship to the arts. Roman Catholicism dominated the region for centuries, until

Martin Luther published Ninety-five Theses in 1517.

The document criticized the Catholic church’s practices such as selling indulgences, creating a schism. New religions such as Lutheranism and Calvinism sprang up, dividing countries by their faiths. Spain, the home country of Luisa Roldán, remained Roman Catholic, while other countries such as the Dutch Republic turned to Protestant faiths. The Protestant Reformation didn’t just affect religious identity – it also affected religions’ relationship with art. Before the schism, the Christian theology of images guided the purpose of religious art. According to Thomas Aquinas, religious art served to educate the illiterate, remember the mystery of incarnation, and effectively inspire deeper devotion.1 However, after the Protestant Reformation, the Catholic Church underwent intense self-examination at the Council of Trent. New guidelines for sacred art emerged, pushing for close adherence to doctrine, appropriate modesty, and devoutness.2 Therefore, as schisms rocked the Europe and Catholic Church, Catholic art emphasized textually accurate devotion. The standards from the Council of Trent quickly became

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Figure 1, 2. Roldán, Luisa, “The Entombment of Christ”, 1700-1701, polychrome terracottta, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

the norm for Catholic patrons and artists alike.

Just as understanding the religious context of Europe furthers understanding of this sculpture, so does understanding the context of Luisa Roldán’s life and the production of this piece. Luisa Roldán lived in Spain from 1652 to 1706. She began her artistic career at a young age in her father’s atelier, training alongside the rest of her family. In 1689, she traveled to Madrid, finding patronage with the court of King Charles II of Spain by 1692.3 King Philip V assumed the throne in 1700, providing an opportunity for Roldán to further advance her position.4 She created The Entombment of Christ from 1700-1701 as a gift for the king, seeking to gain his favor and earn the position of royal court sculptor.5 The sculpture appealed to the king’s interest in religion, providing an exquisitely crafted object to guide devotional meditation.6 Therefore, following Counter-Reformation traditions in art and the preferences of her potential patron, Roldán imbued The Entombment of Christ with elements that encouraged and enhanced devout contemplation.

The Entombment of Christ encourages religious contemplation by capturing the intense emotions of a moment from the passion of Christ. The passion of Christ chronicles the suffering, death, and miraculous rising from the dead of Jesus Christ. Italian depictions of the Passion often sought to inspire meditation on self-sacrifice and suffering, and this sculpture expresses a similar desire.7 It depicts six of Christ’s followers gently laying his body in the tomb, their mournful figures surrounding him in a halo-like shape. Two men on the left support his upper body and a woman in the center embraces his hand. A man on the right leans in to cradle his legs, and two followers on the right hold the slab that will seal the tomb. Each follower’s face is imbued with grief, inspiring deep pity in the viewer. They lean in, the tenderness of seeking closeness to Christ mingling with the sorrow of what they believe to be a final goodbye. Although the sense of a mournful goodbye unifies the figures, each follower’s face expresses a slightly different emotion, with undercurrents of disbelief, anger, and sympathy. The emotional power of the scene captivates the viewer, encouraging empathy and contemplation on the power of Christ’s sacrifice.

Just as the emotional power of this sculpture captivates the viewer, the naturalistic anatomy furthers empathetic contemplation by accurately reflecting the real world. Cloth drapes over much of the followers’ bodies, but the exposed flesh demonstrates thorough understanding of the underlying bones and muscles.

Christ’s body, covered only by a loincloth, further demonstrates Roldán’s skill with anatomy. His body reflects the suffering he has endured - his ribs visibly protrude, as does his pelvis. As with the sculpting of Christ’s followers, Roldán creates recognizably human forms. The sculpture appears to create a suspended moment of reality in both the figures’ world and the world of the spectator, furthering the spectator’s ability to engross themselves in the narrative. Thus, the naturalistic anatomy secures the sculpture’s ability to draw the viewer in.

The emotional depth and naturalism of The Entombment of Christ encourage devotional meditation in the viewer, but their contemplative power stems from the sculpture’s comparatively minute scale.

The sculpture measures 19 ½ by 26 by 17 inches – approximately the size of a microwave.8 The seven individual figures depicted are even smaller. Thus, the small scale draws the viewer in and demands their full attention. Briefly glancing at the sculpture provides a simple version of the narrative, but the details in each follower’s expression reward those who take the time to look closely. Furthermore, the depictions of emotion and the viewer’s contemplation creates a positive feedback loop – the closer the viewer examines the sculpture, the more they understand the emotion, and the more they understand the emotion, the more they feel compelled to pursue meditation on the piece and its spiritual meaning. Thus, The Entombment of Christ ’s small scale creates significant intimacy with the viewer.

The Entombment of Christ’s use of naturalism to enhance religious devotion follows in the footsteps of Renaissance sculptures such as Michelangelo Buonarroti’s Pietà. The sculptures depict similar moments from the passion of Christ, capturing the mourning that occurred after Christ’s death. The Pietà depicts Mary holding her son, whereas The Entombment of Christ depicts a small group of Christ’s followers saying goodbye. The narratives inspire pity in the viewer as spectators recognize the figures’ grief. The use of naturalism fosters the emotional connection by bridging the gap between art and reality. Both sculptures possess considerable naturalistic qualities, with emphasis on faithfully depicting the human form and draping of fabric. However, the Pietà retains more idealized qualities than The Entombment of Christ. One notable contrast is the depiction of Christ’s wounds – Michelangelo represents them faintly, whereas Roldán represents them prominently. Roldán also depicts emotions more strongly than Michelangelo, as the

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the connection unchanged by the addition of another figure. In contrast, the Pietà presents a different narrative that bars the viewer from being fully present.

The Pietà captures a private moment of grief between a mother and son. The interjection of a spectator disrupts the maternal bond, pushing the viewer to enter an alternate perspective in order to fully participate.

Although spiritual contemplation is possible, the relationship displayed in the Pietà creates an additional barrier to achieve that by requiring the viewer to go beyond themselves in order to enter the narrative.

Thus, The Entombment of Christ’s small scale and figures’ relationship to the viewer achieves greater spiritual power than the Pietà by allowing spectators to more directly insert themselves into the narrative.

The Entombment of Christ is a captivating and spiritually powerful sculpture. Its naturalistic depictions of emotion and anatomy allow the viewer to connect to the narrative as a reflection of the real world, and its small scale commands viewers’ complete attention to enhance contemplation. Subsequently, Luisa Roldán’s sculpture exemplifies the Counter-Reformation desire for devout works of art that encourage further devotion. Roldán’s use of naturalism extends beyond that of preceding works such as the Pietà, furthering its devotional power. Similarly, the emphasis on the group’s mourning enhances its ability to inspire devotion by providing room for the spectator to become a part of the narrative. Thus, Luisa Roldán’s use of naturalism and intimate scale fulfill the Counter-Reformation desire for devout works by generating spiritual power far greater than its diminutive footprint.

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group surrounding Christ visibly grieves while Mary’s expression appears peaceful and contemplative. Thus, although both works use naturalism to inspire devotion, Roldán’s greater emphasis on naturalistic qualities further connects the viewer to the gravity and grief of Christ’s death. Roldán’s sculpture shares a naturalistic focus with Michelangelo’s Pietà, but her greater depth in naturalism creates greater religious devotion.

The Entombment of Christ also achieves greater spiritual power than the Pietà as a result of the sculptures’ scale and relationship to the viewer. The Pietà is 5’ 8 ½” high, existing on the same scale as real life.9 In comparison, The Entombment of Christ is only 17” high and thus its scale is much smaller than real life. The scale of each sculpture creates a different feeling – the Pietà’s scale creates a sense of monumentality, whereas the scale of The Entombment of Christ creates a more intimate feeling. The composition of figures in Roldán’s sculpture furthers the sense of intimacy, as Christ’s followers are arranged in a hemispherical formation. Some of the followers’ bodies recede towards the background, while others are arranged towards the front, leaving room for the spectator to close the circle and engage with the narrative as a member of the group. This increases the spiritual power of the work as the spectator can fully engross themselves in the moment of Christ’s passion, furthering meditation and devotion. Furthermore, the group aspect of The Entombment of Christ enhances religious devotion by providing more room for the viewer to insert themselves into the narrative. The group’s mourning becomes a collective moment, with

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Elizabeth Dudley is a first-year student at Northwestern University.

ENDNOTES Encyclopedia Britannica Online, s.v. “Christianity – Theology of Icons,” last modified September 10, 2020, https:// www.britannica.com/topic/Christianity/Theology-of-icons.

2 Jesse M. Locker, “Rethinking Art After the Council of Trent,” In Art and Reform in the Late Renaissance: After Trent, ed. Jesse M. Locker, (New York: Routledge, 2019), 4.

3 Liana De Girolami Cheney. “Luisa Ignacia Roldán: “La Roldana”: New Attributions to the First Sculptress of Spain, 1652-1706.” Mediterranean Studies 14, no. 1 (2005): 148-168. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41166983.

4 Encyclopedia Britannica Online, s.v. “Philip V,” last modified July 5, 2020, https://www.britannica.com/biography/ Philip-V-king-of-Spain.

5 Luisa Roldán, The Entombment of Christ, 1701, polychrome terracotta, 19 1/2 x 26 x 17 in, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/ search/709109.

6 Encyclopedia Britannica Online, s.v. “Philip V,” last modified July 5, 2020, https://www.britannica.com/biography/ Philip-V-king-of-Spain.

7 Jean Sorabella, “The Crucifixion and Passion of Christ in Italian Painting,” Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, Metropolitan Museum of Art, published June 2008, https://www. metmuseum.org/toah/hd/pass/hd_pass.htm.

8 Roldán, Luisa. The Entombment of Christ. 1701. Polychrome terracotta, 19 1/2 x 26 x 17 in. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/ collection/search/709109.

9 Fred S. Kleiner, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, vol. 4 (Boston: Cengage Learning, 2014), 634.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY De Girolami Cheney, Liana, “Luisa Ignacia Roldán “La Roldana”: New Attributions to the First Sculptress of Spain, 1652-1706,” Mediterranean Studies 14, no. 1 (2005): 149-150, http://www.jstor.org/stable/41166983.

Kleiner, Fred S. Gardner’s Art through the Ages. Vol. 4. Boston: Cengage Learning, 2014.

Locker, Jesse M. “Rethinking Art After the Council of Trent.” In Art and Reform in the Late Renaissance: After Trent, edited by Jesse M. Locker, 1-15. New York: Routledge, 2019.

Roldán, Luisa. The Entombment of Christ. 1701. Polychrome terracotta, 19 1/2 x 26 x 17 in. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/ search/709109.

Sorabella, Jean. “The Crucifixion and Passion of Christ in Italian Painting.” Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, Metropolitan Museum of Art. June 2008. https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/pass/hd_pass.htm.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

VIRTUE IN BODIES: JACQUES-LOUIS DAVID AND BEYONCÉ I

Lilia Destin, University of Southern California, 2023

Figure 1. Beyoncé and Jay-Z standing before da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, APESH*T music video

the Mona Lisa, an image that was once the emblem of beauty. The video is all about disruption, and the Carters are positioning themselves within this sphere of centuries-old power, wealth, and culture.

David’s Oath of the Horatii appears for only a second within the entire music video. In a quick, swooping motion, the camera pans over the canvas of tan with splashes of vivid red, blue, and white. However, the inclusion of the painting at all is significant.

If we examine David’s painting formally, we see three brothers facing their father who triumphantly holds a bundle of swords into the air. In the corner, we see a huddle of weeping women. True to the Davidian style, the bodies on the canvas are rigid, stiff, and statuesque. This sculpture-like form was common for Neoclassical painting, as artists returned to iconic ancient Greco-Roman sculpture for inspiration. Figures were meant to resemble sculptures in the round, and hold dramatic, yet composed, poses. In David’s case, the Horatii brothers are presented with an air of “strained austerity” (Crow 2007, 27). Regardless of the encoded values of stoicism and virtue, the figures are still stiff and unmoving on the canvas, the opposite of the dancers in the Carters’ video. In the video, a line of female dancers dressed in nude-toned spandex join hands and move their bodies in smooth, undulating motions. Their hips rise and fall as their bodies sway back and forth; there is not an ounce of rigidity in the choreography. In another scene, we cut from an armless marble Venus bathed in cold blue light to a Black man staring into the camera while he contorts and pulls his arms above and behind his head, his skin shining under white lights. We see images of Black faces in the background, Black hands in ropes in the paintings, contrasted to a dancer in the video

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n the 1780s, Paris was in a whirlwind of ideology. The Enlightenment brought about questions of perception, observation, humanity, and criticism.

Salons were spaces where intellectuals gathered to discuss varying topics of academia as well as the modes and methods of gathering information. With new perspectives on harmony, social order, and equality, political figures emerged to speak out against the king’s neglect of the middle class. Ideas of the Enlightenment movement and the origins of the Revolution permeated throughout society, especially in the arts.

Artists rallied behind radical bourgeois politicians and began to diverge from the elite style of Rococo and into a rebirth of the innovative and nostalgic Classicism. Perhaps the most famous Neoclassical artist was Jacques Louis David. David embraced the ideas of the revolution, with an emphasis on brotherhood and virtue. In his 1784 painting Oath of the Horatii, a tale of bravery, familial sacrifice, and moral virtue is expressed in the classic Davidian style, in which male bodies are accentuated and act as the key figures in a scene.

In 2018, Beyoncé and Jay-Z released the album EVERYTHING IS LOVE under their joint title The Carters. The album’s title track APESHIT was released accompanied by a music video shot entirely at the world-renowned Louvre museum in Paris. The video starts in silence as a “fallen angel” hero emerges. It cuts to close-up images of paintings within the museum, first focusing on the layers of oil paint, but then shifting the focus to reveal the dust and cracks generated over time. When we first see Beyoncé and Jay-Z, they stand inches away from the Mona Lisa, something virtually impossible for a common visitor, since the room is usually overcrowded with museumgoers trying to snap a photo of the masterpiece. They are adorned in clothing of bright colors and ornate jewelry, offsetting the muted tones of the painting and the bare skin of the donna. During the video, Beyoncé and Jay engage with artworks throughout the museum by dancing before them, posing alongside works, or providing direct contrasts to the work -- dancers move their bodies in fluid, complex motions or contort their bodies in front of static, motionless painted figures and sculptures. There are scenes directly challenging the notions of Western aesthetics, such as a woman combing out a man’s tight curls in front of, once again,

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Figure 2. David, Jacques Louis, “Oath of the Horatii”, 1784, oil on canvas, Louvre, Paris.

sacrifice and imminent death. Thomas Crow writes that David “moved private emotions away from center stage; the pride and inflexibility of the early Romans… had come alive on canvas” (Crow 22). These three brothers offer a look into what this male utopia could look like. In a time where the French people are disillusioned with their king, people wanted a symbol of pure masculine virtue, of loving fatherhood, and of devotion to one another and the state. The legends of the ancients provided the perfect role models for young French men with a vision of democracy. On the other hand, women were excluded, a notion even seen in David’s painting. Men were cast in the leading roles in these heroic scenes, projecting the idea that “the subordination of women according to ‘nature’ becomes a necessity for the construction of the revolutionary utopian State” (Currie 1992, 77). White men were the only possible contributors to this ideal world, something directly opposed by Beyoncé’s video featuring strength in femininity, beauty in Blackness, and virtue in melanated, female bodies.

The concept of fraternité has now been extended past the original context of white French men.

David’s precious male-centric utopia lived through his art but disintegrated over time. Instead, we are coming to embrace aesthetics and bodies previously cast off as the “others”. The Carters have reimagined the ideals of history painting and French gallantry into the bodies of contemporary Black men and women.

Their take-over of the Louvre signifies a re-writing of history in progress. Female strength overtakes male heroism, Black beauty dominates the paintings of porcelain maidens in ornate gold frames. There is a shift in the conversation of who art is, and who it is for. As bodies other than the cisgender heterosexual white man are depicted in our visual art, specifically in works as grand as Davidian history painting, there is an opening up of the extremely limiting and exclusionary language of art.

who shakes and waves her arms in freeing gestures.

On Beyoncé’s preceding album and accompanying musical film Lemonade, Zirwat Chowdhury writes that it “underscores the continuing legacy and relevance of slavery to any conversation about the freedom of black bodies today. It also illuminates a strand of the Enlightenment discourse about freedom that demands to be seen in relation to the kind of black bodies that were largely neglected or erased in European art and visual culture” (Chowdhury 2016). Here, Beyoncé is bringing Black bodies and Black voices back into the narrative of history painting and the Enlightenment, a people once and continually “rendered invisible by the visual culture of the period” (Chowdhury 2016).

She is furthering and expanding upon what belongs in such a setting as the Davidian history painting, encompassed by its golden frames in the hallowed halls of the Louvre. In her depiction of the modern now, she shows that virtue and strength can be shown in these flexible and hypnotic moving Black bodies.

David’s focus on the male body comes from the revolutionary ideal of fraternité. After the fall of the elites, and with it their feminine Rococo tastes, masculinity was the natural response. The new utopia envisioned by revolutionaries and artists involved a world of hardworking, patriotic, brave men  women excluded. David incorporated this male utopia ideal into his studio, where young men trained in order to perfect the one sacred form: the academie sketch, the male nude. Consequently, these ideas of masculine perfection shone through in his paintings. In Oath, these ancient pre-Roman male bodies tell the story.

They stand tall in the center, presenting themselves as the main characters of the tale we are about to “read”.

Figure 1. Beyoncé and Jay-Z standing before da Vinci’s Mona The brothers are stoic as they pledge allegiance to Lisa, APESH*T music video their father and prepare to embark on their journey of

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW Lilia Destin is a second-year student of Art History at the University of Southern California.

BIBLIOGRAPHY BeyoncéVEVO. 2018. “APES**T - the CARTERS.” YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbMqWXnpXcA.

01. Restistios in reris distis porem apiet litassit offictata lab iscitis non nise Chowdhury, Zirwat. 2016. “Lemonade’s Enlightenment.” magnia dentur ad que corem veligni a Journal18: A Journal of Eighteenth-Century Art and Culture. millor July 21, 2016. mintium. https://www.journal18.org/735.

Crow, Thomas. 2007. Review of Patriotism and Virtue. In Nineteenth Century Art: A Critical History, 18–54. London: Thames and Hudson.

06. Volo odis non cus pla volupta ssumqui dellatur asim invelis sequi si ne pe volorer speratem quam auda plit, cuptur adi doluptiasim incil moluptatur molupti buscid mo quate nobitis sam.

Institute of Arts, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Réunion des Musées Nationaux, Paris. Detroit: Distributed by Wayne State University Press.

04. Ediditi o verios ut odit, totas dellabo riatur arciust esequiam quis nonse remosti dit dipsanis solore istion nia dolut ipid quiae.

09. Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae 05. Plaut quo tem reium verrovit que vitae dicta sunt explicabo. esed et quiam etum, odit et que cum dolupta spelitae dole sit lam labo. Et lab id quis maximo offictate dis minum alit magnis.

A IMAGE CAPTION, PG. 18 B IMAGE CAPTION, PG. 19 C IMAGE CAPTION, PG. 20

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02. Quas maiorepe pa aute veria quibus et eic te nest, sum re, comnis 07. Aspis evenima gnatur? Iquam Currie, doluptatus Dawn, and sum, Valerie qui Raoul.quo 1992.volor The Anatomy maxime of simus natia vellam raeptas sedit, et quaGender : Women’s Struggle for the Body, 77. Ottawa: Cara estrunda dendis ulitar. tis mod quuntium aut dio conet facilibuleton University Press. sa ate endam repe nulpa si odiciis eum.

Galeries nationales du Grand Palais (France), Detroit Insti03. Et di sita nos ad ut harum dolo tute of Arts, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, exerum nist, nationaux sed qui 08. reicienda cuptibe a nonsequi tenis N.Y.), Foundersfacepta Society, andesseque Réunion des musées (France). 1975. French painting 1774-1830, the Age of Revolunobi sita veliciunto te volupide el mol- inum doluptibus ipid magnatum dis tion: Grand Palais, Paris, 16 November 1974-3 February 1975, orio.

Essinul ab May inctum que dollaut aci magnis dolupta volorit the Detroit Institute lestius of Arts, 5 nat March-4 1975, thesedist Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 12 June-7 September reptaspedis sitem renis re evel eum qui. atiam.

1975 : exhibition sponsored by Founders Society the Detroit

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Figure 3. Yi, Lantai, European Palace, from The Twenty Views of the European Palaces of the Yuanmingyuan, 1783-1786 Copperplate engraving on paper Victoria and Albert Museum.

Figure 1. Anonymous Statue of Shakyamuni, Northern Wei Dynasty Limestone, Yecheng Museum, Linzhang.

Figure 4. Anonymous, European Palace, Yuanmingyuan, 21st century, Photography.

Figure 2. Hou Yimin Comrade Liu Shaoqi and the Anyuan Miners, 1962.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

ICONOCLASTS IN CHINA

Lingran Zhang, University of Washington in St. Louis, 2021

I

GROUP 1: RULERS ICONOCLASM AS A TOOL OF AUTHORITY

In the Western tradition, iconoclasm is primarily associated with the debate about religious images in the Byzantine world. However, the term “iconoclasm” itself is a later term that was only applied retroactively to describe the destruction of images from the early seventh to the mid-ninth century.4 Derived from the Latin Iconoclasmus, the word first appears in print several centuries later in the mid-sixteenth century, long after the Byzantine church and emperors destroyed religious images out of fear they had become “understood as sites of the real presence of saints.”5 Icons had become more powerful than priests, who retaliated against these graven images to reestablish the clergy’s institutional authority. The increasingly realistic nature of images also catalyzed iconoclasm, as the boundaries between image and subject became blurred. Seen as a proxy for the person depicted, such images were attacked to “dishonor the person who had been portrayed” and thereby annihilate the power they embody in the flesh.6 The first group of artworks presented in the exhibition illustrates this early definition of iconoclasm by focusing on the destruction of icons in China. It does so by juxtaposing works of wildly different materials and time periods that remain united by the acts inflicted on them throughout their history.

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conoclasm is no quiet thing: it is dynamite ripping through ancient Buddhas; it is chisels gouging eyes from stone; it is bombs falling from the sky onto ancient cities; it is hands tearing apart statues, limb by limb. In China, the practice is synonymous with the destruction of antiquities during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976). However, at present, scholarly investigations into iconoclasm in China are limited, as is public knowledge about its practice. In fact, the word “iconoclasm” has yet to even earn a Chinese translation.1 This exhibition, “Iconoclasts in China”, aims to provide a more comprehensive understanding of iconoclasm in China through the close study of individual objects and their contexts across time and space. It does so by focusing on the actions and motivations of three major groups of iconoclasts--rulers, imperialists, and artists--and the material consequences of those actions, as told by the works on display, to analyze how these iconoclasts sought to establish new social norms by destroying material remnants of the past.

The term iconoclasm is conventionally defined as “the breaking or destroying of images; especially the destruction of images and pictures set up as objects of veneration.”2 In its expanded sense, iconoclasm also refers to actions attacking cherished beliefs or authorities.

The earliest written account of iconoclasm in China dates to the Qin dynasty (221-206 BCE), when the emperor Qin Shi Huang ordered the “burning of books and burying of scholars” in 213 and 212 BCE. As millions of invaluable Confucian texts were destroyed, over four hundred scholars met their deaths.3 The emperor’s aims were as clear as his orders: to destroy the school of thought founded under his precursor and consolidate his reign through promoting a new school of thought, Legalism. More than 2000 years later, iconoclasm is still actively practiced in contemporary Chinese society: governments demolish ancient buildings to build skyscrapers while artists like Ai Weiwei use their artwork to criticize this disregard for cultural heritage. From the Qin dynasty to the twenty-first century, iconoclasm is historically embedded alongside the very traditions it seeks to destroy.

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Figure 5. Anamous Nanking Zhongshan Gate, 1937, Photography

The first object is the Statue of Shakyamuni (fig.

1), carved in the Northern Wei Dynasty (386-534) and deliberately damaged in the Tang Dynasty (618-907). As the largest and most important of the three figures, Shakyamuni stands on a lotus pedestal at the center; his left hand rests on his robes while his right hand forms a fearless mudra. Although crowned in a halo of lotuses and small, seated Buddhas, this figure has been stripped of all honor through literal defacement: a stone gash now sits where once there were eyes, nose, and a mouth.

Archaeologists have traced this damage to Emperor Wuzong’s “Great Anti-Buddhist Persecution” during the Tang Dynasty.7 As a zealous Daoist, Wuzong undertook this campaign when Buddhism’s rising wealth and influence threatened his absolute authority. This threat was made even more apparent as individuals began converting to Buddhism to escape military service and taxes.8 Wuzong thus sought to destroy the very system of belief that these images represented through the destruction of the images themselves; he then replaced these broken idols with Daoist statues, establishing Daoism as his new ruling ideology.9 The second work in this display is a poster print of Ho Yimin’s painting Comrade Liu Shaoqi and the Anyuan Miners (fig. 2), printed in 1962 and defaced just a few years later during the Cultural Revolution. Ho painted the depicted image in 1961 to commemorate the opening of the Museum of the Chinese Revolution, which aimed to celebrate the Communist Party of China and the Chinese Revolution in high art.10 The painting shows Liu Shaoqi, Chairman Mao Zedong’s then-friend and assumed successor, surrounded by Anyuan miners whose 1922 strike was a formative moment for the Communist party. In this poster, however, Liu’s face and name have been crossed out in heavy blue ink.

While it is unclear who committed this destruction, there is no doubt as to why Liu’s presence was struck from the poster. In 1966, Mao initiated the Cultural Revolution to cleanse China of all remnants of capitalism and traditional Chinese culture. In addition to the destruction of historical relics, this “revolution” destroyed millions of people accused Figure 6. Bada Shanren (Zhu Dan) Fish, 1626-1705, Ink on paper, hanging scroll

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

Figure 7. Ai Weiwei Coca-Cola Vase, 2011, Acrylic on Han dynasty vase.

of anti-Mao sentiments who suffered public humiliation and imprisonment. One such individual was Liu, who was eventually purged by Mao. It was not enough, however, to humiliate and kill Liu: all positive traces of him were also eliminated, including Ho’s painting, which was destroyed in 1968.11 The defacement of this poster print of Ho’s painting demonstrates the former owner’s compliance with Mao’s ideology. Compared to Liu’s representation, the miners—considered essential to social development—remain pristine. The poster serves as a relic of Mao’s strategy to utilize iconoclasm to cement his power and enforce his will among the masses, even while targeting a single individual, whose memory could not be allowed to persist even in images.

Made well over a millennium apart, the stone Shakyamuni and poster of Comrade Liu demonstrate iconoclasm as a favored weapon of ancient emperors and communists alike, who utilized the power of destruction to centralize and consolidate power.

GROUP 2: IMPERIALISTS ICONNOCLASIM AS A CLAIM OF SOVEREIGNTY

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As a result of increasing academic interest, the definition of iconoclasm no longer solely privileges the destruction of icons but the destruction of art and architecture writ large.12 The ruination of cultural heritage during war and rebellion is now at the forefront of scholarly conversations, especially as it pertains to the French Revolution and World War II. As one of the oldest civilizations in the world, China has seen countless wars, ones that have left future generations to recover cultural memory from ruins. The second group of objects in this exhibition illustrates the damage wrought not by the Chinese but by their invaders.

War as an extreme form of iconoclasm, one that annihilates human lives as well as local culture, is on full display in these cases.

The old Summer Palace, Yuanmingyuan, was a monument that invaders reduced to ruins, as demonstrated by two images on display (fig. 3&4). The first of the images is a 1786 print of Yuanmingyuan made by court artist Langtai Yi, while the second one is a photograph of the monument’s current state of wreckage. Constructed in 1709 by Emperor Kangxi, Yuanmingyuan later served as an imperial summer residence in Beijing.13 Today, however, weed-covered fragments of columns and stone blocks are all that remain of the site, whose former splendor now exists exclusively in prints, textual descriptions, and people’s imaginations. Juxtaposing the palace at its peak and in its current state, the 1786 print and the 2020 photograph testify to the crimes of the English and French armies who looted and burned Yuanmingyuan during the second Opium War (1860). This act of iconoclasm targeting an imperial residence served as a trophy for the French and English, who had succeeded in turning China into a semi-colonialized country.14 The ruins of the palace are allowed to persist as a reminder to the Chinese of this historical act of humiliation, a shame that must never be forgotten.

In the same exhibition case, there is a photograph (fig. 5) taken the day that Japanese armies invaded Nanjing during the Sino-Japanese War in 1937. In an act of wanton violence on a place that served as the capital of six Chinese dynasties, the Japanese army

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blew up Nanjing’s fortified walls before the soldiers marched into the city, taking photographs along the way. Although the expression on the soldier’s faces is obscured, the photo conveys a burst of joy: soldiers hold their hands high and point their weapons towards the sky to celebrate their victory over Nanjing. Built in 1366 during the Ming Dynasty, the gate and walls shown in the photograph had long served as a critical emblem of Chinese heritage and a symbol of the city.15 The walls also served as the last line of defense during the invasion, which the Japanese obliterated without pause, destroying centuries of cultural and architectural history.16 Together, the photograph of Nanjing’s ruined walls and the images illustrating Yuanmingyuan’s destruction work together to demonstrate centuries of iconoclasm as a weapon of war that imperialists used to destroy China’s cultural heritage and assert their superiority by attacking citizens’ cultural confidence. The physical memory of that cruelty remains on view in China today, as these monuments no longer stand as proud emblems of Chinese heritage but as scars in China’s cultural consciousness.

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GROUP 3: ARTISTS ADDITIVE ICONOCLASM AS SOCIAL RESISTANCE

Iconoclasm is not only physical: it is also conceptual. This fact is nowhere more apparent than in acts of additive iconoclasm, by which an object’s original worth or concept is “destroyed” through its covering rather than its destruction. In sharp contrast to its widely negative connotations, iconoclasm has assumed something of a positive bend in the modern age.17 The word “iconoclast” can now indicate a heroic figure who bravely challenges power or established norms. In the art world, iconoclasm further implies creation through the act of destruction.18 The last group of objects features the work of two iconoclastic artists who applied unconventional art to criticize their contemporary society: Bada Shanren and Ai Weiwei.

Bada Shanren (1626-1705) is a traditional Chinese painter born into the imperial family of the late Ming Dynasty. He underwent the overthrow of his family’s power by the Qing Dynasty.19 He used his paintings, like the Fish in the show (fig. 6), which were rendered in a simple, abstract style against the realistic landscape painting promoted by the Qing government, to express his resistance to the new regime.20 A single fish occupies the paper, with an especially plain portrayal. It has no surrounding environment and seems unable to move, just like how the lonely artist is trapped in a society where

he does not belong. With its eyes roll back and mouth open, the fish has an expression of anger and satire.

Through the refusal of approved painting standards, Bada established his own school of Chinese painting, which continued to influence future masters like Chen Hongshou.21 Much like violent acts of iconoclastic destruction, Ai WeiWei is not a subtle artist, but a political activist who openly criticizes the Chinese government through his work. In Coca-Cola Vase (fig. 7), Ai painted the Coca-Cola logo onto a Han Dynasty (206 BCE-220 CE) urn that he obtained from an antique market.22 Bright red calligraphy, representing an established, cheap, modern product, forms a sharp contrast with the rusted, plain surface of the antiquity. Ai at once destroys this centuries-old object while transforming it into a contemporary sculpture with new layers of meaning, both figuratively and literally. Ai’s iconoclastic act of defacing the ancient urn with a symbol of globalization and consumerism is an ironic criticism of China’s ignorance of the past as the country races towards urban development and consumerism.23 The vase thus serves as an object that critiques iconoclasm through the very act itself.

Although Bada Shanren and Ai Weiwei live in different eras, they both practice iconoclasm in their artistic creation as a subtle way to challenge the authority. By denying or destroying established and accepted art forms, artists express their refusing attitude towards their contemporary society and generate new artistic trends.

CONCLUSION

This exhibition highlights objects that, although few, represent centuries of iconoclasm in China. By highlighting these practices, the reasoning behind them, and the questions they beg viewers to ask of history, this exhibition provokes considerations of iconoclasm in a heretofore understudied landscape.

As these six objects demonstrate how diverse individuals—rulers, imperialists, artists—utilized this common weapon to both challenge and establish social norms, the works also act as witnesses to the very history that sought to destroy them. The exhibition will show the audience how the Chinese materials fit into the global iconoclasm debate and will amplify iconoclasm as a long-standing phenomenon.

Lingran Zhang is a fourth-year student of Art History, Global Studies, and French at the University of Washington in St. Louis.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW ENDNOTES I searched the term in CNKI, the largest scholarly database in China, and no result appeared. There is only a little English literature on iconoclasm in East Asia.

2 Oxford English Dictionary, “Iconoclasm, n.”

3 Dai, “From ‘Burning Books and Burying Confucian Scholars Alive’ to ‘Espousing Confucianism as the Orthodox State Ideology’”, 18.

4 Brubaker, “Introduction: What is Byzantine Iconoclasm,”4.

5 Brubaker, “Making and Breaking Images and Meaning in Byzantium and Early Islam,” 17.

6 Brubaker, “Making and Breaking Images and Meaning in Byzantium and Early Islam,” 14.

7 Hebei News. “Buddhist Statue at Linzhang Proves Wuzong’s Anti-Buddhism Movement.”

8 Yang, “The Study on the Destruction of Buddhism by Tang Wuzong and the Localization of Buddhism,” 78.

9 Reinders, “Recycling Icons and Bodies in Chinese Anti-Buddhist Persecutions,” 65.

10 Chineseposters.net, “Comrade Liu Shaoqi and the Anyuan Miners.”

11 Chineseposters.net. “Liu Shaoqi.”

12 Bremmer, “Iconoclast, Iconoclastic, and Iconoclasm: Notes Towards a Genealogy,” 14.

13 Baidubaike. “The Old Summer Palace.”

14 Ringmar, “Liberal Barbarism and the Oriental Sublime: The European Destruction of the Emperor’s Summer Palace,” 923.

15 Jing, “The Nanjing Cultural Massacre by the Japanese Army,” 156.

16 Crew, “The Meanings of Ruins,” 92.

17 Brubaker, “Introduction: What is Byzantine Iconoclasm,” 3.

18 Kim, “Creative Iconoclasms in Renaissance Italy,” 65.

19 Hwee, “The Impact of Bada Shanren.”

20 The norm of painting during the early Qing Dynasty is to depict landscapes realistically. Painters would portray a complete set of scenes, for instance, fishes in a lotus pond.

The emperor especially promoted paintings with complicated brushstrokes, which can reveal the proficiency of artists’ skills.

21 Hwee, “The Impact of Bada Shanren.”

22 Guggenheim. “Ai Weiwei.”

23 Moog, “Ai Weiwei: Bare Life Gallery Guide,” 24.

0B

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Baidubaike. “The Old Summer Palace.” Accessed December 16, 2019. https://baike.baidu.com/item/圆明 园/9328?fr=aladdin.

Bremmer, Jan. “Iconoclast, iconoclastic, and iconoclasm: Notes towards a genealogy.” Church history and religious culture 88, no. 1 (2008): 1-17.

Brubaker, Leslie. “Introduction: What Is Byzantine

Iconoclasm?” In Inventing Byzantine Iconoclasm, 1–8.

London: Bristol Classical Press, 2012.

Brubaker, Leslie. “Making and Breaking Images and Meaning in Byzantium and Early Islam.” In Striking images, iconoclasms past and present, pp. 13-24. Routledge, 2017.

Chineseposters.net. “Comrade Liu Shaoqi and the Anyuan Miners.” Accessed December 16, 2019. https://chineseposters.net/themes/liushaoqi-anyuan-miners.php.

Chineseposters.net. “Liu Shaoqi.” Liu Shaoqi. Accessed December 16, 2019. https://chineseposters.net/themes/ liushaoqi.php.

Crew, David. “The Meanings of Ruins.” In Bodies and Ruins: Imagining the Bombing of Germany, 1945 to the Present., 87–111. University of Michigan Press, 2017.

Dai, Y. “From ‘Burning Books and Burying Confucian Scholars Alive’ to ‘Espousing Confucianism as the Orthodox State Ideology’—Reflections on Qin Shi Huang’s and Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty’s Attempts of Ideology Unification.” Academic Forum of Nandu 30, no.5 (2010):17-22.

Guggenheim. “Ai Weiwei,” January 24, 2018. https://www. guggenheim.org/arts-curriculum/topic/ai-weiwei.

Hebei News. “Buddhist Statue at Linzhang Proves Wuzong’s Anti-Buddhism Movement.” May 15, 2012. http://hebei.hebnews.cn/2012-05/15/content_2688989.htm.

Hwee, Tan. “The Impact of Bada Shanren, Late 17th Century Recluse Painter on the Paintings of Zhu Wei, Late 20th Century, ‘Post-89’ Contemporary Chinese Artist.” Zhu Wei, 2001. https://zhuwei.artron.net/ news_detail_33201.

Jing, Shenghong. “The Nanjing Cultural Massacre by the Japanese Army.” Jianghai Academic Journal 5 (2004): 156-163.

Kim, Anna M. “Creative Iconoclasms in Renaissance Italy.” In Striking Images, Iconoclasms Past and Present, pp.

65-80. Routledge, 2017.

Moog, Molly. “Ai Weiwei: Bare Life Gallery Guide.” St. Louis, MO: Kemper Art Museum, 2019.

Oxford English Dictionary. “Iconoclasm, n.” Accessed December 16, 2019. https://www-oed-com.libproxy.wustl. edu/view/Entry/90889?redirectedFrom=iconoclasm#eid.

Reinders, Eric. “Recycling icons and bodies in Chinese anti-Buddhist persecutions.” RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 48, no. 1 (2005): 61-68.

Ringmar, Erik. “Liberal Barbarism and the Oriental Sublime: The European Destruction of the Emperor’s Summer Palace.” Millennium 34, no. 3 (2006): 917-933.

Yang, Jie. “The Study on the Destruction of Buddhism by Tang Wuzong and the Localization of Buddhism.” Handan Academic Journal 29, no.2 (2019):78-83.

ISSUE Nº20 | POWER

with John Doe

Figure 1. David, Jacques-Louis, “Madame du Pastoret and her Son,” oil on canvas, 1791-1792, The Art Institute of Chicago.

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

EKPHRASIS IN JACQUES LOUIS DAVID’S “MADAME DU PASTORET AND HER SON” Katharina Nachtigall, Northwestern University, 2021 “[The]

commodified system of representation of the female body, a body disempowered, objectified, pacified, prettified, exaggeratedly sexualized or purified”

-

Linda Nochlin, Representing Women, 1999

J

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acques Louis David’s work Madame de Pastoret and her Son, painted in 1791-92, hangs in the European Art wing of the Art institute of Chicago, and depicts a portrait of a seated woman, presumably Madame de Pastoret, as the title suggests, shown sewing beside the cradle of her sleeping son. This essay will make the argument that this image, which although upon first glance may appear simply as a typical scene of domestic and maternal life, is in fact a sensualized image of a female that serves an important part in identifying the role of women in this moment in early nineteenth century France.

This painting is perhaps easier to miss in the exhibition space than its neighboring canvases by David and his contemporaries, despite its somewhat large format of 29.8 × 96.6 cm1. We can attribute this to its painterly and somewhat unfinished appearance: the paint is applied incredibly thinly throughout, and parts of the canvas itself creep through the background of the image. In addition, it lacks the “licked finish”2 that Crowe writes as being the cultivation of Ingres and Girodet, two of David’s students’ artistic practices: “… an exactingly polished technique in finishing the surfaces of their paintings, building up glazes so as to banish as far as possible individual gestural imprints in the paint”3. This allows us as viewers to question whether the difference in appearance of this canvas is intentional, or whether there was a reason for why this painting was never finished. When considering the year in which David produces this work, we can understand it to be during the French Revolution, and that this is most likely a contributing factor to the unfinished nature of this piece.

David’s palette here is incredibly limited to beige-y brown tones. We see only slight tints of red in the lips and cheeks of his female subject, which therefore immediately catch our eye at first glance. Although clear efforts have been made to render shadow and depth in this image, the woman posing for this portrait appears flatter than the figures in the surrounding paintings in the gallery space. Her chair is flattened, given that its shadow is not visible behind her, despite there being a light source that shines directly onto the left-hand side of her face. This is made evident by the shadow that falls onto the front panel of her son’s wooden cradle, though the paint-strokes here are wider and less detailed than in other portions of the canvas. This is also due in part to the entirely plain background, painted in a similarly neutral tone as the rest of the image, with only the swirls and marks of the bristles of his paintbrush to give it any differentiating factor. In this way, we notice that David chooses not to situate his female subject into a real space, as we do not see the room in which she was posing, giving us few clues to give context as to who she is. We can therefore consider this canvas to be contingent, as its entire story is not immediately understood. This quality renders this painting to be modern, as this is unusual for paintings at the time, which were typically drawn from stories of antiquity or depicting a specific person or scene. Even other portraits depicting similar subject matter, for example Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun’s portrait of the French queen, Marie Antoinette with her Children, painted in 1787, that shows a mother figure with her children is placed into

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a room, is heavily ornamented and decorated in the classic Rococo style.

In this way, it is only the fact that David titles this work Madame de Pastoret and her Son that we gain any knowledge of who this female subject is, as she could otherwise serve as an anonymous allegory for motherhood. She can thus only be understood at face value: a motherly figure seated next to a cradle with a sleeping baby, as well as someone who partakes in domestic life, given that she appears to be sewing or embroidering a white cloth that she clutches in her left hand. The fact that this painting is in fact a portrait, and thus a staged and planned representation of this female subject, means that we can assume that there was intent behind the decision to render her in this way. It can therefore be argued that this image serves an almost propaganda-like purpose, in the way in which it intends to promote an idealized domestic mother-figure who partakes in household chores and in the looking after of her children. This is a trope that occupies the minds of many artistic figures at the time, as affirmed by Carol Duncan in The Art Bulletin: “The association of motherhood with sexual satisfaction was frequent in eighteenth-century”4. Despite her son’s presence in this painting, he serves as more of a ‘prop’, given that he is turned away from view, with only the crown of his head being represented here. In this way, our attention is solely given to her.

Although dressed in a simple plain muslin gown, we can still understand David’s representation of Madame de Pastoret to be a romanticized one.

Firstly, we can see that her dress is arguably the most detailed portion of this image, where specifically the intricate folds of fabric across her bust are particularly highlighted. A sash of muslin fabric also crosses directly between her two breasts, drawing attention to them, thereby sexualizing her, despite her otherwise more innocent appearance as a mother. Duncan continues in her chapter to say that “illicit love was openly celebrated in French eighteenth century art, often by the same artists who illustrated conjugal love”5 thereby confirming that there is perhaps not such a difference in how Madame de Pastoret should be considered vis-à-vis other female subject in scenes of love affair, such as those painted by Fragonard at the same time. She looks directly at the viewer, but instead of the typical confrontational or powerful glare traditionally associated with a male subject in nineteenth century portraiture, her expression is gentle and soft. Her mouth tilts slightly upwards, though she is not quite smiling – her face is approachable, and despite being the main subject of this image, does not show dominance. Her cheeks are rosy, showing her

liveliness and youth, and also perhaps aims to make reference to her role as a domestic figure, i.e. eluding to the hard nature of household chores. In addition, David chooses to give her small hands, with nimble fingers, which are exacerbated by her pose, where she is seemingly depicted pulling a needle and thread.

This needle, however, does not exist in between her thumb and fore-finger, and this thread appears invisible. The lack of these tools, instrumental in the act of sewing, suggests therefore that the actual act of what it is that she is sewing is unimportant here; it is rather that she plays the role of the idealized nineteenth century wife, as described by Carol Duncan: “pretty, modest and blushing, her happiness consists in making her husband happy and in the serving the needs of her children… She is coquettish for her husband, whose physical and emotional needs she fulfills and to whose will she gladly submits…”6. Madame de Pastoret is therefore reduced here to a romantic fantasy of ‘the perfect wife’ in the mind of the presumed male viewer gazing at this work.

In order to better illustrate this point, we can compare this image to another painting that was made during a similar time period of the nineteenth century in Germany: The Interior of the Palm House, by Carl Blechen, which too hangs in the European wing of the Art Institute of Chicago, and was painted in 1834.

Rather than representing an idealized image within the realm of motherhood, Blechen paints a more explicit and obvious scene to represent the undeniable fascination and sexualization of the female subject. More specifically, we are no longer looking at French women, or European women at all for that matter. In fact, Blechen paints women of the “Orient”, i.e. from an Asian, North African or Middle Eastern descent7, who are clearly intended to be admired and looked at by the viewer. The piece contains a voyeuristic quality, as none of them look toward us, and in fact appear as if they do not know they are being captured in a painting here. Blechen pays an astounding attention to detail to the surroundings in which they are placed: The Palm House on the Pfauseninsel near Potsdam, a building situated in the outskirts of Berlin. The interior of this Palm House is almost jungle-like with sprawling palms and other exotic plants erupting from every wall.

Intricately painted ivy climbs up the column behind the female figures, dotted with tiny pinkish-purple flowers. Every leaf is meticulously painted, giving the plants in this image an almost scientific or diagrammatic feel. This incredible attention to detail here shows Blechen’s clear obsession to render this image as one that is ‘exotic’ and ‘real’. This is made further known to the viewer, given that the plants within this

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW

59 Figure 2. Blechen, Carl, “The Interior of the palm House on the Pfaueninsel Near Potsdam,” oil on canvas, 1791-1792, The Art Institute of Chicago.

enclosed space are in direct contrast with the more rounded trees that can be seen outside the window at the center of the canvas, i.e. trees that would more commonly be seen in Europe at the time. This same perfectionist quality exists also in the depiction of the building itself. The walls on the left of this painting are ornamented with oriental, geometric designs that are painted in bright hues of pink, orange and blue, acting in juxtaposition with the darker, entirely green component of the plants on the right-hand edge of the canvas. The colors used are incredibly saturated in this portion of the work with regard to the rest of

the canvas that is mainly painted in varying shades of green, which is only dotted with color to show the petals of flowers in the trees that Blechen captures.

Unsurprisingly, Blechen’s four female subjects that occupy the lower third of the painting (three seated woman and one standing behind them), are similarly ‘exotic’ and ‘oriental’ as their surroundings. Firstly, they are not only sitting down on the ground, but rather are shown seated on a woven rug, that is red, with blue trimmings and golden fringing. There is also a clear invitation by Blechen to focus on these four female figures, given that the light in this canvas is

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also directly shining upon them: presumably sunlight that is radiating through the glass ceiling. In this way, they appear in a spotlight, with a golden sheen on their skin, that acts as another clue that these are not at all European women, as they do not share the same pale complexion of the French or German women. This allows us to look at them in the awe that Blechen presumably intends for us to.

Their portrayal is further sensualized through their facial expressions: one stares romantically in the distance, with the appearance of being almost like a ‘damsel in distress’ figure that is purposeless and longing. The figure to her right, seated with a sitarlike instrument, gazes at her with a similar expression - perhaps suggesting a slight homo-erotic charge between them both. This same face is also seen on the female figure most to the right who again looks affectionately at the fourth female subject, who stands looking down as she adjusts her sheer shawl that is embroidered in gold thread. All of their clothes are incredibly detailed and ornamented with metallic patterns that emulate a clearly Oriental style. Each of them, are also completely covered in lavish jewelry (earrings, necklaces etc.) that also serve to show their ‘otherness’ in the way that they are incredibly different in style to Western designs. Although entirely clothed, their positions and revealing clothing allow us to see these women in only a sexual context. They become almost a part of the ‘furniture’ of the palm house, there only to serve a decorative purpose to be enjoyed and admired in the same way that we can enjoy the fine cornicing in the ceiling, or the embossed gateway into the building. This ‘consumption’ of Oriental figures is similar to the nude female subject in Jules-Joseph Lefebvre’s work Odalisque, of 1874, that hangs in a neighboring gallery in the Art Institute. It is incredibly similar to the Ingres painting with the same title, where we see a woman reclined with her back towards us and is situated in an equally ‘exotic’ space, with vases, beads and incense. Her skin is perfectly smooth, with no imperfections or marks, almost so much so that she appears as if we are looking at a statue.

Through the careful observation of these two seemingly different images, we can understand that despite portraying varying subject matter they work in similar ways to portray women in a submissive and hyper-sexualized manner, as described by Thomas Crow who states: “domination is exercised over a woman, a diminutive figure who is turned into an impossibly sinuous and compliant emblem of

submission”8. We learn how at this time the female subject can dominate the painting itself, however it is never truly she who holds the power at this moment.

Rather, it is her role to serve the needs of her male counterparts and appearing entirely beautiful, and therefore consumable by the eye, at the same time.

Katharina Nachtigall is a fourth-year student of Art History and Business Institutions at Northwestern University.

ENDNOTES metmuseum.org. Accessed February 2, 2020. http://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/ search/680565.

2 Crow, Thomas. “Patriotism & Virtue: David to the Young Ingres.” Essay. In Classicism & Romanticism, 54, n.d.

3 Crow, Thomas. “Patriotism & Virtue: David to the Young Ingres.” Essay. In Classicism & Romanticism, 54, n.d.

4 Duncan, Carol. “Happy Mothers & Other New Ideas in French Art.” The Art Bulletin 55 (1973): 572.

5 Duncan, Carol. “Happy Mothers & Other New Ideas in French Art.” The Art Bulletin 55 (1973): 572.

6 Duncan, Carol. “Happy Mothers & Other New Ideas in French Art.” The Art Bulletin 55 (1973): 582.

7 Said, Edward W. Orientalism. New York: Pantheon Books, 1978.

8 Crow, Thomas. “Patriotism & Virtue: David to the Young Ingres.” Essay. In Classicism & Romanticism, 53, n.d.

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BACK COVER. Artist Unknown, "Steer Horn Armchair," Horn, Silk, Brass, c. 1870-1888, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago.

SUMMER 2021

NORTHWESTERN ART REVIEW ISSUE Nº20 | POWER