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Gavin Young Introduction to Art History How Might a Feminist Art Historian Respond to Amedeo Modigliani’s Representation of Women? 21 November 2011

Modigliani and Women

Artists of the 19th and 20th century have his/her own representation of femininity with their own unique vision. This influences the message interpreted by the viewer, especially the feminist eye. Many artists have left a great impression for feminist debate but I will be looking at the works produced by Amedeo Modigliani. How a few of his selected paintings may be interpreted by the feminist viewer and the idea of ‘the male gaze. Amedeo Modigliani’s works have sparked both outcry and praise, but for feminists, it is the former. Feminists have always regarded art, along with many other disciplines, to have a clear sexual division, dominated by men and sexist in nature. As feminist Griselda Pollock1 noted, “The myth of free, individual creativity is gender specific; it is exclusively masculine.” Pollock further observed that women were representations of objects in art instead of producer of art. She also added that the portrayal of women carries different meanings depending on the artists’ gender. This can be related to the ‘male gaze’ and ‘female gaze’ often used to study a painting. The gaze is a concept used for analyzing visual culture for how an audience views the people presented. The types of gaze are primarily categorized by who is doing the looking. The term “male gaze” is accredited to Laura Mulvey and her essay “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” which was published in 1975. In it, Mulvey states                                                                                                                 1  Woman’s Art Journal, p. 45 ‘Women, Art and Ideology: Questions for Feminist Art Historians’ Griselda Pollock, Woman's Art Journal, Vol. 4, No. 1 (Spring – Summer, 1983), p. 45 Published by: Woman's Art, Inc. Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1358100

 

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that in film women are typically the objects, rather than the possessors, of gaze because the control of the camera comes from factors such as the as the assumption of heterosexual men as the default target audience for most film genres. Although times have changed since the essay was written, the basic concept of men as watchers and women as watched still applies today. Although it originates from film theory, John Berger in his studies of the European nude found that the female model is often put on display directly to the spectator/painter or indirectly through a mirror, thus viewing herself as how the painter views her. For Berger these images record the inequality of gender relations and a ‘sexualization’ of the female image that remains culturally central today. They reassure men of their sexual power and at the same moment deny any sexuality of women other than the male construction. They are evidence of gendered difference… because any effort to replace the woman in these images with a man violates ‘the assumptions of the likely viewer’.2 Amedeo Clemente Modigliani was born 12th July 1884 in Livorno, Italy to a Jewish family. He was the fourth child of Flaminio Modigliani, owner of a small banco3 and Eugenia Garsin. He was plagued with bad health, suffering from pleurisy, typhoid fever. After recovering from pleurisy, his mother took him on a tour of Southern Italy, namely Naples, Rome, Capri, Amalfi, Florence and Venice. His mother played a significant role in nurturing his artistic talent, observing that his intelligence was an artistic kind. In 1898, Modigliani undertook his studies in drawing and painting under the guidance of Guglielmo Micheli, an artist in Livorno. In May 1902, Modigliani enrolled at the Scuola Libera di Nudo of the Accademia di Belle Arti, Florence and furthered his                                                                                                                 2 3

 

Berger, John, Ways of Seeing (London: Penguin Books Ltd, 1972) p.58 A broker’s office

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studies in March 1903 at the Istituto di Belle Arti, Venice. Around late 1905, he moved to Paris where he lived until his death. Modigliani had a keen interest in sculpting, but was inclined to paint for reason of better income. He spent his early years in Paris drawing up to hundreds of drawings a day and held several exhibitions under the Salon des Artistes Indépendants. Before long, he developed a unique style influenced by African masks, drawing subjects with elongated necks. Modigliani had a reputation for drinking and voraciously use of drugs as a selfmedication for his ill health. He was also a serial womaniser. He succumbed to tuberculosis in 1920, and his partner of two years, Jeanne Hébuterne who was nine months pregnant, committed suicide out of anguish, leaving behind a daughter, Jeanne Modigliani. For Modigliani painting the female nude was different to the portrait. His portraits were fragmentation of the sitters’ body put together in a way he thought best expressed their individuality. He painted them through his emotional reaction towards them. Because of this, his female nudes were not portraits. He never painted his friends nude, especially the woman that he had special and lasting relationship with.4 One interesting aspect of Modigliani’s nude drawings and sketches are done in a series, usually painted consecutively, indicating their importance of exclusiveness.5 For the studies of his nude paintings, his initial sketches show that he worked around the models through experimentation of various poses. This was in contrast to his portraits where the model’s pose and angle was fixed from the throughout. The women Modigliani chose to model were usually either Mediterranean, full-breasted women with wide hips and dark skinned or, Child-like with high breasted and fair. He

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He did however once draw his lover Beatrice Hastings in the nude, looking bedraggled and weary. His different series of nudes.

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also preferred girls who were accepting and unquestioning, enabling him to hide behind his artistic exterior. Modigliani’s paintings have captivated viewers in different ways, including feminists. The three notable paintings I will explore by how feminist art historians might interpret it are. In The Servant Girl (fig. 1), the apparent emptiness of her direct gaze is subtle and haunting not an effect one expects from eyes painted a flat blue, without iris or pupil. Colour, as characterized by Kristeva, “has a diacritical function in painting; it both produces the visual object within the system of the painting and destroys it”.6 The “self” of The Servant Girl is not a simple portrayal a viewer might expect. Feminist art historians will interpret that the artist’s choice of blue does construct the servant girl’s eyes while destroying her image in a sense that one is drawn to the lightness of her eyes, directing them away from her true ‘self’. One may observe her self-awareness and humility. Modigliani’s female gaze is unique because of the lack of any detailed element except for the colour of their eyes.7 Through the direct gaze of female subjects in painting, one cannot ignore the implication of the viewer; their persistent stare makes us conscious of the relationship between the viewer and the viewed. Modigliani found a power in the eyes of women that had not been previously portrayed. Modigliani’s the Suffering Nude (fig. 2) of 1908 is made up of rough paint strokes on a dark background, projecting a woman’s gaunt body, her head thrown back indicating an emotionally charged aura, mouth gaping. This is highlighted by the strong black stroke that marks out the woman’s chin and tensely stretched neck. Carol Mann introduced the notable painting as Modigliani’s first sexually expressive work. “The nude is shown here responding to Modigliani’s desire and becoming                                                                                                                 6

Deepwell, Katy, New Feminist Art Criticism: Critical Strategies. (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995) p.160 7 Deepwell, New Feminist Art Criticism: Critical Strategies, 1995, p. 160

 

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identified with it,” Mann stated. It was precisely this sentiment that Modigliani was to paint in this great series of nudes I 1916-1917.”8 From the Suffering Nude, the subject is projecting to the viewer the persona of Modigliani as the desiring man. She is responding to his sexuality, from the painting’s depiction of agony and ecstasy of her face. From a feminist point of view, Carol Mann interprets the classic Venus naturalis pose of Modigliani’s nudes in her book Modigliani. The pose depicts nudes lying on their side with their gender facing the spectator, anticipating delights. Modigliani employs the classic pose and makes it his own (fig. 3). The background is bare aside from suggestions of a bed or sofa. The lines gradually leads around the woman’s body, while the brushwork surrounding areas of the pelvis gains strength. All of his nudes show these features with only slight differences. The stress that Modigliani places on the eyes in his portraits is now on the nude’s sexual parts. In most of his reclining nudes one breast is visible in profile with the other turned to the viewer, the pelvis area is visible from the front with a contrasting dark triangle for the public area. Modigliani hides the woman’s legs from the knees down and cuts off the arms, pushing the viewer’s gaze towards the torso. Carol Mann makes the comment; "he centres on the torso, by cutting off arms and legs, not unlike photographic cropping that goes on in centre-folds today.”9 The women always have sexualized faces, whether their eyes are open and gazing at the viewer or closed in the illusion of sleep. When Modigliani depicts them asleep, it signifies a mutual desire because the woman is responding to him both in her sleep and in her sexuality. Thus, they are first objectified sexually, and second, artistically.

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Mann, Carol, Modigliani (London: Thames & Hudson, 1980) p. 42 Mann, Carol, Modigliani, 1980 p. 144

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Their open and seductive poses reveal Modigliani’s imagined power from fantasies of success and recognition. To conclude, Feminism has definitely played a great part in interpretation of art. Feminist Art History is a new growing field. Since the idea was born it has changed and evolved. Since Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunuch, ideas of feminism have changed significantly. However, their interpretation on art has remained roughly the same, centralizing around the faults of how a female subject is depicted or ‘exploited’. Feminist in Art History have certainly made an enduring impression through these different sentiments. However, I believe that art is open to any interpretation, making it more special. Feminist views should be regarded as a contribution to healthy debate that diversifies art.

 

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Bibliography Mann, Carol. Modigliani. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 1980. In Modigliani: Beyond the Myth, edited by Mason Klein, 55 - 74. New York: Yale University Press, 2004. Werner, Alfred. Amedeo Modigliani. New Yor: Harry N. Abrams Inc. Minor, Vernon Hyde. Art History' History. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 2001. Adams, Laurie. The Methodologies of Art. Philadelphia: Westview Press, 2010. Wolff, Janet. The Social Reproduction of Art. London: Macmillan Press Ltd, 1993. Hatt, Michael, and Charlotte Klonk. Art History: A Critical Introduction to its Methods. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006.

 

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List of Images Figure 1. Amedeo Modigliani, The Servant Girl, 1919. Oil on canvas, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, London. Figure 2. Amedeo Modigliani, The Suffering Nude, 1908. Oil on canvas, Private collection, . Figure 3. Amedeo Modiglaini, Reclining Nude on a Red Couch, 1917. Oil on canvas, Collection Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart.

 

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