It will then examine the continuing resonance and influence of Manet's Laure across successive generations of artists from Manet's own time to the present moment. It will first seek to establish that the maid figure of Olympia, in the context of precedent and Manet's other images of Laure, can be seen as a focal point of interest, and as a representation of the complex racial dimension of modern life in post-abolition Paris. This dissertation will attempt to provide a sustained art-historical treatment of the second figure, the prostitute's black maid, posed by a model whose name, as recorded by Manet, was Laure. The discourse around Olympia has centered almost exclusively on one of the two figures depicted: the eponymous prostitute whose portrayal constitutes a radical revision of conventional images of the courtesan. One readily observable development of the period was the emergence of a small but highly visible population of free blacks in the city, just fifteen years after the second and final French abolition of territorial slavery in 1848. Manet's Olympia (1863) was foundational to the new manner of painting that captured the changing realities of modern life in Paris. 2014 Theses Doctoral Seeing Laure: Race and Modernity from Manet's Olympia to Matisse, Bearden and BeyondÄuring the 1860s in Paris, Edouard Manet and his circle transformed the style and content of art to reflect an emerging modernity in the social, political and economic life of the city.
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