Mary Beard On The Nude In Western Art

Mary Beard On The Nude In Western Art | World Histories Podcast - HistoryExtra

"Committed gallery goers tend to be terribly sniffy when they hear someone say: you know, oh this is just soft porn for the elite, isn’t it? And, you know, I can be sniffy about that too. But I think it's a question that that you really have to answer or you have to ask. I'm not sure if there is an answer is there? But I think you do have to look at this and think, so what is the difference between this and soft porn?

And that comes over very clearly in one of the paintings that we feature in the first episode, which is Courbet’s origin of the world, which is a very detailed hyper realistic painting of a woman's genitals, and she doesn't have a head and she doesn't have any limbs. And you think, why is it? How do we explain why this is in a gallery and it is a masterpiece, whereas similar photographs of that, we’ll much more likely find in a, you know, a not wholly salubrious shop.

And, and I think that, there isn't, you know, when it comes to the human body, there isn't a strict divide: porn or art is partly in the eye of the beholder. But I think it was very interesting looking at this painting which has been extremely controversial. And it now hangs very much in a very kind of proud place in the Musee d'Orsay in Paris. And it was interesting thinking about all the ways that we have of convincing ourselves that a painting like that is art. So it's in a very elaborate gilded frame, which says, masterpiece, right? It's called, the origin of the world, which gives it a kind of, sort of high level mysticism.

And even the Musee d'Orsay’s own website, talks about the use, and the sophistication of the use of color, stops it being pornography. And, you know, all those things are, in a way true, but all I think that shows is just how difficult the boundary is between art and porn and I, I've been very surprised at the vehemence of the reaction, even, even to the kind of rather crude semi accurate quotes of what I said. How. Really. Violent people get when they're confronted with the difficulty of that distinct. And in a way, justifies the program, I think... ‘I think she needs to be punched every day.’…

‘You open with a fourth century BC statue’...

‘It’s what we believe to be the first full sized sculpture of a female nude in the West, certainly in Greece but probably the West. And it's a very puzzling piece. It was made in the early fourth century BC. We’ve got no idea why after centuries of representing women closed the sculptor practically chose to do this sculpture of the goddess Aphrodite in the nude. What we do know is it was instantly quite difficult for people. The first clients he offered it to said no thank you, we’re not taking that. It then ended up being taken by the city of Kaleidos [sp?] in what is now Turkey.

And they kind of turned lucky in a way because it became a huge slightly notorious tourist attraction. You know, they put it on the ancient equivalent of fridge magnets, you know, it went on coins and on lamps and, and everything. But there is, there's a whole lot of, kind of background stories told about it, which shows you very clearly how difficult it was for people. There's one famous incident. It's described a couple of centuries later.

About a young man, story of a young man who falls in love with a statue and manages to get locked up with her in the temple. And then he tries to, well, sleep with her is probably a bit too coy and rape her is probably a bit too extreme. Have his way with her is what kind of books usually say. And he then, he does that. He leaves, apparently, the mark of his seed on on her thigh. And then he goes off and he throws himself off a cliff...

We have very strange boundaries about what we think counts as a nude. And that's still very much sits, not entirely, but it very much sits within a essentially classical form. And there's all sorts of other naked bodies that maybe we have to put back into the category of the nude. And we start very near the beginning of the program with the body of Jesus.

Because actually, if you think about Western urban culture, the place you see naked bodies, sometimes is more often anywhere else, maybe apart from an art gallery, and even there sometimes is in churches, you know that the crucified Jesus is usually not absolutely naked, effectively naked. And yet we don't talk about the nude Jesus…

We look at some amazing Michelangelo drawings at the British Museum with Neil MacGregor who used to be the director there. And he’s very clear that, you know, one of the bodies that has been most crucial and formative in the way the West has thought about nakedness and nudity is Jesus's body and of course it has, because if you have a religion whose central paradox is God made man, you have to say, so what sense, how far is Jesus man? And how far is Jesus a sexual being? And there are some extraordinary drawings in which you can see. Well, yeah, let's not put too fine a point on it. There's not much doubt that Jesus has got an erection...

‘If you look at, you know, standard definitions of pornography, I mean, I don't think there was ever any good definition of pornography. But if you look at what people say, make something pornographic. It's that you have no personality. All you've got is the genitals. You don't have a head, you don't have a face. You're not engaging with this person. You're just seeing it as sexual organs.

And in every way, on that kind of definition, Courbet’s origin of the world looks like a piece of porn... And yet it is treated now. And to some extent for me has become is… when I look at it, I enjoy actually enjoy looking at it. But it's become a piece of art, it is a piece of art. And yet it's a piece of art that you can see. Everybody is terribly, very careful to remind you that it's art. Let me talk about all the the wonderful use of mustard and brushstrokes. You know, the website, the museum tells you that it's not pornography, because of the nice colours. And you think that this is, I mean, you know, I can see where they're coming from, but it's desperate. They put it in this gilded frame which you know, and it's a kind of frame that you don't put pornography in, you know. This is the kind of frame that masterpieces go in…

There's a wonderful street artist who came down... sits in front of it in the Musee d'Orsay. And then she lifts her skirt up, reveals her genitals… There is a woman, a real woman, whose genitals you can’t actually see as clearly as the one in the painting, is being removed from the gallery when behind her is this really detailed-... I assumed what she was doing was trying to point out the irony of it'"


Sounds like people think Mary Beard is 'trolling' - since they feel uncomfortable when she points out Hard Truths