Posted inArt

The Age of Constricting Glamor: A Preview of Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity at the Met

Compared to other portraits of 19th century ladies, Édouard Manet’s painting of poet Nina de Callias was scandalously exotic, with her golden bangles, bolero jacket, Algerian shirt, and flourish of a feather in her curled hair, not to mention her open, sensual pose. A little scruffy dog rests its head on her flurry of skirts from which emerges an exposed ankle, and a tumult of colorful fans decorate the wall behind her. While the shock has totally subsided for contemporary audiences, the portrait drove her estranged husband to demand Manet not show it anywhere. Fashion and the identities it offered or constrained in the mid-1860s to mid-1880s (centering on Paris) is an undercurrent in the works by the top Impressionists, along with examples of period clothing caged in glass display boxes, in Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity, opening February 26 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Posted inNews

Experts Argue Head Might Not Match Courbet’s “Origin” Body #NSFW

Last week, Hyperallergic reported on the alleged discovery of the upper half of Gustave Courbet’s x-rated “The Origin of the World” in Paris. Experts are now casting doubt on the argument that the portrait fragment belongs to “Origin,” or even that it was actually painted by Courbet. With help from an American Courbet expert, we delved a little deeper into the story behind the face of “The Origin of the World.”