By
April 22, 2005
The latest exhibit at the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Lucas Cranach’s “Judith and Lucretia: Fashioning Women in the Northern Renaissance” organizes images that demonstrate representations of women and their ambivalent if not paradoxical portrayals. The images are of primary female figures of European cultural consciousness of the sixteenth century, women inhabiting daedal positions of power, simultaneously destructive and procreative. Among them are the Virgin Mary, St. Barbara and Eve. This ambivalence and anxiety over feminine violence is best exemplified by the centerpieces of the exhibit, “Judith with the Head of Holofernes” (1525), on loan from Syracuse University and “Lucretia Committing Suicide” (1529), from the Blaffer Foundation in Houston. Cranach’s Judith governs the canvas. She stands in an immodest and triumphant posture, gripping her prize (the head of Holofernes) with one hand and erecting a sword in another, gazing directly to her audience. In juxtaposition to Cranach’s panel painting are prints of other representations of Judith’s fatally captivating personage. According to the Old Testament, the Jewish town Bethulia was under siege buy the Assyrian army and its general, Holofernes. A beautiful widow, Judith tricks Holofernes and ultimately beheads the Assyrian aggressor. On the one hand, Judith’s deliverance is a story of a virtuous woman who saves her town from the hands of a foreign invader; while on the other, she is a dangerous woman whose beauty brought about the death of an otherwise powerful man. One such portrayal is a print from Hans Sebald Beham that takes the weight of her legend but produces a slightly different woman. The image evokes the biblical figure of Judith in a highly sensual manner. Her nude body is domesticated within an architectural frame as she maintains hold of another erect sword as she fixes a tender gaze downward towards her decapitated trophy. “Lucretia Committing Suicide” presents a comparable convergence of admiration and desire, virtue and wickedness. Cranach’s translation of Lucretia’s final scene is one marked by an undefined intimacy and an indeterminate subject of display. Lucretia’s husband, a Roman nobleman, boasted to the court that he has the most virtuous woman for a wife. Intrigued and desirous, the King’s son accosts her. To remove any misgivings about her virtue, Lucretia, with her father and husband watching, kills herself. As a result of Lucretia’s honorable slight of hand, the king and his disreputable son are banished, setting the stage for a glorious Roman empire. However, the virtuous act is not as certain in picture as it is in story. One of at least thirty-five different versions, Chranach’s painting ousts the two male witnesses of the suicide, leaving the viewer and the visual subject isolated with in a dark, intimate setting. We catch Lucretia at the moment of her lethal penetration. Lucretia’s representation is as enigmatic as the distinct yet uneasily interpretable expression on her chaste, cherubin face. Her aestheticized body becomes the site of the dual nature of the power-yielding woman — both virtuous and wicked. Other works in the exhibit display the contradictory readings of the nude female body, connotating both purity and promiscuity, inciting both desire and dread. One such figure is the “Eve”, perceived as the body responsible for both the birth and condemnation of human race. Hans Baldung Grien’s representation of Eve is a directed one, positing Eve at the forefront with two apples ready at hand, Adam behind her and the malicious serpent missing. Without the serpent, culpability for the fall of humankind rests solely on Eve’s shoulders. The exhibition also displays other forms the woman was fashioned in sixteenth century Europe. It is representative of the manner by which the northern Renaissance artists understood the figure of the woman in context to Biblical and mythical references, contemporary social fashions and the newly discovered world outside Europe. One etching by Jost Amman maps the world by dress as envisioned by a Eurocentric worldview. Entitled “Costumes of Different Nations of the World,” the piece illustrates the fashion of late sixteenth century Europe. Symptomatic of European epistemology, the etching maps out a hierarchical organization of the continents with Europe standing prominently above the more primitive populations. The fashioning of the world, as manifested by Amman’s representation, extended far beyond the body. In the background, we see a landscape sensationalized, objectified, violated and occupied by European hands. The exhibition also includes prints by Northern European artists such as Hendrik Goltzius, Albrecht Durer and Jacob Mantham. The images organized within this collection succinctly and deftly express the anxious dubiety over the politically and biologically powerful female body. Furthermore, it poses a question to the viewing agent — were they (and are you) looking at an object of desire, veneration or fear?Archived article by Whine Del RosarioSun Staff Writer
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April 22, 2005
Every child is a philosopher, and like most kids, when I was young I had many theories about life. My best theory by far was that I was born knowing everything, and slowly, day-by-day, I forgot what I knew. Don’t get this mixed up with the idea of reincarnation. I did not think I had existed before this life. But in the period of gestation, I felt sure that I had acquired universal knowledge along with arms and legs. Therefore, my response to a question I did not have the answer to was, “I used to know that, but I forgot.” I think this is a pretty good theory, and I would like to reapply it to my life. Why don’t I know everything in the world? Everything would be better off if I was tuned into some universal knowledge bank. I wouldn’t forget important vocabulary for my French tests or how to integrate an equation right before my Calc prelim (not that I ever knew how to do that anyway … or did I?) More importantly, I would have the answer to every question on the Sunday Times crossword puzzle, making me the coolest person in the world. Alas, this is not the case. I quickly learned that I was not born knowing everything, as my parents tired of my antics and informed me that it was wrong to lie. How they were aware that I was lying about having forgotten how to speak Italian at the ripe age of 3 I did not understand. It seemed perfectly plausible to me. But they were too wise, and with a little encouragement, I soon broke the habit. Well parents, I’m here to say that I wish you had just let me keep thinking that I was all-knowing at some previous point in my life. It’s way cooler to say I used to speak every language, knew the words to every song, and knew all universal laws and principles. Why crush a little girl’s dreams? Why let me accept defeat so young in life? Is there anything wrong with having self-confidence? Now I’m sure I don’t know everything. I don’t even dare cut out the Sunday Times crossword puzzle for fear of being mocked by the black newsprint questions and empty white boxes. I can barely get myself to take a gander at Monday’s puzzle. Had you given me a crossword puzzle at the age of three, I would have filled it out no sweat. (Unless I had temporarily forgotten the alphabet.) It may not have been right, but that wouldn’t faze me. I would just brush it off, slapping my forehead and muttering in frustration, “what was that answer? Oh well, I used to know all the names of the British Cricket players in the year 1980.” I think my three-year-old self knew something that I wish I was more sure of today: It’s all about confidence. Whether I used to know everything or not, I totally pulled off the know-it-all thing, no sweat. There was not a doubt in my mind. So maybe it’s not a good idea to tell such blatant lies. But no harm, no foul, right? I guess instead I could just wear a princess tiara and pretend I’m the queen. Plus, how do you know we didn’t have universal knowledge when we were born? You probably just forgot.Archived article by Becky WolozinSun Staff Writer