Marcel Châtelain (active 1898-1930)

Marcel Châtelain (known as Eugène, active 1898-1930)

Marcel Châtelain, Femmes nues, dans un riad

Marcel Châtelain, Jeune femme à la cigarette, vers 1904

Marcel Châtelain, Nu au jasmin, vers 1904

Alexander Koester (1864-1932)

Alexander Koester (1864-1932), German painter.

Alexander Koester, Sprintgtime

John Singer Sargent (1856-1925)

John Singer Sargent (1856-1925), American artist.

John Singer Sargent, Study of an Egyptian Girl

Whores in History

Whores in History by Nickie Roberts is an attempt at an in-depth history of prostitution in the West. The author admits that she is not unbiased (as a former stripper she considers herself to be a sex worker) but she’s actually rather less biased than most authors who have tackled this subject. She makes it clear up-front that she favours the complete legalisation of prostitution. Interestingly enough she’s as critical of feminists as she is of moral crusaders.

Her accounts of the various different forms of prostitution that existed in classic Greece and ancient Rome are fascinating. I knew that of course there would have been expensive courtesans and cheap streetwalkers but I had no idea that there were so many distinctively different varieties of prostitute in the ancient world, each with a different social status. Prostitution was simply taken for granted in the ancient pagan world. The rise of Christianity changed all that.

In spite of Christian hostility to sex the Dark Ages and the Middle Ages were in practice surprisingly easy-going in sexual matters. The mediävel Church may have ben corrupt but it was tolerant and often humane. The Reformation and the Counter-Reformation put an end to tolerance. But efforts to persecute prostitutes were notably unsuccessful and the profession continued to thrive until the moral reformers of the late 19th century appeared on the scene. The moral reformers were horrified by the things they saw in working class areas. Working class people were, despite their ghastly lives, managing to enjoy themselves - they were drinking, dancing, singing, making jokes and carousing with prostitutes. They had to be stopped.

The moral reformers were nice respectable middle-class people. They were distressed by the plight of the poor but they were not prepared to consider that maybe that plight was the result of an unjust economic system that ruthlessly and mercilessly exploited the working class, especially working class women (wages for working class women in “respectable” occupations were either starvation level or below starvation level and the work was unbelievably gruelling). It was after all that unjust economic system that made those nice respectable middle-class people so prosperous. Another explanation had to be found, and it was. They decided that the plight of the working class was a result of the immorality and viciousness of working-class people. It was all their own fault. So nice respectable middle-class people didn’t need to feel guilty after all. And surely the most wicked of all those wicked working class people were the prostitutes. The fact that the prostitutes made enough money to afford decent housing and decent food just proved how wicked and sinful they were.

The 19th century was the great age of prostitute rescue. Pious moral reformers put the whores into homes where they could be taught respectable middle class values. These homes were in practice prisons. The girls were taught respectable trades to fit them for a life of never-ending toil and drudgery for starvation wages but at least they wouldn’t be upsetting nice respectable middle-class people any more.

One of the key points that Roberts makes is that efforts to suppress prostitution were invariably aimed at working class prostitutes who catered for working class and lower middle class customers. The moral reformers were careful not to interfere with the pleasures of the rich and powerful.

She also points out that for working class girls prostitution was often by far the best career option available. Prostitutes on the whole enjoyed a much higher standard of living and were healthier, better housed, better fed and better clothed than respectable working class women. Their working conditions were immeasurably better. Many had the temerity to enjoy their lives. It was the relative prosperity and well-being of working class prostitutes that seemed to enrage the moral reformers more than anything else, added to the fact that so many prostitutes stubbornly refused to die young but instead eventually married or started small businesses with their earnings.

The book gets really interesting when it gets to the early 20th century. In the US this was the great age of Progressivism. The progressives succeeded in getting draconian anti-prostitution laws passed, the result of which was to put prostitution in the hands of organised crime. In most European countries similar approaches were taken, all of which made life miserable for whores but made nice respectable middle-class people feel really good about themselves. Then the feminists got in on the act. Feminists didn’t want men telling women how to live their lives. Henceforth feminists would tell women how to live their lives, and women would have to listen to the feminists, or face the consequences.

Even if you’re uncomfortable with her idea that prostitution should be completely legal and unregulated it has to be admitted that Roberts makes a very strong case. It’s hard to argue with her assessment that trying to regulate prostitution just leads to police corruption and abuses of power. Roberts also doesn’t take a simplistic political view. She points out that socialist regimes have been just as sexually repressive as capitalist ones, and she clearly (and rightly) dislikes the strand of feminism that seeks to control women’s sexuality. She also (correctly) points out the links between censorship (all too often driven by hostility to women’s sexuality and fear of women’s bodies) and attempts to control women’s sexual behaviour.

It’s a book that makes a complex but compelling argument. If you only ever read one book on the subject of prostitution this is the one to read. You may not agree with her but she’ll get you thinking. And in the current age of neo-puritanism the book is more relevant than ever.

orientalist photography

Orientalism was one of the more interesting artistic manifestations of the late 19th century. I have no desire to rehash any of the political arguments on this subject since I dislike the politicisation of art. Suffice to say that in the late 19th century European, British and American artists were obsessed by the exotic.

They were also obsessed by the erotic. The combination of the exotic and the erotic always makes for a heady brew.

Artists who flocked to North Africa and the Middle East (and sometimes further east) did not just take canvasses and their paintbrushes with them. They also took cameras.

Algérie, Jeunes Femmes Photochrome originale d'époque, Circa 1890

Algérie, Bédouines du Sud, Photochrome originale d'époque, Circa 1890

Algérie, Femmes Mauresques, Photochrome originale d'époque, Circa 1890

Algérie, Jeune Fille du Sud, Photochrome originale d'époque, Circa 1890

Algérie. Jeunes Femmes Mauresques. Photochrome originale d'époque. Circa 1891

Nu au jasmin, vers 1904

Afrique du nord au repos

Une belle fille du sud

Jeune mauresque nue

Types d'Orien

Harlots, Whores and Hookers

I hope I got you attention with the title of this post. Harlots, Whores and Hookers is an entertaining if not particularly scholarly history of prostitution. And the social history of the 19th century is one of the focuses of this blog (or at least it was intended to be one of the focuses).

He takes the story back about as far as it can be traced, to the historical rise of temple prostitution in ancient times.

He tries to be fairly even-handed, admitting abuses when they existed although it’s fairly obvious that he takes the entirely sane view that most of the abuses are either the result of attempts to prohibit prostitution, or are exacerbated by such attempts. At the time he wrote the book (1979) it still seemed possible that western societies would learn to deal with sex in a rational grown-up manner.

Much of the book is devoted to cataloguing the repeat attempts to suppress prostitution and the inevitable failure of all those attempts. Failures which usually just made things worse for everybody. Evans seems to favour the idea of legalised but government-regulated prostitution, which is at least saner than attempts at prohibition (although the argument could be made that government regulation could make things worse).

He’s not inclined to see prostitutes as victims, pointing out that for most of history prostitution was a better option for women than supposedly respectable occupations which paid a pittance. He also explodes the myth that most prostitutes come to a bad end. Some prostitutes certainly have come to a bad end, but most have eventually married and blended into respectable society and some have done very nicely for themselves.

The book does deal briefly with the subject of prostitution in the 19th century, which is of course the period that interests me most.

The book is an interesting throwback to a time when it was still possible to discuss social problems in an intelligent and reasonable way. Not a great book but not bad as a brief introduction to the subject.

Pierre-Gérard Carrier-Belleuse (1851-1932)

Pierre-Gérard Carrier-Belleuse (1851-1932), French painter.

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse, Femme en déshabillé vert, 1889

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse, Young Lady Adjusting her Corset, 1893

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse, La frileuse, 1894

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse, Nu sous un parasol, 1890

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse, La Première Pose, 1900

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse, Reveil

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse, Un nu, 1897

Jean Agélou (1878-1921)

Jean Agélou (1878-1921), French photographer.

Jean Agélou, Fernande

Jean Agélou, Fernande

Jean Agélou, Serie 034 No 2

Jean Agélou, Serie 034 No 3

Jean Agélou, Seated nude smoking

Jean Agélou, Seated nude female, circa 1920

Jean Agélou, Female nude posed under a garden arch

Paul Désiré Trouillebert (1829-1900)

Paul Désiré Trouillebert (1829-1900), French painter.

Paul Désiré Trouillebert, The Nude Snake Charmer

Paul Désiré Trouillebert, Servante du harem (The Harem Servant Girl), 1874

Gaudenzio Marconi (1841-1885)

Gaudenzio Marconi (1841-1885), Italian photographer. His photographs were intended to be used by art students. From the start photography’s status as an art form was a subject of debate and disagreement but there were major artists who used such photographic studies as supplements to the use of live models. Whether these photographic studies qualify as art works is perhaps also debatable but clearly they were very much in the style of fashionable painting of the era.

Are they art or erotica? It’s fair to say that they were intended as art, and function as well in that capacity as the paintings of the average second-tier painter. There is of course something about photography that makes nudity seem more graphic. Partly it’s because photographs showed things that painters tended to be coy about showing, such as female pubic hair. Which made nude photographs more shocking, especially to those who were uncomfortable with the idea that women had genitals. So photography did have a tendency to make nudity seem somehow less respectable.

And when you look at a painting of a nude you can perhaps convince yourself that you’re looking at an allegorical figure or the goddess Venus. Photographs make it a bit more obvious that one is looking at an actual nude woman. Naked goddesses are one thing, but a photograph of an actual naked woman is something else.

Photography forced people to ask themselves whether they really thought that the naked female body was obscene. For some people the answer was yes.

Gaudenzio Marconi, Female nude with pictorial backdrop 1870-1879

Gaudenzio Marconi, Nude Study

Gaudenzio Marconi, Nudo accademico femminile con violino

Gaudenzio Marconi, Nudo femminile, circa 1870

Gaudenzio Marconi, Nudes and cherubs (putti)

Gaudenzio Marconi, Nude Study

art, photography and the erotic in the 19th century

François Boucher, Portrait of Marie-Louise O'Murphy c. 1752

Photography has always had an uneasy relationship with art. From the time photography became a practical proposition in the mid 19th century it attracted the interest of artists, for various reasons. Some painters liked the idea of being able to work from photographs rather than live models, live models having a tendency to complain bitterly about having to keep still.

Artists were also interested in the potential of photography as an art form in itself. Whether photography really does (or can) qualify as art was a subject of controversy and to this day not everyone is convinced that photography is “real” art.

A major difficulty arose when the famous “box brownie” arrived on the scene. Suddenly anyone could take photographs. A means had to be found to distinguish between the snapshots taken by ordinary people and art photographs taken by “proper” artists. To be honest no-one has ever been to do that other than by saying that photographs taken by real artists are art and photographs taken by non-artists are not art. Of course there is a difference between a photograph that is art and a mere snapshot but the difference is essentially subjective. We may not be able to define art but we know it when we see it. Except that no two people see it the same way.

Félix-Jacques Antoine Moulin, Recumbent female nude, Amélie, 1852–1853

The blurry line between photos as art and photos as non-art becomes particularly problematic when we’re dealing with erotic subject matter. Erotic art is a pretty fraught subject even when we’re dealing with painting. Everyone knows that Boucher’s Portrait of Marie-Louis O’Murphy is art and a pinup painting isn’t, even though the subject matter of Boucher’s painting is just a painting of a pretty girl lounging naked on a sofa.

Maybe it’s something to do with the intention of the artist or the photographer? Surely when great painters painted naked ladies they had allegorical or symbolic intentions? Undoubtedly that’s true in many cases, but it’s not that easy to see profound meanings in Boucher’s painting. Of course it’s possible that when M. Boucher asked Mademoiselle O’Murphy to disrobe and take up her pose he was immediately overcome by the desire to create great art that would offer profound spiritual insights into the meaning of life. Or maybe he was just overcome by awe at the young lady’s beauty. Perhaps he exclaimed, “Sacre bleu, what a magnificent opportunity for allegory.” Or perhaps he just exclaimed, “Sacre bleu, what a delicious derriere.”

Sometimes a beautiful nude girl is just a beautiful nude girl, even when painted by an artist.

When it comes to erotic photography things get tricky. Obviously a painting of a pretty girl lounging naked on a sofa is art but what about a photograph of more or less the same subject? Is it art if the photographer went to art school? Is it more OK if it’s a really old photograph? Is Félix-Jacques Moulin’s daguerrotype of a naked young lady acceptable in a way that a 1960s centrefold is not? People at the time didn’t think do, since Moulin went to prison for taking such photographs. François Boucher did not go to prison for painting Mlle O’Murphy without her clothes on.

Maybe it’s the technical or aesthetic quality of the image. As paintings of naked females go Boucher’s is unquestionably very very good. He was a very technically accomplished painter. But many of the photographers who took photos for girlie magazines in the 1950s and 1960s were very technically accomplished photographers. Boucher’s painting is well composed and aesthetically pleasing. But it’s difficult to deny that the centrefold shown here is also well composed and aesthetically pleasing. In both cases the object was to emphasis the attractiveness of the young lady’s posterior and I think both Boucher and the 1960s photographer managed to do that.

Is the desire to celebrate female beauty an insufficient justification for art? Clearly art can do many other things besides celebrate feminine beauty, but does that mean that paintings or photographs that are primarily or solely concerned with the celebration of female beauty cannot be art?

For the past century or so we have become accustomed to the idea that important art should be ugly and unpleasant and have a political purpose. Is it possible that it’s OK for art to celebrate beauty?

What all this rambling is leading up to is that I’m intending to do a lot more posts on the subject of 19th century and early 20th century photography. Since in my opinion the most interesting photographs of that era were photographs of women and those photographs are very often somewhat erotic (or even very erotic). Some of the images will undoubtedly occupy that uncomfortable “is it erotic art or is it just erotica” region.

Félicien Rops (1833-1898)

Félicien Rops (1833-1898), Belgian Symbolist painter, illustrator and print maker.

Félicien Rops, La Dame au pantin, 1885

Félicien Rops, title unknown

Félicien Rops, Appel Aux Masses!

Félicien Rops, Diaboli Virtus In Lumbis, 1888

Félicien Rops, La Pudeur de Sodome

Félicien Rops, In the Wings, 1878-1880

Félicien Rops, Le paravent

Félicien Rops, Parisian Masks, heliogravure

Félicien Rops, title unknown

Félicien Rops,

Félicien Rops, Prostitution and Madness Rule the World. ca.1887-1893, heliogravure

Félicien Rops, Cent légers croquis sans prétention pour réjouir les honnêtes gens, 1878-1881.