Juicy Couture does Marie-Antoinette

Marie-Antoinette mania strikes again, in a recent ad for Juicy Couture fashion and fragrance. What on earth could this image really mean? The teeny bopper with the pink Antoinettesque hairdo and avian companion seem an unlikely combination… unless one recalls the popularity of such portraits in eighteenth-century high society, and the delightfully wicked connotations associated with the death of a girl’s pet bird (as seen here in Greuze’s famous “Jeune fille qui pleure son oiseau mort”). Whereas the innocence of the Old Regime flew the coop long ago, it is amusing to see how the advertising world in the USA keeps the memory alive, and how the tale of the naughty queen and her coterie is ever reinvented in the hopes of selling luxury to a society of plebs.

The wizardry of Oz, 2: Echoes of Robespierre?

Have you ever noticed the political echoes between the Wizard of Oz and Robespierre? Consider these similarities: 1) In the L. Frank Baum novel, the Wizard of Oz obliges all inhabitants of the Emerald City to wear green-tinted spectacles because, as the guard explains to Dorothy upon her arrival at the gates, “if you did not wear spectacles the brightness and glory of the Emerald City would blind you. … They are locked on, for Oz so ordered it when the City was first built” (117). 2) Robespierre himself always wore green-tinted glasses, according to his biographer Ruth Schurr (Fatal Purity, 12). 3) When he is unveiled at the end, Baum’s Wizard admits he is a humbug and reveals the tricks he has used to fool observers into believing in his power (ventriloquism, optical illusions, hot air balloon technology), his reclusive habits, and fear of being revealed. But his original rise to prominence, he insists, was something of an accident; as he notes, “I found myself in the midst of a strange people, who, seeing me come from the clouds, thought I was a great Wizard. Of course I let them think so, because they were afraid of me, and promised to do anything I wished them to” (187). The Wizard’s final words underline his goodness. In response to Dorothy’s exclamation, “I think you are a very bad man,” he replies: “Oh no, my dear; I’m really a very good man, but I’m a very bad Wizard, I must admit.” (189). 4) Robespierre’s speech to the Jacobins on November 21, 1793 reveals a similar mix of grandiloquence and humility. Defending his notion of a great Being who watches over the people, he describes himself as a “poor sort of Catholic,” but insists that his aim is true: “I have never cooled in my friendship for, or failed in my championship of, my fellow men. Indeed, I have only grown more wedded to the moral and political ideas that I have expressed … The French people pins its faith, not on its priests, nor on any superstition, or any ceremony, but on worship as such–that is to say, upon the conception of an incomprehensible power, which is at once a source of confidence to the virtuous and of terror to the criminal” (cited in Shurr, 194).
These echoes may be fortuitious; the landscape of 19th-century America abounded with tyrants and tricksters, to be sure. Nevertheless, it is intriguing to note the reverberations that echo between the sentiment and populism of the Wizard of Oz and the so-called Charlatan of the Terror.
Works cited (and sources of illustrations):
Ruth Schurr, Fatal Purity: Robespierre and the French Revolution (NY: Henry Holt, 2006).
L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (repr. of 1900 edition; Ann Arbor, MI: Ann Arbor Media Group LLC, 2003).

Reflections on women of the Revolution, by Julie Congdon

This comment just in, from TAS participant Julie Congdon, who contributed an arresting poster featuring famous women of the French Revolution and some of their most memorable words. She writes, “Since many women played an instrumental role behind the scenes (and a few at the forefront) of the American Revolution, I wanted to research the women who were key figures prior to and during the French Revolution. What would be the repercussions of the choices they made? With the massive bloodshed and executions that were taking place at the time, who was brave enough to stand for their beliefs? Many of the women depicted in the poster paid the ultimate price for the decisions they made, thus the placement of the guillotine by their picture.”
by Julie Congdon, Technology Lab Facilitator, LaSalle Intermediate Academy, South Bend, IN

A question of rights, by Cynthia MacWhorter

Cynthia MacWhorter participated in the 2009 Teachers as Scholars program on “The French Revolution: A Cultural Approach” (10/6 & 10/13/09). The creative project she contributed is a painting in grisaille of Marie-Antoinette juxtaposed, over whirling cloud-like brush strokes, against images of Robespierre, the halls of Versailles, the National Assembly, and the guillotine. The text on the painting reads: “October 16, 1793: What was her crime, really? Born, wrong place, wrong time? Totally clueless? Married a guy equally clueless? Not French?”
This commentary accompanies the painting: “Due to the fact that the revolution was all about human rights, I felt I wanted to address the lack of rights granted to the many persons who lost their lives due to who they were by birth. Obviously they were not totally innocent of ignorance, respect for the plight of thousands of deprived individuals and a lack of understanding which they probably could have remedied, but as I am opposed to captital punishment for even the worst criminals in contemporary society, I wanted to draw (with paint) attention to the young Queen and her plight.”
Cynthia MacWhorter, Art teacher, St. Joseph High School, South Bend, IN

Trompe l’œil imagery: Irma, ou les malheurs d’une jeune orpheline

Thanks to the astute detective work of participants in the October 2009 “Teachers as Scholars” seminar on the French Revolution, another tantalizing instance of trompe l’œil imagery has been unveiled. Look carefully at the folds of Irma’s dress, near her right leg, and you will see an angry head jutting forward toward the tomb.
Given that the story ends with a macabre account of Robespierre’s ghost haunting the catacombs in Paris and devouring the remains of his victims, perhaps this furious demonic-looking face is supposed to represent the infamous terrorist himself. It would make sense, as this image captures the final scene of the first edition of Irma, where Irma (anagram of Marie, sole survivor of the royal family) is reunited with her betrothed, the Duc d’Angoulême, and takes a vow to marry him over the tomb of Louis XVI.

This frontispiece is found in Elisabeth Guénard (Méré, madame Brossin de). Irma, ou les malheurs d’une jeune orpheline ; histoire indienne, avec des romances. Publié par la Ce. Gd. A Delhy et se trouve à Paris : Chez l’auteur, An VIII (1799-1800). University of Notre Dame: Rare Books Small PQ 1987.G45.I7.1799z. vol. 1.

New work in art, by Laura Auricchio

I am pleased to announce the publication of: Adélaïde Labille-Guiard: Artist in the Age of Revolution.
Adélaïde Labille-Guiard (1749-1803), a remarkable portraitist, was among the small number of women ever granted membership in the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture. Her work was sought out by such diverse figures as the aunts of Louis XVI and the future American president Thomas Jefferson. Yet, unlike her contemporary and fellow Academy member, Élisabeth-Louise Vigée-Lebrun, Labille-Guiard remained in France during the Revolution and participated in the reinvention of the country, its art, and its women. Tracing the fascinating story of her rise and fall in the context of her tumultuous times, this book fills major gaps in the scholarship on art during the French Revolution, on women artists, and particularly on the intriguing figure of Labille-Guiard herself. The artist is represented in the J. Paul Getty Museum by one of her finest works, the 1779 pastel Delightful Surprise; her paintings are held in a number of other important museums in America and Europe.
Published by the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
46 color and 30 b/w illustrations

by Laura Auricchio, Parsons The New School for Design
AuricchL@newschool.edu

Trompe-l’œil: a metaphysics of observing

After visiting the exhibit, “Une image peut en cacher une autre” at the Grand Palais yesterday, I realized that the the popularity of “The Mysterious Urn” (posted on 5/13/09) relied not only on political sympathies, but also on a way of seeing.  This imagery rewards the observer who looks beyond the obvious for vestiges or hints of other realities.  Like the exhibit artworks, the trompe-l’œil invites and in fact trains the eye to reverse black/white and scrutinize the contours, the blank spaces, the silences, for what might lie behind them.  The “Mysterious Urn” points to a metaphysics of observing, as well as a politics of mourning.  Note how the sunrays backlighting the “Mysterious Urn” illuminate the otherwise static seated figure and cast an expectant air on the scene, as if the Almighty were effecting some kind of miracle before our eyes.  Hopes for the king’s eventual martyrdom relied on a leap of faith (or credulous imagination) similar to those hopes that buoyed the heartbroken people who attended popular fantasmagoria shows after the Terror, and paid to bring loved ones back to life, if only for a moment, in a flimsy flickering image on a poorly-lit wall…

The fantasmagoria show pictured here is from Etienne-Gaspard Robertson, Mémoires récréatifs, scientifiques et anecdotiques d’un physicien-aéronaute, tome 1 : « La Fantasmagorie ». Éditeur : Cafe Clima (2000), where you will find many accounts of such events, and their effects on the spellbound audiences.  For an eloquent analysis of our attraction to this kind of image/spectacle, see Max Milner, La Fantasmagorie : essai sur l’optique fantastique, Paris, PUF, 1982.  A good, short account of this phenomenon is in Marie Lechner, ”Les médias disparus,” Libération.fr (August 2008).

Memory, spectacle, wishing, and grief… in a society wracked by trauma these words and feelings  interpenetrate and saturate the imaginary.  The codified genre of mysterious urns and weeping willows  functions like the literary genre of  “élégide”: ”C’est un récit poétique, nécessairement plaintif et possiblement merveilleux, d’une passion, c’est-à-dire d’une souffrance.” [a poetic account, necessarily plaintive and possibly marvelous, of a passion, that is, of suffering.  --J.J Regnault-Warin, L'Ange des prisons (1817).]

What other kinds of codified, trompe-l’œil, layered memorials existed in the post-revolutionary period?

The wizardry of Oz: French echoes in an American classic?

Have you ever noticed:

– The Cowardly Lion played by Bert Lahr in the 1939 MGM film, The Wizard of Oz, bears a striking resemblance to Louis XIV, king of France from 1654 to 1715…

(Note the arched eyebrows, the hair parted in the middle, Louis’s bouncy coiffure–whose profile is mirrored in the Lion’s perky ears and little red bow– their serious  jowls, and the magisterial gaze.  Moreover, Lahr’s solo, “If I Were King of the Forest,”  spoofs the pretensions of kingship with hilarious effect. )

– General Jinjur’s Army of Revolt, from L. Frank Baum, The Marvelous Land of Oz (1904) bears a strong resemblance to 18th- and 19th-century imagery of the “Amazons” of October 1789 and other agents of unauthorized female politicking…

(Note the comely women warriors and the bemused expressions on their erstwhile enemies in these illustrations, and especially their pointed weapons–knitting needles in General Jinjur’s army, pikes in revolutionary Paris.  A textual comparison reveals more similarities; consider The Marvelous Land of Oz, pp. 83-95; and Pierre Roussel’s lampoon of women’s political clubbing in Le Château des Tuileries [1802], 2:36-38.)

Did the Oz team (author L. Frank Baum, illustrator John R. Neill, and comedian Bert Lahr) borrow from French history in their search for the marvelous?  Is the Cowardly Lion skewering Louis XIV’s pretensions with his “woofs” and “growls” to the chipmunks under his command?  Read the lyrics and judge for yourself!

The Mysterious Urn: what does it mean?

What is the urn’s mystery: Cautious hope of a Bourbon resurrection and melodrama over the thwarted tomb? Or an attempt at reconciliation by republicans tormented by past brutality and seeking expiation in the realm of the imagination?

(Hint:  Look in the tree’s branches, and at the sides of the urn, to see the hidden profiles of Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette, Mme Elisabeth, and the two royal children.)