Splendour and Misery. Pictures of Prostitution, 1850 -1910
- Blair Loves
- Sep 22, 2015
- 1 min read
The first major show on the subject of prostitution, this exhibition attempts to retrace the way French and foreign artists, fascinated by the people and places involved in prostitution, have constantly sought to find new pictorial resources for depicting the realities and fantasies it implied.
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901)Au Moulin Rouge1892-1895Huile sur toileH. 123 ; L. 141 cmThe Art Institute of ChicagoHelen Birch Bartlett Memorial Collection, 1928.610
From Manet’s Olympia to Degas’s Absinthe, from Toulouse-Lautrec and Munch’s, Van Dongen or Picasso, the exhibition focuses on showing the central place held by this shady world in the development of modern painting. The topic is also covered with regard to its social and cultural dimensions through Salon painting, sculpture, decorative arts décoratifs and photography. A wealth of documentary material recalls the ambivalent status of prostitutes, from the splendor of the demi-mondaine to the misery of the pierreuse (street walker).
Splendour and Misery. Pictures of Prostitution in France, 1850 – 1910. Musée d’Orsay. September 22, 2015 until January 17, 2016.
Image Courtesy © The Art Institute of Chicago
