Three extra vertebrae. On the women's backs in the paintings of Ingres

All art is full of eroticism. Otherwise, simply can not be. But there are artists whose paintings eroticism is immediately visible, and all the work says the artist noble lover of women. This was Ingres.

The fact that Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres at the age of 82 wrote "Turkish bath", which is often called the most erotic painting of the nineteenth century, few were surprised by his contemporaries. The artist was known for his vivid sexual temperament.

When he was young, arrived at the Villa Medici (French Academy in Rome), Ingres copied Nudes with paintings by Titian, Raphael and Bronzino. And then from Italy sent for consideration to the Academy "the Bather depicted on the belt".

It was already notable findings of the painter: the model, as noted by Vincent Pomarede, in the book "Ingres", no odalisque and not Oriental beauty, but not the ancient goddess, and it is written in a more realistic manner than its "contemporaries".

It in 1807, and in the 8th year, Ingres has created a "Large bather". In contrast to the "bathers depicted in the zone", the heroine turning his face away from the viewer and appear to us in the nakedness, but while remaining a stranger.

Although this painting and have earned some approval, critics reacted to it meticulously: "it is not clear where the light falls, and the body of the woman does not cast a shadow on the bedspread on which she sits". This, of course, not a complete list of claims: in addition to the artist advised me not to get distracted and follow a high, noble, classical style.

However, this "semiprecious" painting by Ingres and glorified him.

Titian. "Venus Of Urbino"

Jupiter and Antiope, Ingres, 1851

Usually ideas don't occur in a vacuum. And Ingres was the standard — Titian. "Venus of Urbino", a copy of which Ingres was written in Italy, had an impact on the work of the Frenchman. Compare with "Venus of Urbino" his "Odalisque and slave" and "Jupiter and Antiope".

"The big odalisque" — the order of the Queen of Naples Carolina. In 1819 the painting was removed from the Salon because of "anatomical discrepancies."

And now Ingres has a character with his back to the viewer, it gives the pose more dynamics and finally (unlike the bathers) turns her head, forcing her to look the audience straight in the eye. A hitherto unseen image of Eastern beauties in a harem awaiting their master, ready!

That's it, friends! Three extra vertebrae and thin hands! Good critics. Just strongly doubt that their names somehow remembered if they hadn't toured Ingres). By the way, about three vertebrae, technically it is. Only had they nothing else to say? Didn't take a powerful eroticism, sensuality and seduction paintings?

1839. Nude odalisque, musician and the eunuch in the interior of the harem. Now this is a classic example of Orientalism in French painting.

Ingres annoyed, but not only renounces "Odalisque", but rather uses the same style in the new paintings. The artist himself admitted that he hates anatomy, "the terrible science that I can think of without disgust."

In the end, for physiological details existed real life. And Madame Ingres, of course. And its impact is felt in academic painting and even among the Impressionists Auguste Renoir and Edgar Degas.