Valentine's Day of the Dead (Part II) (Completed 6/16/26)

A rosy Ace of Spades playing card with a 3 pence royal duty stamp - c. 1868 (?) -
possibly designed by artist and architect Owen Jones; printed and distributed by Thomas De La Rue & Co., London.

"With this in mind, I had an epiphany. I envisioned a white rose opening in the center of the spade symbol... so clearly that I was sure I had seen it before. And, it began to haunt me the way the Rose Pentacle haunted me in the early days."

- Quoting myself from Part I of this series in which I intuited a symbol representing the weird synergy presented by Friday the 13th, normally an ominous day, transitioning into Valentine's Day, the official day of love and friendship; a rare occurrence and an odd conjunction... the spade as an inverted heart, and vice versa.

Of course, my first inclination at the time was to interpret it in a darkly romantic way... a deathless (or clandestine) love kind of way. And, while I wasn't exactly wrong, I found clues to inform me that, relative to our Kafkaesque times, I was missing the greater picture. I was overlooking the shadows.

In any case, I did eventually find an image of a white rose in the center of an Ace of Spades. (See  above). This occurred in the midst of a constellation of synchronicities, a few of which I discuss on PMB in the post Hidden Synchronicities (of the Memetic Kind).

The image wasn't quite what I envisioned - the rose was much too large and clearly it's context was strictly an official one. But, it was intriguing nonetheless... a rosy spade surrounded by thistles and clover. Only later did I find that this trinity of plants is a reference to the British Flower badge, a heraldic device which symbolizes the union of England (Tudor rose), Ireland (shamrock) and Scotland (thistle). Sometimes Wales is also represented... by a leek, or a daffodil. Inset left is the Badge of the Yeoman of the Guard.

But, there's more. Because I found the coveted white rose/Ace of Spades symbol quite unexpectedly... in the Wiki entry for a 19th century British card maker, Richard Harding, in spite of the fact that the image was first printed by Thomas de la Rue long after Harding's death. That beng said, it was within the tale of Richard Harding that I found The Shadow.

Harding's was a rather strange, gothic story. It began in eighteenth century England with a tax levied on playing cards.

"Initially duty was paid and a random card in the pack was hand stamped to show it had been paid, but in 1765 the Ace of Spades was given a special design and designated as the card on which duty would be shown as paid.

The Ace of Spades was stamped using a metal plate and designed to be hard to copy – hence it’s detailed features."

But, apparently it was not too hard to copy... and Richard Harding got away with it for quite awhile.

He rented some space in a building owned by a certain Mr. Skeleton in order to carry out his "nefarious business." And, really, if this were a spooky movie, you might consider yourself forewarned.

While Mr. Skeleton did initially claim ignorance of Harding's forgery operation, "this, however, was cast into doubt when 2,000 aces of spades were found in his home." 

Harding also had a daughter. More cards were found at the bottom of her laundry basket... "money laundering" ? Anyway, this is all we know about Ms. Harding... and ditto for Mr Skelton. It's a very short story.

Suffice to say, Harding was tried and found guilty of a capital offense at London's Old Bailey, and on November 13, 1805, he - “a genteel looking man, powdered and dressed in black” - was executed by hanging, very possibly at the notorious Newgate Prison. He was 35 years old.

"His remains were at St George Hanover Square Burial Ground in Bayswater until 12 March 1969, when he - and others - were removed to Lambeth and cremated."

The upshot being that less than 30 years later (1832) the Forgery, Abolition of Punishment of Death Act was enacted, abolishing the death penalty for all offences of forgery, except for forging wills and certain powers of attorney.

This, however, did not remove the stain from the Ace of Spades, and to this day it maintains a sinister reputation.

•

Source material for this section was also found in Death by Hanging, and the BBC's The man hanged for printing his own ace of spades.

Inset left: A tarot card depicting the Hanged Man (Le Pendu), the 12th key of the Major Arcana from the "Gringonneur" deck.

(This post continues below the break...)

Once Possessed - The "Madness" of Vaslav Nijinsky

Russian dancer Vaslav Nijinsky in his 1911 role as the "Rose Ghost"
from the ballet "Le Spectre de la Rose." (Also here, and another related article in French).
Click all images in this post to enlarge.

"Ô toi qui de ma mort fus cause,

Sans que tu puisses le chasser

Toute la nuit mon spectre rose

A ton chevet viendra danser.

Mais ne crains rien, je ne réclame

Ni messe, ni De Profundis;

Ce léger parfum est mon âme

Et j’arrive du paradis."

("O you, who caused my death

Without the power to dispel,

All night long my fragrant specter

Will dance at your bedside.

But fear nothing, I require

Neither psalms nor sacred rites;

This delicate scent is my soul

And I’ve come from paradise.")

- From the poem Le Spectre de la Rose by Théophile Gautier which inspired Michel Fokine's ballet about a young woman haunted by the spirit of a rose she had received at her debut. Later that night, while she dozes in a chair, the spirit of the wilted rose visits her in a dream. (Note: So much tends to be lost in mere word translations of French poetry... specifically: the poetry! I've seen several translations of this particular stanza but found myself dissatisfied with all of them. So, I tweaked it. In other words, if this translation is also problematic, the fault is mine.)

The rose (inset right) is named for a man... as many roses are. Did you know that? It's name is Fantin Latour, named for the French artist who was known for his elegant paintings of flowers... especially his roses. More of his work can be found here. There might, in actuality, be a variety of rose named Nijinsky - well, there ought to be - but, if so, I haven't found it.

"His dancing has the unbroken quality of music, the balance of a great painting, the meaning of fine literature, and the emotion inherent in all these arts. There is something of transmutation in his performances; he becomes an alembic, transforming movement into a finely wrought and beautiful work of art. The dancing of Nijinsky is first an imaginative triumph, and the spectator, perhaps, should not be interested in further dissection of it..."

- From "The Russian Ballet and Nijinsky" by Carl van Vechten found in Nijinsky, an illustrated Monograph edited by Paul Magriel, 1946. Also found within the pages of the book are the 3 b/w photos of Nijinsky as the Rose found inset left, inset right (below) and below the jump.

"In December 1917, Vaslav Nijinsky, the most famous male dancer in the Western world, moved into a Swiss villa with his wife and three-year-old daughter and started to go insane. This diary, which he kept in four notebooks over six weeks, is the only sustained, on-the-spot account we have by a major artist of the experience of entering psychosis. Nijinsky's diary was first published in 1936, in a heavily bowdlerized version that omitted almost half of his text. The present edition, translated by Kyril FitzLyon, is the first complete version in English, and the first version in any language to include the fourth notebook, written at the very edge of psychosis. It contains Nijinsky's last lucid thoughts - on God, sex, war, and the nature of the universe, as well as on his own broken life."

- A description of The Diary of Vaslav Nijinsky. The New York Times has archived a small portion of the newer translation of the diary here.

"Nijinsky's Diary was written during the six weeks he spent in Switzerland before being committed to the asylum, combining elements of autobiography with appeals for compassion toward the less fortunate, and for vegetarianism and animal rights. Nijinsky writes of the importance of feeling, as opposed to reliance on reason and logic alone, and he denounces the practice of art criticism as being nothing more than a way for those who practice it to indulge their own egos rather than focusing on what the artist was trying to say. The diary also contains bitter and conflicted thoughts regarding his relationship with Diaghilev."

- Excerpt from the Wiki entry for Nijinsky.


"The man who is right is the one who feels but does not understand."

- A quote from Nijinsky's Diary found here.

***

A Less Common Kind of Guy

If someone had told me years ago that one day in the far future I would fall in love with a man dressed as a flower, I would've probably just figured they (or I) had inhaled one flower too many. And, yet, that's just what I did one recent Pandemic night, as I gazed at a photo of the Russian dancer, Vaslav Nijinsky. The photo was found in a slim red book with the name "Nijinsky" written in a thin, black script on its spine; a book I might have easily overlooked had it not fallen under my creative radar earlier in the day. And what to my wondering eyes did appear, as I opened the book to a random page, but a photograph of Nijinsky in his role from the ballet "Le Spectre de la Rose"... that is, the ghost or spirit of the rose, which I learned had been inspired by a French poem of the same name.

Lovely, lovely, exquisitely lovely. As it so happens, roses (and spirits) figure prominently in a current art project of mine - a project devoted to the mysteries of the power of love - and, well, I'd be the last one to ignore the quirky habits of fate. Unfortunately, as I began reading the book (into the wee hours of the morning) it became apparent that I had another tragic artist on my hands and, worse still, another misunderstood "mad" artist. At which point I realized Nijinsky would eventually have to make his way to Trans-D... the home of the misunderstood "mad" artist.

As a young dancer, Vaslav Nijinsky (March 12, 1889 – April 8, 1950) was beautiful, graceful, luminous, beloved by both men and women, and considered the greatest dancer and most innovative choreographer of his time. This was during the latter years of the Fin de Siècle when all sorts of dark romanticism, spiritualism - and debauchery - transpired. Tragically, his life - and (allegedly) his mind - began to unravel around the age of 29 (apparently the shelf-life of many a brilliant flame). He was eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia and was to spend his remaining 30 years in and out of mental institutions. Professionally, he would never dance again... reminding us (to our dismay), that, yes, for an artist, there are fates worse than death... and almost all of them are in some way related to institutions.

Nijinsky is and was most often referred to as gay: the stereotypical effeminate ballet dancer - and, while looking at his "Rose" photographs, you might've  thought so, too - as if grace and beauty (and some great eye-shadow) are exclusively found in feminine form. This a fairly modern misconception. The classical world entertained a broader, unbiased perspective, glorifying both their pretty boys and pretty girls equally in art and poetry. Then again, in ancient Greece and Rome, one's sexual orientation wasn't the socially definitive issue it became in the modern world. In fact, no precise Latin words for "homosexual" or "heterosexual" existed. As for Nijinsky, well, he married a woman, fathered two children and employed a number of female prostitutes, while his few documented relationships with men - specifically Sergei Diaghilev, the founder of the renowned Ballets Russes in which Nijinsky found his fame - seem to be based predominately on Nijinsky's artistic opportunism and his partner's egocentric, abusive indulgences. "Love" did not seem to have been the operative term in their relationship. But, for Nijinsky, love was all. And, his feeling was so strong, he believed he was love's personification. In a letter to Diaghilev, Nijinsky wrote:

"You are the one who wants death and destruction, although you are afraid of death.
I love love, but I am not the flesh and blood, I am the spirit, the soul. I am love..."

Ultimately, whether Nijinsky was gay, bi, straight - or some permutation thereof - doesn't really interest us here. I'm more inclined to agree with Dorothy Parker's remark:

“Heterosexuality is not normal, it’s just common.”

 So, let's just accept that Nijinsky was a less common kind of guy and move on...

Qualifying Feminism: Empowerment and the Arts (Part III)

"You've come a long way, baby." But, no, this is not a vintage ad for
Virginia Slims. It's a (1896) self-portrait by New Woman photographer
Frances Benjamin Johnston (1864 -1952). Then again, for a woman of that period,
blatantly smoking a cigarette in public was a radical feminist statement...
that is, when it wasn't illegal (see quote below).

"Though men could, and did, smoke with abandon anywhere they wished, a woman with a cigarette was regarded as dangerously sexual, immoral and not to be trusted. That the government tried to ban only women from smoking says a lot about how society responded as women claimed new rights at the turn of the 20th century."


(Update as of August 3, 2019: Originally this article was referred to as "Part 3a" of what I had intended to be a 3 part series. This has changed. It is now Part 3 of a 7 part series. My apologies for any confusion - DS.)

____________________________________________________

The New Woman

"As educational opportunities were made more available in the 19th-century, women artists became part of professional enterprises, including founding their own art associations. Artwork made by women was considered to be inferior, and to help overcome that stereotype women became "increasingly vocal and confident" in promoting women's work, and thus became part of the emerging image of the educated, modern and freer "New Woman". Artists then, "played crucial roles in representing the New Woman, both by drawing images of the icon and exemplifying this emerging type through their own lives," including Abbéma who created androgynous self-portraits to "link intellectual life through emphasis on ocularity". Many other portraits included androgynously dressed women, and women participating in intellectual and other pastimes traditionally associated with men."

- Reference to the New Woman via the Wiki entry for New Woman painter, Louise Abbéma (1853 -1927). Inset right is one of her self-portraits. Below is an example of her work: La dame avec les fleurs (1883). More of her work can be found here.

"At the age of 18, Abbéma painted her first portrait of the 'Divine Sarah,' which she showed at the Paris Salon of 1876. It was an instant success, and the work propelled the young painter into the limelight alongside her famous subject. From that moment, Abbéma became Bernhardt’s official portraitist; she also received a flood of commissions from wealthy and fashionable clientele. Her works hung in the homes of the French elite, as well as on the walls of the Paris Town Hall and Opera House.

Yet, it was not just her famous subject that brought her success – Abbéma possessed, like Bernhardt, a certain je ne sais quoi. She was brash, smoked cigars, and dressed in men’s clothing, and the attention she attracted brought her much public acclaim. Favored almost as much for her flamboyant behavior as for her popular paintings, it is no wonder that Abbéma became fast, lifelong friends with the equally eccentric Bernhardt. Throughout their fifty-year-long friendship, Abbéma would paint Bernhardt’s portrait numerous times, and would serve as her companion and confidante until Bernhardt’s death in 1823."

- Excerpt from the article: Bernhardt and Abbéma: Leading Ladies of the Belle Époque. Primarily known as an actress and muse to a number of artists and writers (including the equally flamboyant Oscar Wilde, who referred to her as the "Divine Sarah" or the "Incomparable One"), Sarah Bernhardt (1844 -1923) (in costume, inset left above) was also an accomplished sculptress.*

"The Woman's Building was designed and built for the World's Columbian Exposition held in Chicago in 1893. It had exhibition space as well as an assembly room, a library, and a Hall of Honor. The History of the World's Fair states 'It will be a long time before such an aggregation of woman's work, as may now be seen in the Woman's Building, can be gathered from all parts of the world again.'

14 women architects submitted designs for the Women's Building. The Board of Architects selected Sophia Hayden's design. Alice Rideout was chosen as the official sculptor for the Women's Building. She created the exterior sculpture groups and the pediment. Enid Yandell designed and created the caryatid that supported the roof garden.

The Women's Building contained exhibits of works by women across a variety of fields from fine art, applied art, literature and music, to science, and home economics. There were also exhibits about women in American History and other cultures and places in the world.

... Buildings at world's fairs are often demolished when the event ends, and finding another home for them is rarely practical. (The exception was The Crystal Palace after the Great Exhibition of 1851.) The Woman's Building was destroyed as part of the general demolition after the Fair. Sadly, after the exposition, Cassatt's mural and many other artworks by many women were placed in storage and subsequently lost.

Eighty years later, the Woman's Building had been almost lost to history. With the flourishing of second-wave feminism, women went searching for what had gone before. Feminist artist Judy Chicago and her team of students, in the midst of creating The Dinner Party, discovered a copy of the Woman’s Building catalog in a second-hand bookstore. When the Los Angeles Woman's Building was opened in 1973, the founders decided to name the organization after the 1893 Woman's Building."

- Excerpts from the Wiki entry for The Women's Building (inset left is a photo of the interior): a segregated exhibition space made by women for women at the World's Columbian Exposition held in Chicago in 1893. Inset right and left above are photographs of sculptress Enid Yandell (1869 -1934) standing beside her massive caryatid of the goddess Athena. Interestingly, Yandell maintained a studio in Paris where the 40-foot statue was sculpted, and finally shipped to the states. Allegedly, while in Paris, Yandell also "worked with" Auguste Rodin. As for the fate of her Athena: it was never cast in a permanent material and deteriorated within a year. (Note:There seems to be no evidence of the finished piece online.) In reference to the Woman's Building founded by Judy Chicago, Sheila de Bretteville and Arlene Raven in 1973: it was formally designated a historic cultural monument during the summer of this year.

"In the dread art of war the male element of the race asserts itself alone. In its antithesis, the art of peace, woman is paramount... A generation ago the seers of our race foretold two great things: a material growth and prosperity, the like of which the world has never seen; a mastery of electricity, that most potent of man's friendly genii, and a great city through which the traffic of the world should roll, one of the strongholds of the earth–all this the voice of the male seer foretold from his tower, and much more.

A clearer, sweeter prophecy went forth from the tower where the wise women watched the signs of the times: "Woman the acknowledged equal of man; his true helpmate, honored and beloved, honoring and loving as never before since Adam cried, 'The woman tempted me and I did eat.'"

We have eaten of the fruit of the tree of knowledge and the Eden of idleness is hateful to us.

- Excerpt from Maude Howe Elliot's The Building and its Decoration, a chapter from the 1894 publication: Art and Handicraft in the Woman's Building of the World's Columbian Exposition, 1893, edited by Maud Howe Elliott. Insert left is the official poster for the Woman's Building created by French painter, Madeleine Lemaire (1845 –1928).**

"What started as a playful game in woman's fashion is gradually becoming a distressing aberration... It is high time that sound male judgement takes a stand against these odious fashions... the excesses which have been transplanted here from America... the look of a sickeningly sweet little boy is detested by every real boy."

- Quote taken from a vintage Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung's 1925 article: "Enough is enough! Against the Masculinization of Woman."  Found in Marsha Meskimmon's We Weren't Modern Enough: Women artists and the Limits of German Modernism. Inset right is the lovely actress, Louise Brooks... and her "sickening, sweet little boy" look...?

Note: challenge for the day: substantiate the phrase "sound male judgement." ;-)

“The chief obstacle to a woman's success is that she can never have a wife. Just reflect what a wife does for an artist: Darns the stockings; keeps his house; writes his letters; visits for his benefit; wards off intruders; is personally suggestive of beautiful pictures; always an encouraging and partial critic. It is exceedingly difficult to be an artist without this time-saving help. A husband would be quite useless."

-  A quote from the New Woman painter, Anna Lea Merritt (1844 –1930). Inset left is her 1885 painting Eve.

"In 1907, the French filmmaker, playwright, journalist, feminist, and political activist Germaine Dulac (1882-1942) gave a lecture on the “international task of French Women.” She urged her audience to “create things anew and according to your own spirit” and to organize into cooperatives and unions. Tami Williams’s in-depth historical study and critical biography Germaine Dulac: A Cinema of Sensations reveals the breathtaking extent to which Dulac followed her own advice. Among the most prolific and influential figures in early French cinema, Dulac is today virtually forgotten."

-  An excerpt from Jenny Mcphee's 2014 article: The "Pure Cinema" of Germaine Dulac. Inset right is the cover of an early French cinema review featuring a photo of Germaine Dulac (1882-1942) a pioneer filmmaker whose 1928 Surrealist film La Coquille et le Clergyman (The Seashell and the Clergyman) predated  Buñuel's  and Dalí's Un Chien Andalou. She was also on the editorial staff of the radical feminist newspaper La Fronde (The Sling).

“Do you really believe ... that everything historians tell us about men – or about women – is actually true? You ought to consider the fact that these histories have been written by men, who never tell the truth except by accident.”

- Quote from Il merito delle donne, oue chiaramente si scuopre quanto siano elle degne e più perfette de gli huomini (On the Merit of Women, Wherein Is Clearly Revealed Their Nobility and Their Superiority to Men) by 16th century Italian writer and poet Moderata Fonte (inset left). An additional article (in English) can be found here. More quotes can be found here. Other Italian poets of the period: Vittoria Colonna, Veronica Gambara, Chiara Matraini.

***

Impressionist painter,
Berthe Morisot.

Well, it took long enough, but finally I've the presence of mind (and quality time) to tend to the last Feminist Art and Empowerment post - which, incidentally has already fragmented into Part 3a and Part 3b (no, it never ends) - but, first, allow me to back up a bit and clear up an oversight.

In "A Day for the Little Ladies," which mostly focused on the political aspect of first-wave feminism in relation to International Women's Day, we witnessed a solidarity of assertive, empowered, formidable women who, outraged by their second-class citizen status, literally fought "tooth and nail" for emancipation. In some countries, such as Russia, they also helped ignite actual revolutions; in Spain, they led them.

Après le déjeuner - oil painting - 1881, Berthe Morisot.

Pre-Raphaelite
Marie Spartali. 

Yet, this was merely a portion of a much larger picture. Underlying the political strides of the feminist movement during the latter decades of the 19th century and the early decades of the 20th there emerged a different form of feminist insurgence (and/or resurgence); equally as liberating and, perhaps, even more radical. A creative New Woman was finding her voice and autonomy under the auspices of what was, in effect, a new cultural renaissance across the globe. While the New Women's contributions may have been undervalued at the time, or lost in subsequent years - as were those of women who flourished in the initial Renaissance (see here) - the New Woman reopened the door for all future generations of women and her existence was the crucial, empowering force which lay dormant in the contemporary woman's psyche until the next wave of feminism was established.

Madonna Pietra degli Scrovigni.
1884, Marie Spartali.

And, who were these New Women? They were the artists, writers, poets and performers of the late Victorian era, the Belle Époque, the Fin de Siècle, the Naughty Nineties, the Roaring Twenties and the beginning of the Jazz Age. Talk about an exciting, multi-faceted time! Within this period (covering approximately 40 years) the art world would explode with new forms, innovations, and a multitude of new genres: Romanticism, Symbolism, Impressionism, Expressionism, Cubism, Fauvism, Constructivism, Futurism and early Modernism. The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and Arts & Crafts movement were established earlier during this period. Art Nouveau (Jungendstil) and, later, Art Deco emerged. Surrealism was born. Poster art flourished. It was the Golden Age of Illustration. Photography became an art form and the first motion picture was shot in 1888; by 1896, movie theatres had opened in France, Italy and Great Britain.

And, as for the New Woman, she was a player in all of these arenas... and, very often the star...

Baudelaire, Rodin & the "Crouching Woman" (A Speculation)

Detail of Je suis belle (I am beautiful), a 1882 sculpture (plaster)
by Auguste Rodin housed in the Musée Rodin in Paris; it was
originally entitled L'Enlèvement (Rape and/or Abduction).

"Mystérieuse faculté que cette reine des facultés ! ...C’est l’imagination qui a enseigné à l’homme le sens moral de la couleur, du contour, du son et du parfum. Elle a créé, au commencement du monde, l’analogie et la métaphore. Elle décompose toute la création, et, avec les matériaux amassés et disposés suivant des règles dont on ne peut trouver l’origine que dans le plus profond de l’âme, elle crée un monde nouveau, elle produit la sensation du neuf. Comme elle a créé le monde (on peut bien dire cela, je crois, même dans un sens religieux), il est juste qu’elle le gouverne."

("How mysterious is Imagination, that queen of the faculties! ...It is Imagination that first taught man the moral meaning of colour, of contour, of sound and of scent. In the beginning of the world it created analogy and metaphor. It decomposes all creation, and with the raw materials accumulated and disposed in accordance with rules one cannot find save in the furthest depths of the soul, it creates a new world, it produces the sensation of newness. Since it has created the world, (so much can be said, I think, even in a religious sense) it is proper that it should govern it.")

- Excerpt from La Reine des Facultés, one of Baudelaire's critical essays from his Salon de 1859 (French only). Inset right is the cover page from an online illustrated edition of Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal, 1857, a .pdf in both French and English. (Note: downloads immediately.) For views of the many different covers of Baudelaire's masterpiece published over the years, see this page (click on the arrows).

"Je suis belle, ô mortels! comme un rêve de pierre,
Et mon sein, où chacun s'est meurtri tour à tour,
Est fait pour inspirer au poète un amour
Eternel et muet ainsi que la matière."

("I am beautiful, O mortals! as a dream of stone,
And my breast where each one in turn has bruised himself
Is made to inspire in the poet a love
As eternal and silent as matter.")

- The first 4 lines of Baudelaire's poem, "La Beauté," from Les Fleurs du mal inscribed at the base of Rodin's bronze sculpture Je suis belle (inset left). The original (1882) plaster was entitled L'Enlèvement (Rape, or Abduction), but when it was cast in bronze Rodin added the lines from Baudelaire's poem, and retitled the piece to Je suis belle. Mysteriously, he also altered the last line of Baudelaire's quatrain to read: "Etant alors muet ainsi que la matière," ("So being mute as matter"). (See here.)

"These lines might not seem fitting for a piece originally exhibited as The Rape in 1900. But this past title, the sculpture's current title and the poem inscribed on its base all speak to an ambiguity that characterizes much of the installation. I am Beautiful presents two figures—a more masculine standing figure and one that is more feminine grasped in the former’s arms. Are the two locked in an embrace, the female figure having leapt into her lover’s arms just moments before? Or is it darker, showing a scene of abduction?"

- Excerpt from Love and Lust at the Rodin Museum, a review of an 2017 exhibition at the Rodin Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (USA).

"This two-figure group appeared in 1880 at the top of the righthand pilaster of The Gates of Hell. It is a combination of Crouching Woman  and Falling Man, whose back seems to arch under the strain of holding her in his outstretched arms. Also known as The Abduction, Carnal Love or The Cat, the group began its life as an independent sculpture circa 1882...

It illustrates Rodin’s use of assemblages, which became one of the characteristic features of his working method. The sculptor thus profoundly altered the meaning of Crouching Woman, a very open female figure whose posture may appear either obscene or erotic, by turning her over and folding her up into a closed ball, which the man lifts into the air like Atlas..."

- From the Musée Rodin page describing Je suis belle.  Inset right (above) is allegedly the first incarnation of the "Crouching Woman" Rodin created in 1880 for his Gates of Hell. (Note: I have also seen this same figure referred to as Andromeda.) There is also a second crouching female figure at the top of the left-hand pilaster (not shown). Lastly, there is a third figure: a separate piece Rodin created and actually entitled La Femme Accroupie (The Crouching Woman) in 1882 (inset right below), the same year he created L'Enlèvement (Je suis belle). Inset left is the "Falling Man," located directly beneath the female figure on the Gates of Hell. Rodin recycled the Falling Man again, as well, in 1882.

"Rodin had illustrated this poem with an image of a reclining woman encircled in the halo of her hair, presenting a much more serene interpretation of the poem. In the sculpture, however, the original title of The Rape as well as the opposition between masculine and feminine, vertical and horizontal, and round and erect shapes suggest a vision of the “rêve de pierre” as tainted by a certain violence and conveys a message that is more difficult to decipher."

- A reference to the poem "La Beauté," from the 1857 edition of Les Fleurs du mal Rodin illuminated with some of his own drawings in late 1887 and 1888.

"Have pity, cruel girl, I can’t go on, I can’t spend another day without seeing you. Otherwise the atrocious madness. It is over, I don’t work anymore, malevolent goddess, and yet I love furiously. My Camille be assured that I feel love for no other woman, and that my soul belongs to you. … Ah! Divine beauty, flower who speaks and loves, intelligent flower, my darling. My dear one, I am on my knees facing your beautiful body which I embrace."

- A reposted quote, taken from a 1886 letter Rodin wrote to Camille Claudell in the early days of their affair, currently at the Musée Rodin.

***

Well, my friends, It appears I'm continuing to embrace the inevitable online distractions I've (continuously) been presented with all month... while researching - and attempting to finish - the post-that-shall-not-be-named (again). But, I couldn't resist posting my latest "find" as it relates so deeply to my previous find.

Once again we are presented with a sculpture... this time a creation by Auguste Rodin (Fr) (inset left, as a dapper young dude), Camille Claudel's lover. I confess, when I first set eyes on the full version of Je suis belle (see photos above) I was appalled. Especially as the first example I discovered online was entitled "The Rape." In ways, I suppose, I'm still appalled, but, in trying to solve the mystery of Rodin's (possibly) most bizarre creation and, at the same time, coming across its connection to poète maudit, Charles Baudelaire, well, I am compelled to elucidate.

As it stands, it appears many critics find Je suis belle disturbing, but, none seem to grasp just exactly why. While they might admit the odd coupling seems "tainted by a certain violence" or, conveys "a message that is difficult to decipher," or, resort to adjectives like "darker," one gets the impression the critics are lost at sea. My favorite understatement: it "embodies a difficult notion of beauty."

I'll say it does! Because, if you look very closely at the women's face, she's obviously insensible. And, if you take into consideration the position of her body - her dangling limbs, and a compression unlikely to be achieved by a living body - she may, In fact, be a true homage to Baudelaire (and/or the Symbolists in general): that is, a fresh corpse...

Camille Claudel, Lost... & Found

Detail of L'abandon (or Sakountala) - bronze - 1905, Camille Claudel.

"Camille Claudel died in a lunatic asylum in 1943, alone and forgotten. Few people remembered that in her youth, she’d been regarded as the greatest sculptress of her generation. By the time she died, aged 78, amid the chaos and carnage of the Second World War, she’d become an obscure footnote in art history, merely remembered (if at all) as the muse and mistress of Auguste Rodin.

After the war Claudel’s work was ignored, while Rodin remained a household name. Yet lately something rather wonderful has happened – she’s been rediscovered, not only as Rodin’s model or his bedfellow but as an important artist in her own right."

- Via the BBC article: How Camille Claudel stepped out of Rodin's shadow.

***

Yesterday was a strange day... previously referred to as an "André Breton" sort of day... that is, dreamlike... or maybe the fragmented trance state which precedes the more coalescent realm of dreams. (But, yes, "surreality" is as good a word as any.)

I'd been attempting to establish a healthy beginning to my proposed third Empowerment post but was distracted (as I often am) by my research. Yes, I'm afraid I was down one rabbit hole after another. The André Breton post was one off-shoot of my mental travels and this post is, yet, another unexpected fruit from that particular tree; the sort of information that is just too amazingly wonderful to "save for later."

Some months ago, I'd come across a photo of a beautiful sculpture by Camille Claudel I'd missed previously (in 2016, while researching the Into the Madhouse section of this post.) Actually, I think it's possibly the most emotionally-satisfying sculpture I've ever seen. It wasn't the greatest of photos, however, and I saw no other evidence of it online at the time, but, I added it to my files, knowing that I'd share it on the blog eventually. Anyway, to "cut to the chase," I intended to use it in Empowerment Part III, but I needed both its date and title, so I wondered if, by this time, there was more information online. And, there certainly was... more than I could possibly hope for! Not only are there far better photos online now - and a plethora of documents referring to Camille -  but the photos of L'abandon (inset right, also above and below) were there to announce the opening of a new museum in March of last year... in Nogent-sur-Seine, France. And, the name of the museum is... (are you ready?):

 Musée Camille Claudel!!!

I really cannot say just how deeply happy I am to discover this information. My very special thanks go out to all the very special people who made this come to pass. I cannot think of an artist more deserving... or a more fitting postscript to the events of her tragic life. Merci!

Incidentally, regarding the other working title of L'abandon, Sakountala (or Shakuntala): it's the name of Sanskrit play - full name: Abhijñānashākuntala - by a fifth century Hindu poet, Kalidasa. I've just read the play and I'm still not sure why Camille chose that title, but, interestingly, (via this translation) we learn:

"The term Shakuntala means one who is brought up by birds (Shakun). There are references stating that Shakuntala was found by Rishi Kanva in a forest as a baby surrounded by, or, as some believe, being fed by birds after being left by her mother, Menaka."

A link to a related article (in French): Visite en images du nouveau Musée Camille Claudel.

"Tell me, beloved, what you want of me -

I am Love, who is filled with the all:

what you want,

we want, beloved -

tell us your desire nakedly."

- Poem fragment from The Mirror of Simple Souls, 1290 ?, Marguerite Porete.

For the Love of Old Books (Part 2) - The Poètes Maudits & an Artiste Maudit

(From left to right) Das törichte Herz - Vier Erzählungen (The Foolish Heart - A Collection of Essays) by Paul Zech, paperback,1925; Une Saison en Enfer  (A Season in Hell) by Arthur Rimbaud - galley proof (uncut), 1944; Les Fleurs Du Mal - Les Épaves (The Flowers of Evil - The Scraps) by Charles Baudelaire - galley proof (uncut), illustrated by Maurice Mixi-Bérel, 1945.
(All images in this post can be clicked-on for enlarged views.)

"Symbolism was a late nineteenth-century art movement of French, Russian and Belgian origin in poetry and other arts. In literature, the style originates with the 1857 publication of Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal. The works of Edgar Allan Poe, which Baudelaire admired greatly and translated into French, were a significant influence and the source of many stock tropes and images. The aesthetic was developed by Stéphane Mallarmé and Paul Verlaine during the 1860s and 1870s. In the 1880s, the aesthetic was articulated by a series of manifestos and attracted a generation of writers. The name "symbolist" itself was first applied by the critic Jean Moréas, who invented the term to distinguish the symbolists from the related decadents of literature and of art.

Distinct from, but related to, the style of literature, symbolism of art is related to the gothic component of Romanticism."

- Introduction for the Wiki entry regarding the Symbolists.

"If there is one central tenet held by Symbolist artists, it is that life is fundamentally mysterious, and the artist must respect and preserve this mystery. Thus they insisted on suggestion rather than explicitness, symbols or equivalents rather than description, in both painting and poetry. Choosing music as their model, Symbolists found the creation of a mood to be as important as the transmission of information, and sought to engage the entire mind and personality of the viewer by appealing to the viewer's emotions and unconscious mind as well as intellect. The recognition that there was a major portion of mental activity that is closed to the conscious mind confirmed the Symbolists conviction that there was more to life than could be explained through positivist science."

- Excerpt from the New World Encyclopedia regarding the Symbolist philosophy.


"In terms of specific subject matter, the Symbolists combined religious mysticism, the perverse, the erotic, and the decadent. Symbolist subject matter is typically characterized by an interest in the occult, the morbid, the dream world, melancholy, evil, and death."

- Excerpt found on the following Art Story "Symbolist" page. For information about Symbolist literature in Spain, Germany and America try here (in English only).


"My originality consists in bringing to life, in a human way, improbable beings and making them live according to the laws of probability, by putting - as far as possible - the logic of the visible world at the service of the invisible."

- Quote attributed to French Symbolist painter, Odilon Redon.

Coquille - pastel - 1912, Odilon Redon (Musée d'Orsay)

***

It's been hot and humid in New Mexico for over a week now, but without a drop of rain in my general vicinity. While there may have been flooding elsewhere on the planet in recent months (including the States), in the American southwest the threat is fire - uncontrollable fires. Happily, my neighborhood has not had to evacuate, but if the dryness continues... well.

But, I can clearly remember the summer's day I bought the three paperbacks shown above. It was a sunny day, possibly in June, but much cooler. I was, after all, still living in New England at the time, and had just been bitten by the antiquated-book-collecting bug. So, when I heard about a book sale being sponsored by a nearby retirement community, well, it was a no-brainer; off I went. 

The books were sitting in a small box on the ground under a tent with other books in foreign languages... dejectedly, as if they were considered less desirable than the American titles lined up on the folding tables above them. I think the first title I saw was Les Fleurs Du Mal, and my heart skipped a beat; Baudelaire (inset, right), Godfather of the Symbolist poètes maudits! And, lying right beside the work of the master, was an inconspicuous (and fragile) little paperback by Rimbaud - the younger of the "accursed" poets - who would have been honored to have his Une Saison en Enfer side by side with Les Fleurs Du Mal. It was too magical; I couldn't believe my luck.  Because, as it was, my first, and most sacred influences as a young artist (and, secretly, a poet) were the Symbolist artists and writers of the turn of the (last) century.

I was yet to realize the books were galley proofs; I just grabbed them, along with a few others - including a German paperback with a bold red and black graphic on the jacket - paid for my treasures, and left. Cradling the books in my arms as I walked to my car was an almost religious experience. Imagine finding such foreign treasures under a tent in Connecticut on a summer day! I drove home in a daze...