Faithin Omaha eBook Collection

Download or read book Rembrandt's Female Nudes in History Paintings and Issues of Morality written by Andrea Lorraine Dawber and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Moralist writers such as Jacob Cats, Johan van Beverwijck and Gerard de Lairesse cautioned viewers during the seventeenth century of the immoral impact that could result from gazing at a painted female nude, especially one that is naturalistically rendered. This thesis therefore discusses the way in which Rembrandt’s treatment of a nude female in history subjects could have impacted the seventeenth-century male viewer when considering the moralizing literature from the same period. I rely on treatises from Cats, Van Beverwijck and de Lairesse to inform the moral climate of the seventeenth century, along with Seymour Slive’s account of Rembrandt’s reception. I am indebted to the works of Kenneth Clark, Simon Schama, Eric Jan Sluijter and Wayne E. Franits, who provided a plethora of information in which to build my argument. Therefore, I will be discussing the way in which Rembrandt juxtaposes a naturalistic female nude who is the object of the male gaze within the context of a moralizing mythology or biblical narrative and the dichotomy of such representation. This thesis will discuss the following works by Rembrandt in the chronological order in which they were produced: Andromeda Chained to Rocks 1630/1631, Danae 1636, Susanna and the Elders 1636 and 1647, The Toilet of Bathsheba 1643 and Bathsheba Reading King David’s Letter 1654. Gary Schwartz highlights during the seventeenth century the priority of an artist was to captivate the viewer’s eye and arouse desire for art. Desire was generated both by how a subject was depicted and what specifically was depicted. This is important when considering Rembrandt as he differs from other artists during the seventeenth century that are producing images with similar subject matter. I will discuss how Rembrandt depicts a single female nude to convey a powerful moral message differing from his contemporaries who depicted the same scene with a number of figures. I will argue that it is this one on one confrontation between the nude female and the viewer that heightens the moral impact of the story Rembrandt depicts thus encouraging the viewer to question his role within the story.