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Icons of Femininity
Submissive or Perverse? Gender Studies Applied to Fin de Siècle Images
While most women's lives revolve around the fields, factories or their homes, a few are breaking free by riding bicycles or attending exclusive universities. Outrageous! The male dominated field is now under threat!
These new Amazons fuel the old witch fantasy, which the arts sublimate without admitting it.
Prominent scientists examine the issue of sexuality…
And establish behavioural rules. Societies are considered more civilised when sexual dimorphism is more pronounced, meaning when the female population is physically weak and intellectually inferior, whereas the male population is powerful and rational. Healthy women, who are the guarantors of an advanced society, must meet these criteria. This establishes the foundations of a male-dominated society.
Chapter 1 - The Norm of a Healthy Femininity
Sexual anarchy and feminism are shaking the foundations of Western society.
The catalyst is the modern Amazon, or the New Woman. She cycles, wears trousers, smokes cigarettes, educates herself, and reclaims her sexuality. Men are panicking and the nation is in danger.
Chapter 2 - The New Woman and The Crisis of the Sexual Norm
Lombroso confirms that the liberated woman is a nymphomaniac criminal.
According to him, nature has endowed women with a fragile, menstruating constitution, meaning they can only cultivate their intellect at the expense of their uterus. Weakened, the uterus will give birth to atavistic beings. Furthermore, chronic anaemia caused by menstruation unleashes the potential vampire within emancipated women. The female creatures painted by Lawrence Alma-Tadema, the numerous representations of Ophelia and the Lady of Shalott, and Edvard Munch's vampiresses are proof of this.
Chapter 3 - The New Woman and Fin de Siècle Arts
Jewellery serves women in their venomous transformation.
With its mournful procession of witches, sirens, sphinxes, and other ophidian creatures, French and Victorian academic painting (the Pre-Raphaelites) lends these beliefs ancestral validity. Since the dawn of time, sensual women have been seen as enchantresses, hindering the progress of men. And Art Nouveau jewellery embodies this theory.
Chapter 4 - Reality and Mythology
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