Ornamentation in the art of Julia Margaret Cameron: Fabric

Happy 200th birthday Julia Margaret Cameron, born on this day in 1815. I wanted to do a couple of special blog posts for today so here is a look at the use of fabric and jewellery in her photographs, starting with fabric...



Julia Margaret Cameron (1873) Henry Herschel Hay Cameron

If you spend time looking at the work of Julia Margaret Cameron what will strike you first and foremost is her intense concentration on faces.  Like Dante Gabriel Rossetti in the 1860s, primarily Julia's photographs focus on the interest and differences of expressions, beauty and the sweep of hair, often seemingly without much attention paid to costume and jewellery, but that is part of the genius of her work.  We are drawn to her subject and it is only with a second look that we begin to notice the ornamentation and therein it is possible to find fascinating reuse and meaning in the details.  As in her portrait above, the use of pattern, particularly paisley, and the sharpness of silver jewellery displays an awareness of what works within her medium and what adds to the power of her art.

Daughters of Jerusalem (1865)

Starting with what might be the most repeated of Julia's motifs, the dark shawl with paisley border, it seems to signify stoic courage.  In Daughters of Jerusalem, it swathes the head of the central figure as they look down on a baby (in an expanded version).  The paisley border provides a strong horizontal line in the centre of the composition as the rest of the drapery flows in vertical lines, and also adds pattern to the plain clothes.  Something about the thread used on the shawl shows brightly in the photographs, making it absolutely unmistakable, probably why Julia used it again and again.

Lady Elcho as a Cumaean Sibyl (1865)

Again, the dark drapery on the classical figure is alleviated by the bright border that frames the face and draws attention to the curve of her arm.  In what is a typical move, the shawl that draped Lady Elcho (mother of a member of The Souls), an aristocrat at the height of cultural society, also draped Julia's maid, Mary Hillier in a few of her photographs.

Hope (1864)

Kept in the Heart (1864)

An interesting point about Julia's use of ornamentation is that it is a social leveller; what a lady might wear on one day, the maid will wear the next.  When you are in front of the lens, in the photographer's eyes all are equal.

After the Manner of Perugino (1865-66)

Untitled (1867)

Another common garment in the photographs is the white dress with dark edging.  In the pictures above, the dress appears the same, just styled differently, the celtic/classical edge pattern cutting across the rich folds of white and providing a break between white fabric and white skin.

Zuleika (1871)

Mary Fisher (1866-67)

The black at the neck, shoulders, waist, arm bands and on edges all provides visual interest and contrast to a simple garment.  By exploiting the interplay of white and black in her medium, Julia provides strong lines against delicate beauty and almost frames her subject within the frame of the image. Often the vertical lines, as in Mary Fisher above, lead the eye away before returning you to the focus, her face. They are pathways around the piece.

Julia Margaret Cameron at her piano (1863) Oscar Rejlander

Hypatia (1868)

Maud or The Gardener's Daughter (1867-74)

Julia imposed her own sense of style on her photographs, and it is possible to find instances of her wearing a motif of her art in portraits, as seen with the paisley shawl, but also the unusual criss-cross sleeves which crop up in a number of her works. In the image of her at her piano, Julia's full sleeve is gathered and controlled by the frame of ribbon, a style repeated most notably in Hypatia where it is just possible to see that the entire dress is criss-crossed, and in Maud, where the sleeve is shortened. The dress or at least the sleeves occur repeatedly in pictures such as Gareth and Lynette and Yes or No.  In most of these photographs, the sleeve is prominent, towards the viewer for display, luxuriously decorative.

Sappho (1865)

Sappho (1865)

In the boldest patterned dresses, rich with detail, Julia pictured her maid as the poet Sappho.  The second dress caught my eye especially as it occurs again in a portrait photograph of Lady Ritchie...

Lady Ritchie and her Nieces (1868-72)

The square neckline has been folded to a point for Sappho, but the unmistakable curved lines following the bodice seams mean that this can only be the same dress worn by a maid pretending to be a classical poetess and Lady Ritchie, daughter of the novelist Thackeray.  To drape maid and lady in the same shawl is one thing, but to put them in the same dress is a step further in muse equality.

The Sisters (The Peacock Sisters) (1873)

Some fabrics take on a special quality in photographs.  The fur trim in The Sisters and the related image The Angel of the House appears fluffy and glowing against the dark, possibly velvet robes.  The use of pitch black, or at least dark enough shades that appear black in the photographs, is more unusual in her feminine works, but when used it brings out details such as the faces and hands, appearing pale against the darkness and more than ever draws your eye to the faces of the women and their expressions.

It would not be possible to end the first part of this double post without mention Julia's gentlemen models and sitters.  For the most part, the men appear in dignified portraits, dressed soberly in their own clothes to emphasis their faces and heads, such as this well known example...

Charles Darwin (1868-69)

...or swathed either in dark robes or a cloak, often with an attribute, hinting at their artistic, romantic nature...

Alfred Lord Tennyson, with book (1865)

Quite a number of her male sitters were from the literary world, as you would expect, so the large, floppy beret reoccurs, again adding to the artistic effect.

William Michael Rossetti (1865)

Her husband, Charles Hay Cameron, provided Julia with a male model for works such as Vivien and Merlin and King Lear and His Daughters, his wonderful beard and hair glowing, freshly washed, against his dark robes.

Vivien and Merlin (1874)

There is a strength of passion behind Julia's images of her husband which belay normal conventions of gravitas for a man of his age.  There is almost fetishistic treatment of his hair, most apparent in this image, with Agnes Mangles (brilliant name) entangling her fingers in the snowy mass. It makes a refreshing and appropriate change to see a man of his age being treated as a sex object and interestingly you can see similarities in her treatment of Henry Taylor.

Henry Taylor (1865)

In a paisley edged robe, Henry Taylor was called upon to act as King David, as well as Prospero and Friar Laurence, with the  beautiful young maids bowing before him. The attraction of Taylor as a model to Julia can be discerned in the way she portrays him, his hair providing a counterpoint to the formality of the dark robes.  The hair in both men's case becomes a texture, a fabric which adds to the overall effect and meaning.

Annie Chinery Cameron (1873-78)

The use of fabric in Julia Margaret Cameron's works is both subtle and impactful. Whilst her obvious emphasis lies in the beautiful faces of her sitters, the interplay of fabric and pattern frames and highlights, acting as an indicator of wealth, luxury and exoticism.  The paisley pattern may reference back to Julia's colonial heritage, but on the whole, as in the above image of Annie, her daughter in law, the use of Eastern motif is a shorthand for decorative beauty. In the work of Julia Margaret Cameron, the beauty of her subject was presented like a gift in the finest wrapping.

In my second post, we'll take a closer look at the jewellery that held the magnificent costumes together...

Model Children

If you have the dubious pleasure of knowing me personally, you'll know I take an unfeasible amount of photographs of my daughter, Lily-Rose...

Lily-Rose, May 2015

I always loved taking photographs and she's a fairly handy model (who can be easily bribed with chocolate) and very beautiful, so the photographs keep coming. There are no doubt other things going on with my photographs, including my fascination with how beautiful her genetic condition, oculocutaneous albinism, is. I wondered about Victorian artists and the use of their children in art...

This is our Corner (1873) Lawrence Alma-Tadema

There is always a good reason to use your own children in your art.  Lawrence Alma-Tadema used his daughters, Laurense and Anna in this wonderful picture, appealing to the sentimental side of Victorian taste.  More than that though, he also captured his daughters in a moment of time, in a little reading nook.  Alma-Tadema had lost his first wife four years before and moved to England from Brussels, marrying again in 1871.  Possibly guilt over the rapid change in the children's situation caused him to paint them so lovingly, or maybe a sense of unity that the three of them had survived such a time of sorrow.  One girl is in shadow looking unsure but her sister has moved into the light.  Maybe Alma-Tadema felt that they were emerging from a shadow, looking forward to a brighter future in a new country with a new wife and mother.

William Holman Hunt and his son Cyril (1872) Charles Dodgson

Holman Hunt and little Cyril also went through the loss of Fanny Holman Hunt, just two months after she gave birth to Cyril, in Florence (Cyril's middle name was Benoni, meaning 'child of sorrow').  Six years later, this photograph shows father and son united, but with a new woman in their lives, Fanny's sister Edith who had been acting as Cyril's guardian.  The photograph was possibly a gift for Edith who began her romantic affair with Hunt in 1872, marrying him three years later.

Cyril Benoni Holman Hunt (1880) William Holman Hunt

The artist's obvious pride in his son shines through this handsome portrait of his teenage boy.  Cyril, transformed into a gentleman (14 years old) is shown enjoying suitable pastimes and dressed to the nines. There is a tenderness to this picture, the pose and attitude of the young man, which expresses the love between father and son, and in the growth and accomplishment of the child as perceived by his father.

My First Sermon (1863) John Everett Millais

My Last Sermon (1863)

A man who was not short of children at home was John Everett Millais.  After marrying Effie Ruskin, the couple didn't hesitate in repopulating London with their many little Millais children.  Effie, obviously named for her mother, was born in 1858 and was the third child (first daughter) of the couple. Millais' cherubic images of his daughter include the two above and another of her dressed as Little Red Riding Hood, all very cute and very commercial.  With Millais' art, there seems less personal element, and more of an eye to what would be popular. It could be as simple as commercial acumen but it could also be a celebration of his success in making the marriage work whether others couldn't - Ha! Take that Ruskin! Mind you, I know of a few people on Facebook like that...

Margaret Burne-Jones (centre, with Sara and Elizabeth Norton)

I empathise with Edward Burne-Jones' delight in the beauty of his daughter, Margaret, and his use of her in his art.  Margaret, deep set eyes and oval face, looks like the epitome of a Burne-Jones virgin and her father's art reflects and repeats that pale simplicity until all of his women look a little like Margaret.

The Golden Stairs

Margaret is fourth from the top with the long trumpet, surrounded by her friends, all looking very much alike...

Sketch for Sleeping Beauty in The Briar Rose Series

Most famously, Margaret was Sleeping Beauty in her father's massive Briar Rose panels.  Speaking as a mother (what an odd phrase) I wonder if part of Burne-Jones' artistic vision was a way of freezing his child in her growth away from him.  Burne-Jones was miserable when Margaret married and he had to let her go and so to show her as the princess, sleeping peacefully, preserved as a child, might have acted as wishful thinking. 

Collette's First Steps (1895) Henri Gervex

Collette Gervex (1910)

The artist Henri Gervex chose the moment of his daughter's first steps to paint her portrait.  Obviously the painting is a conceit, the painting did not happen spontaneously at the moment she walked, but is a piece of memory, created around the time that Collette began to walk, possibly inspired by the moment of her first steps but not begun and finished in that moment.  Unlike Burne-Jones' desire to keep his daughter passive (consciously or unconsciously), Gervex is celebrating his daughter's blossoming independence, her active motion which will eventually take her away from him.  Fifteen years later, the beautiful young woman who stands before us is reminiscent of Holman Hunt's teenage son. Gervex shows us the young woman, graceful and fashionable, who is ready to go out in the world on her own.

Julia Margaret Cameron and Henry Herschel Hay Cameron (1867)

Despite starting late in life, Julia Margaret Cameron managed to use her children in her art, not to mention her grandchildren.  Her love of children makes me sorry she did not have the camera earlier in their lives, but she certainly made up for it with images of her children, grandchildren and friends' children.

Lionel Tennyson by Julia Margaret Cameron



Madonna and Child (with Archibald Cameron)

Her first photograph success was the child of a friend and her pictures of children rival the images of flowing haired maidens as being the strongest in Cameron's repertoire. Her pictures of the children of her famous friend Alfred Tennyson show them relaxed or playing a part in a scene, in contrast to the more formal treatment they received from professional photographers.  Each picture seems like a relationship Cameron held and treasured, and by showing each sitter in a new light, Cameron explored the child's character, delighting in her own insights and sharing them with the world.

The Last of England (1855) Ford Madox Brown

Saving the most complicated for last, you can't talk about parent artists without talking about Ford Madox Brown.  His use of all his children in his art is both charming but also filled with pathos. Starting with his daughters Lucy and Catherine (or Catty, seen in the pink bonnet eating the apple in The Last of England), Madox Brown also included his two sons, Oliver and Arthur in his work.  Arthur is the baby in Work...

Work (1863)

Detail of above

Arthur Madox Brown is the little baby in the urchin girl's arms.  He grew ill as his father worked on the picture and died before the work was finished.  The baby wears a little black ribbon around his arm as a mark of the loss. Arthur is also the baby in Take Your Son Sir! and his death at 10 months is used as explanation for the picture's unfinished state.

Take Your Son, Sir! (1851)

Ford Madox Brown created a lasting memorial to a child who lived a mere 10 months and he is remembered today in one of the most puzzling pictures of that period.  It is possible that his death contributed to the enigma, as we have only the mother's face, the baby and the reflection of the father in the image which I have seen interpreted as a simple celebration of motherhood and also a damning  accusation of illicit liaisons and illegitimate children.

Oliver Madox Brown Ford Madox Brown

The use of children in the art of their parent can be as simple or complex as you choose to interpret it. At one end, they are the model close at hand, always available and able to sit for  as long as you like (or as long as they will stay still). In some cases, like that of poor little Arthur Madox Brown, it feels like foreshadowing, but it is just a reflection of infant mortality at that time. The images of Arthur seem filled with pathos because he died at the moment we see him in the painting, but then this image is just a fact of life. The image of him in Work with the little black ribbon is similar to Rossetti's tribute to his wife in Beata Beatrix, a tribute and memento mori both for the child and for us all. However, using your own children might also reflect your own fears of them growing up, growing away from you, your own mortality. Parental pride cannot be underestimated, and there is definitely an element of bragging in some of the pictures.  Look how gorgeous my child is!  Look how accomplished they have become!  That's my genetics at work.

Well, that's what happens in my work anyway...

Lily-Rose, 2011

Mind you, I'm just following in the footsteps of my own photographer father...

Me c.1976 by my Dad

I'm Your Venus, I'm Your Fire, Your Desire

Well, here we are on the brink of a nice, sunny bank holiday weekend and so to get us off to a jolly fine start, I thought it might be splendid to have some rampant nudity…



Love's First Lesson Solomon J Solomon

Steady now, there is going to be a lot of that sort of thing in this post.  Today I’m going to talk to you about Venus, Goddess of Love and All The Good Stuff. She crops up quite a bit in art over the ages and the Victorians weren’t immune to her nudey charms.  Well, take this well-known image, for example… 

That’s Venus Verticordia (1865) by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, his only nude in oil and a gorgeous representation of the goddess as the turner of men’s hearts (‘verticordia’).  She is the very embodiment of beauty and female persuasiveness, holding her apple and flashing a bit of nipple (which in the real world doesn’t get you as far as you’d think.  Apparently.)  Rossetti also seems to say that the attributes of this goddess are very transient, the gorgeous blooms going to seed before our eyes and the butterflies epitomising the brevity of all life. Possibly she is so wonderful because she represents something so brief yet so utterly glorious – lust, youth, beauty – all gone before we notice. Well, that’s depressing, let’s see some more boobs to cheer ourselves up…

A Venus Albert Moore

This is one of my favourite Venuses as it is basically Action Man from the nipples down.  I’m sure I read a story that Mrs Moore didn’t want her husband looking at lovely ladies bits all day and so made him paint this from a chap.  That is hilarious because surely at some point Moore would have questioned whether women had a six-pack or not.  All in all, she does look like ‘Goddess of Love’ might be her wrestling name… 

The Birth of Venus (1923) Charles Shannon

According to mythology, Venus was born from sea-foam.  Coming from the water, she is seen as the balancing and tempering counterpart of Mars, a very manly God, seen elementally as ‘fire’.  When showing her in art, her birth and the associated sea-side jollity were understandable a popular choice. Shannon’s late piece, resplendent with deep water-tones and the glowing shell-pink torso, is a wonderful example.  Best known is probably this Rococo-esque  pastel explosion…

The Birth of Venus (1863) Alexandre Cabanel

Lawks! And similarly, this one…

The Birth of Venus (1879) William Bouguereau

Both pictures share an atmosphere of light, summery breezes and splashy cherubs.  Rather more people turned up to Bouguereau’s birth (dress optional, obviously) and he imagines her riding the giant clam shell, reminiscent of Botticelli’s vision.

Dear Lord, there is this one too…

The Birth of Venus (1933) George Spencer Watson

A bit out of our time-line, Watson was a very nice Victorian painter who obviously went a bit odd in his later years.  He died the year after this was completed.  Presumably this killed him.

Venus Born of Seafoam (1887) William Stott

Far more delicate is Stott’s fae lassy, toddling out of the sea with her hair swirling.  Looking remarkably like the Little Mermaid taking her first steps on dry land, it’s hard to reconcile this little sea-imp with the goddess of love, lust and fertility.  She is very beautiful however, as is her reflection in the glassy wet sand and I love the dappled foam of the breaking waves behind her.

The Bath of Venus (1895) William Blake Richmond

The study of antiquity and the availability of images from previous centuries informed the pictures in the nineteenth century in some very obvious ways.  Looking at Richmond’s goddess, you are immediately reminded of not only Botticelli, but also statues such as Venus di Milo.  The arms-up-knee-dip pose is a common one for Venus, elongating her body, raising everything perkily upwards, framing the face and freeing the hair.  It’s about display, of inspiring desire in the viewer. When you look at a picture of Venus you are meant to feel what the goddess symbolises.

Laus Veneris Edward Burne Jones

In the legend of Tannhäuser, the eponymous knight discovers the underground home of Venus (the Venusberg).  In the poem ‘Laus Veneris’ (‘In praise of Venus’) Algernon Swinburne told the story of Tannhäuser, and Edward Burne-Jones painting owes a great deal to the description in Swindburne’s work, which equally were inspired by Burne-Jones' watercolour of the same subject. Burne-Jones shows a sad, loney Venus, awaiting someone to love her (for what is the goddess of love without someone to love her?), while the knights outside pause at the sound of the beautiful music played by Venus’ companions. 

In the Venusberg (1901) John Collier

Popularised by Wagner's opera in 1845, Tannhäuser was a knight who spent a year worshiping Venus. Looking at Collier’s picture, it is quite obvious why our errant knight took a nice long time to worship the gorgeous goddess and when, after trying to repent for his saucy wanderings, ended up going back to the Venusberg and was never seen again. I mean, for goodness sake, would you leave?

Venus and Tannhäuser (1896) Lawrence Koe
Looking a bit more repentant in this one...

Poor Venus wasn’t exactly lucky in love.  Often men had to be borrowed from Roman mythology, so that she wouldn’t get lonely in pictures.  There are images of Venus and Adonis, but I really like this picture of Venus and her mortal lover Anchises…

Venus and Anchises (1889) William Blake Richmond

According to the myth, Venus pretended to be a princess and seduced the lucky Anchises for two weeks of sex.  No wonder he needs to lean against a tree. Nine months later she turned up with a baby and told him not to tell anyone of their epic romp or else he would get blasted by a thunderbolt.  I think I saw something similar on Jeremy Kyle…

Also Venus is seen with Mars, her lover and fellow deity…

Mars and Venus (1918) Mabel Layng

I love this modern allegory, with a First World War soldier beside his sweetheart. She has her apples around them and he is in his uniform, possibly on leave. It must have seemed so relevant to wonder at the relationship of love to war in 1918. Mars sits with his back to the viewer, unreachable and solid. Venus touches her heart with one hand and leaves the other hand open for him to take. Maybe Layng was optimistic that Venus’ gentleness would temper her war-bound lover as he is beginning to turn to her.

Venus and Cupid Evelyn de Morgan

One relationship that is ever-present in imagery of Venus is the one with her son, Cupid.  Cupid is a reflection of his mother, he is the mischief that desire causes and often Venus is called upon to correct him…

Venus Spanking Cupid Hans Zatzka

Yes, well, moving on.  I was thinking more in terms of one of my favourite non-Victorian works of art…

 

An Allegory of Venus and Cupid (1545) Angelo Bronzino

I’ve always loved this picture despite the fact that it is really disturbing, not least because of the bloke screaming in pain on one side and the little snake/lion girl on the other.  Oh and the boob-squeeze too.  Wrong, wrong, wrong. Anyway, often Venus is seen removing or breaking the arrows of love from the hands of her little boy, implying that he does not have the maturity to understand the power of his actions. The use of Cupid in a scene is a way of showing the two sides of love, or how sometimes we mere mortals do not appreciate the importance of love.

The Veiled Venus (1900) Kohne Beveridge and Ella von Wrede

All in all, the repetition of Venus in art through the ages reveals our obsession with love in all its many forms. Love can be wild, sudden, physical, deep and everlasting but it will always be seductive and beautiful. The Veiled Venus above is a fascinating sculpture – the veil over the beautiful face is technically clever and very striking, but does emphasis how much we are not looking at her face, if you excuse the liberty.  Possibly it is a comment on how we mistake lust for love, how people assume they are in love when they are actually lusting after some rather striking curves. Still then, however problematic our relationship with the emotions of love and lust, the truth of Venus is that she can overcome our destructive nature.  Venus is always triumphant in her relationship with Mars, and we will always side with the goddess who would rather kiss you than kill you.