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"James Dawkins and Robert Wood Discovering the Ruins of Palmyra" painted by
Gavin Hamilton
"James Dawkins and Robert Wood Discovering the Ruins of Palmyra" painted by
Gavin Hamilton
Art in the Round: Orientalism
July 21, 2008
by
findingDulcinea Staff
The Tate Britain’s exhibit collects over a hundred depictions of “bazaars, public baths, domestic interiors and religious sites”—the diverse, intricately decorated spaces of another world that became a fascination for European artists beginning in the late 18th century. The exhibit doesn’t gloss over the artistic movement, however, whose purpose was challenged in the 20th century by the philosopher Edward Said.
Taking the Everyday to the East
Genre art, the depiction of the everyday, was a cornerstone of 18th century art, so it is no wonder that the ordinary became the subject matter when European artists ventured east beginning in the 1780s. This newly opened passage to other cultures had innovation in transport to thank, particularly the steamboat and railroad. But once artists arrived in the so-called Orient, they felt “excluded” from some practices and places that held much fascination, particularly the harem. Male artists were left to imagine such spaces, or to visit places permitted for men, and make those the subject of their work.
Source: The Tate Britain
Victorian Web documents dozens of Orientalist artists and how their work and life fit into the grand scheme of the British Empire, art history, and the era of Orientalism. Some artists of note here are William Holman Hunt, Sir David Young Cameron, and Thomas Seddon.
Source: Victorian Web
The paintings themselves can be viewed at Orientalist Painting, a U.K.-based site. Browse alphabetically by artist name, or explore the “Odalisques,” “Merchants” and “Slaves” categories, which compile paintings of those subjects from many different artists.
Source: Orientalist Painting
A Figurehead of the ‘Orient’
The Near and Middle East was a fascination for both Europeans and natives. The Turkish artist Osman Hamdi Bey received his training in France, but his heart was in his birthplace, where he chronicled religious spaces and private spaces, as well as traditional costume and practices. findingDulcinea’s “People” profile of Hamdi notes that Turkish culture was immensely connected to art: it “involved many media: rugs, tapestries, architecture, embroidery, mosaics, ceramics, as well as painting and sculpture.” Each one of these showed up in Hamdi’s art, and his proximity to the spaces and people of Turkey lent him much more agency and credibility as an artist than most Europeans had. His work is considered part of the Orientalist movement because it helped change and shape Western perceptions of Middle and Near Eastern culture.
Source: findingDulcinea
Orientalism Today
While the artistic merit, the skill and creativity behind Orientalist art can’t be denied, the trajectory of Orientalism doesn’t stop at the canvases. As the British Empire shrank and more scholarly studies of East and West were shared, the Palestinian philosopher Edward Said emerged with a new concept: that Orientalism as a movement was limited in its viewpoints, depicting but not entirely understanding, generalizing rather than specifying. In his 1978 book “Orientalism,” now required reading in schools and universities, Said, a Columbia University professor who died in 2003, showed how an examination of his own roots uncovered images of the Near and Middle East as an “ideal other” created by the West. In this video, Said discusses the roots of his book and how Orientalist art fits into the larger picture of the historical movement.
After “Orientalism” the book, the Romantic period of English art and literature that encompassed it were viewed very differently. The Norton Anthology of English Literature writes that rather than being “stimuli for easy thrills,” the period was seen more objectively and critically as “a time of global travel and exploration, accession of colonies all over the world, and development of imperialist ideologies that rationalized the British takeover of distant territories.”
Source: Norton Anthology of English Literature
© 2009 Dulcinea Media, Inc.
