My conference paper

[lobelia321]

I wrote a draft outline of the paper today!



The first two slides I'll show will be:
Camuccini, Death of Caesar, completed 1818
Gerome, Death of Caesar, 1867

If you can't see the pics, try the links:
Camuccini:
http://www.francescomorante.it/images/301_2.jpg

Gerome:
http://www.artrenewal.org/images/artists/g/Gerome_Jean-Leon/large/The_Death_of_Caesar.jpg

Camuccini:




Gerome:

If we take simply the content into account, there'd be no difference between the early picture and the later one; they both show the same topic: The Death of Caesar. Yet they are very different pictures.

The early painting by Camuccini has Caesar at its centre. He forms the focus of the classical pyramidal grouping. He is distinguished by the colour of his clothing and by his expansive gesture. He is an active protagonist.

By contrast, the Caesar in Gerome's painting, completed 50 years later, is no longer an active protagonist. He is dead. He's a corpse. He's not at the centre of the composition but off to one side in the bottom left-hand corner. In fact, the painting has no immediately obvious centre of attention. Attention is dispersed over the canvas: corpse, toppled chair, assassins in background, seated senator at right. The setting has become a protagonist in its own right: the fallen chair, the bloody dagger, the scrolls -- these props are as important for the visual plot of this picture as are the human figures.

Both paintings are based on the same textual sources, primarily the ancient Roman histories by Plutarch and Suetonius (the 'Parallel Lives' and 'The Twelve Caesars', respectively; Shakespeare was another source but Shakespeare's 'Julius Caesar' itself closely follows the story as told by Plutarch). But the "fruitful moment" (Lessing) chosen for each painting is taken from a very different part of the story.

Camuccini chose the dramatic highpoint: the actual killing. We see Caesar in the process of *being killed*. Gerome chose the moment *after*. We, the viewers, are asked to reconstruct the actual murder by using props, figures and setting as clues to piece together our tale. The toppled chair is a trace of the "before" (we imagine the struggle). The opening to the street in the far background is the immediate future: the public space into which the senators are about to run and where they will proclaim Caesar's death to the people. Camuccini's painting, by contrast, all takes place in the here and now; there are hardly any hints to any 'before' or any 'after'.

In the painting by Gerome, the Death of Caesar has been transformed from an exemplum virtutis (example of Republican virtue -- the senators assassinate Caesar to prevent him from making himself emperor and tyrant) into an eyewitness report of the scene of a crime.

I will then go on to show further examples of how deaths in the second half of the 19th century were painted as crime scenes, and I'll link that to contemporary press reports of crime, and to detective and mystery stories.

Does that sound at all interesting and/or convincing?

Comments

[ia-ne.livejournal.com]

I can't see the first picture, but I definitely think your ideas/thoughts/points are very interesting and thought provoking.
I get easily bored in exhibitions, but I've come to the conclusion that that's because I almost have no knowledge of art history (or contemporary art for that matter). If I have somebody who can give me more information about a painting (etc.), like a background story or analysis, it's a totally different thing.
And I'm especially intrigued by the links to crime reports and detective stories!

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Oh, thanks, sweetie.

Heh, if bored in exhibitions, you may be lookin' at the wrong stuff. Because there are plenty of orgasmic sculptures of nude and semi-nude nubile young men about, and juicy pics of men draped over each other wearing nothing but a sword, and even juicier pics of orgiastic women and... need I go on?

[sheldrake.livejournal.com]

I'd say that sounds absolutely fascinating, and I'd be interested in reading the finished thing. Your link said I wasn't authorised to view the Gerome, but I found it elsewhere.

Ooh! Makes me want to go and research something!

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Thank you, iridescent imp of Ipswich. ;-)

[sheldrake.livejournal.com]

iridescent imp of Ipswich

Ooh, I like that. I'm adopting it as my official title.

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

Oh, this is an interesting idea! I don't know a great deal about crime reporting during that time period, but my impression is that it was generally very sensational and dramatic. It certainly seems that you can make a case for contemporary art following that particular trend. From a purely economic standpoint, if the popular press documented crime a certain way because there was considerable public appetite for such reporting and stories, it stands to reason that an artist like Gerome would be aware of these preferences and tailor his painting accordingly. Whether he did so consciously is probably another matter. :)

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Thank you, honey bunch. Problem is, this is only supposed to be about a third of the paper, then I leave crime behind and talk about other stuff. I always do this: my material eats up the time and space allotted.

[eyebrowofdoom.livejournal.com]

This sounds fabulously interesting.

Is there a big interest in forensic science in this period, and is that culturally tied up with detective stories etc? And could one see realist painting in general (with its science of proportions etc) becoming sort of a forensic act?

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Is there a big interest in forensic science in this period?
I am cheating a tiny, tiny bit because I don't *yet* know all that much about forensic science in this period. I'm hoping to find the evidence, as it were, after I've given the paper and claimed these things. But actually, my hunch is there was. Forensic science started then - the first police force wasn't established until the 1830s and in the 2nd half of the 19th C. people got interested in fingerprinting and other ways to trace criminals. And the illustrated press regularly and gleefully reported on gristly crimes, with pics. Eugene Sue published 'Mysteries of Paris' in the early C. but I haven't read that yet; it's a compilation of Parisian crime tales.
I suppose if anyone asks me that question afterwards, that's the sort of thing I could say to fend them off?

And could one see realist painting in general (with its science of proportions etc) becoming sort of a forensic act?
Well, ha, barrel of bees. Realism, as they say, is a 'hotly contested topic'. Most art historians would even dispute that the Gerome is remotely realist but the people writing at the time did think of him as realist. It depends on the definitions. Hm, must think about the 'forensic act ' thing. The crime thing is only part of my paper, btw, but hm, maybe it'll be a whole chapter in the book.

(Heh, and then I'll be able to thank slashsibs in the foreword. *falls down with amazement at the mere notion*)

[eyebrowofdoom.livejournal.com]

I suppose if anyone asks me that question afterwards, that's the sort of thing I could say to fend them off?

That sounds like an excellent defence considered response. :)

And could one see realist painting in general (with its science of proportions etc) becoming sort of a forensic act?
Well, ha, barrel of bees. Realism, as they say, is a 'hotly contested topic'. Most art historians would even dispute that the Gerome is remotely realist but the people writing at the time did think of him as realist. It depends on the definitions. Hm, must think about the 'forensic act ' thing.

Being not an art historian I am tripping over my own terms, naturally. I think I mean representational; certainly realism is another kettle of fish. I'm thinking of that Enlightenment sense of conquering things through systematic investigation and knowledge, and how that may be common to both forensic science and neo-classical painting (in the sense that perfect beauty in representation is considered to follow laws and to be in need of systematic study). If beauty=truth then painting and forensic science have the same object...

Except erk, maybe that doesn't help here because the first painting, not the second, follows classical composition rules more closely. Ah well, just shooting the breeze... :)