Viewing Gender

          During the 19^th century, females were starting to be portrayed more as people rather than objects. Artists were starting to portray them as they were really seen during those times. The exhibition, Angles and Tomboys, at the NewarkMuseum, displays this shift in how females were portrayed during these times. One can experience the beauty, innocents, roles and characteristics of young females during the 19^th century and can see the contrast between females today.

            One painting that displays the female role in society was William Henry Lippincott’s, Infantry in Arms. The scene takes place in a Victorian dinning room, where a young girl is running to her mother in fear of her younger brother. The infant boy, is in the arms of a servant or nanny and is holding a wooden sword and wearing a paper hat. This plainly shows the role of the two siblings. The infant boy is playing solider, preparing for his future as an aggressive male. The young girl, who is dressed in white and running to her mother, represents the passiveness and innocents that females were seen to have. This is how males and females were viewed since the beginning of time.

            In contrast to Lippincott’s, Infantry in Arms, Picasso’s Cubistic paintings take a drastic turn in how women were seen. In his Picasso’s painting, Three Women, he paints his figures in blocky, geometric shapes. To someone who is unfamiliar to Cubism, they may think that Picasso did not care about his figure and their forms. But in fact, Picasso had a “…passion for the human form.” (Hunter) and was aware of what he was doing. He repainted the canvas until he thought that the expressionistic energy was somewhat controlled and consistent. Not only that, but this was also Picasso’s first painting that he tried to “…utilize the Cézannian technique” (Hunter) of brushstrokes and color to bring forth and push back certain elements in his figures.

            In Three Women, Picasso displays his figures nude. Like artist before him, Picasso was trying to display the beauty of the women’s bodies but in a way that was very uncommon (before cubism). He was showing the beauty of the female body within simple geometric shapes. Everything was broken down and purposely done that way to simply the female form. Like Lippincott, Picasso displays his female figures the way that men usually see them- as objects and figures that men fantasies about. But unlike Lippincott, Picasso is seeing his figures (and paintings) in a whole new perspective. A perspective in which, simplifies its subjects in shapes.

            In conclusion, Lippincott and Picasso painted genders in their roles and context that society (in there time) placed them in. Lippincott clearly foreshadows the roles of the infant boy and the young girl while Picasso approaches his work in a very different way. He breaks his subjects up while showing the beauty of the female form. Though their works are very different from one another, they share that common theme of placing genders in their stereotypical roles.  

Work Citied:

Hunter, Sam, John Jacobs, and Daniel Wheeler. Modern Art. New York: Prentice Hall PTR, 2004. Print

Infantry in Arms

Three Women