Revolutionary Context

Early 20^th century was a period of many revolutions on all social fronts. Naturally, artistic expression was used as a medium of announcing the new, recalling the past, projecting into the future and protesting the undesirable ways of the world. The Mulatto was painted in 1913, in the fast-changing and cacophonous pre-World War 1 social environment.

The culture of Berlin in 1910s and 20s was very fertile and gave birth to sophisticated and innovative artistic styles in different art forms: Bauhaus (1919-33) in architecture and design; German modernism in literature (Döblin, Berlin Alexanderplatz, 1929); German expressionistic cinema (Lang, Dietrich); music (Weill and Brecht); New Objectivity (Grosz) and German expressionism in painting (Nolde); German idealism and aesthetic theory in criticism (Benjamin); and analytical psychology and philosophy (Jung). (Laqueur) This cultural fertility extended onwards until Adolf Hitler took power in 1933 and stamped out this culture that he considered decadent.

The most important artistic revolution that pertains to the work in focus is German Expressionism. As discussed in one of the earlier posts, Expressionism was a movement that emerged simultaneously in various cities across Germany as a response to a widespread anxiety about humanity’s increasingly discordant relationship with the world and left an important directional and stylistic mark on many different artistic disciplines. Some characteristics of German Expressionism in painting were bright colors, thick obvious brushstrokes, and bold forms. (MOMA)

On the political front, it is possible to relate this work to the series of national revolutions that happened in different corners of the world, as colonized countries demanded their independence from empires. Empires played the most important role in the racial mixing that defined the 18^th and 19^th centuries. When countries gained their national character, questions of racial diversity became more prominent and gave rise to artistic trends like primitivism and political extremities like Nazism.

A discussion of this work would not be complete without a reference to a destructive anti-revolution that directly affected it two decades after its completion.

After his ascent to power, Hitler rejected all forms of modernism as “degenerate art,” and Nolde’s work was officially condemned by the Nazi regime. Although he was initially sympathetic to National Socialism, Nazis nevertheless confiscated 1,052 works, more than from any other artist. He was prohibited by Nazis from painting in 1941, but continued secretly in watercolor until bombs destroyed his studio in Berlin and the archive of his prints in 1944. This painting is particularly important since it can be read as the epitome of all that the Nazis despised: she demonstrates what mixing races will produce and supplies pictorial evidence for the Nazis' point of view claiming the necessity of keeping German blood pure. (Bradley, Chapter 5)

Sources:

Bradley, William S. Emil Nolde and German Expressionism: A Prophet in His Own Land. Vol. no. 52. Ann Arbor, Mich.: UMI Research Press, 1986.

Laqueur, Walter Weimar: A cultural history, 1918-1933, Putnam, 1974

Moma: German Expressionism - 

http://www.moma.org/collection_ge/browse_results.php?criteria=O:AD:E:4327|A:AR:E:1&role=1

http://www.moma.org/explore/collection/ge/artists

Abstract

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In this paper I am going to explore the relationship between the “self “ and the “other” through both a societal and a biographical approach. I will focus my research around the identity of the woman in the painting, or her anonymity. Was she someone Nolde knew personally or was she an imagined character in his head? What are each option’s implications in relation to Nolde’s artistic choices in this painting? I will use the following observations as my starting point: The woman Nolde chooses to portray in this painting is of mixed heritage and two cultures, as implied by the painting's name. She is not idealized and creates a superimposition of modern nightlife (implied by the make-up and the jewelry) on an exotic subject. Her expression evokes curiosity and mystery, and the choice of painting her eyes closed suggests a dream-like state, which is further strengthened by the halo-like structure around her head. This dreamy expression is inviting into her world, and encourages the viewer to project himself/herself into the sensory field implied by the artist’s choices. The intention of the painting might be to attract the viewer’s attention to the artist’s interest in exotic subjects at the time of this painting’s execution. 

It is important to contextualize this within Nolde’s life and the social conditions he lived in. Nolde’s two-year association with the “Brucke” (“Bridge”) renewed and strengthened his interest in the arts of Africa and Melanesia. (Benson, 13). “Mulatto” was painted right before his voyage to the South Seas by way of Moscow, Siberia, China, Japan, Java and Burma “introduced many new elements into his work.” (Benson, 14) After his return, his figures became more unusual, fantastic, sometimes even grotesque, and definitely more mask-like. Nolde wrote many years later that his heart “beat faster when he painted a Russian, a Chinaman, a South-Sea Islander or a gypsy.” (Benson, 14) I will try to discover the importance of the timing of this painting: Was it painted as a preparation for his voyage? Does it represent what he expected to encounter? Or is it based on what he had previously encountered that later inspired him to travel to the South Seas?

Finally, I will explore the importance of this painting within a framework of “self vs. other.” What does it tell us about Emil Nolde? Here I will borrow from different philosophers, mainly from Lacan. His famous claim “L’autre, c’est moi” (The other is me) will be one of the hypotheses I will be testing: Was Nolde painting himself in the form of the “other”? I will also consider the ideas of racial purity that were being seeded in the society in his time, which later become the fountainhead of the Nazi movement. Where does Nolde stand in the face of the question of racial purity? Is this painting an element in his manifesto of diversity, proclaiming the inherent value of the “mulattos”?

To summarize I can say that I will be writing my final paper on the relationship between the self and the other as it relates to the biographic and societal context of this painting. My thesis will be that this relationship was present and significant at every level of Emil Nolde’s life and the Germany of the early twentieth century, and that it can be read in this painting through the visual clues.

Sources:

Benson, E. M. "Emil Nolde." Parnassus 5.1 (1933): 12,14+25.

Lacan, Jacques, 1901-1981. Autres Écrits. Paris: Seuil, 2001.

Seldis, Henry J. “The Nolde Paradox: Half Demon, Half Mystic: NOLDE EXHIBITION”; Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) [Los Angeles, Calif] 28 July 1963: d13.

Label & Exhibition Alternatives

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Label:

Emil Nolde, a German Expressionist, portrayed scenes of urban life in early 20th century, while also borrowing inspiration and themes from non-Western art. The Mulatto brings these two fields of interest together, situating an exotic figure in Berlin's nightlife. The bright smeared colors of her heavily-applied make-up, and the halo-like nondescript shape around her head all help to communicate her non-idealization and mixed influences shaping her identity. His treatment of questions about racial diversity was in conflict with Nazi ideas of racial purity of the 1930s and 40s. All of his works were confiscated and this work was exhibited in the Degenerate Art exhibition of 1937. 

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Different ways of exhibiting:

Before discussing a few alternatives to how this painting can be exhibited, I want to borrow some thoughts about the deliberate decisions museums make from a previous paper I wrote on the subject.*

<< Any decision of how to exhibit a certain artwork in a museum setting involves decisions of categorization. In the story of art told by a museum, categorization is the most important element; it is simultaneously the backbone of the presentation and the perspective through which the visitors perceive it. Classifying and mapping are devices for describing difference and hierarchy, and they exist within and through  “assumptions about time and its narrative, history.” (Nelson 39) Such assumptions define the tone of the museum in telling the story of art and the approach it takes toward the foundational principles of art history, namely, influences, reactions, relations and other ways of establishing connections between different works of art.

Bruner, Goodnow and Austin define categorization as a “man’s ability to render discriminately different things equivalent, to group the objects and events and people around him into classes, and to respond to them in terms of their class membership” (Bruner, Goodnow & Austin, 1) Therefore, categorization is the act of simultaneously seeing the similarities between the different and the difference between the similar.

These observations come with a warning. When applied to art, this practice may prove problematic, inefficient, or even deceiving. The discerning art historian must be very careful when labeling art works, as careless classification can lead to “jagged gerrymandered divisions of art history.” (Nelson 28) The museum is an attempt to homogenize the heterogeneity of the art world: to interpret, order, classify.  As Schubert says, the allure of categorization is irresistible, so much that the “mechanism of classification can become more important than the classified object and, in a wider sense, the world it stands for.” (Schubert 145) Indeed, it is very common for an art museum visitor to remember the visit within the framework of the categories the divisions in the museum imply, rather than the actual art work seen during the visit. >>

In light of these observations and thoughts, I can suggest a few alternative ways of exhibiting Nolde's Mulatto. The most obvious of these would be a periodic/stylistic exhibition ("German Expressionist", "Early 20th century"). This framework would help the visitor get the bigger picture of the period, perceive common stylistic and thematic trends, and sketch a thread of progression within the specific period. For example, the German Expressionism exhibiton at MOMA in the summer of 2011 employed both a chronological and thematic categorization within the period, discussing how important events like the World War I influenced the inspirations and techniques of the artists.

Another possible way of exhibiting this painting would be a thematic organization ("degenerate art", "urban life in early 20th century") Tracing these themes through different periods, styles and cultures, a curator can convey the sense of the theme's universality. For example, the current exhibition at Tate Modern in London explores the theme of modern urban life in the past few decades in different cities like New York and Tokyo through photography and film. Such a categorization helps the viewer extrapolate the theme in question to his/her life today and think about how (s)he would have contributed to such an exhibition if asked.

Finally, another suggestion could be to exhibit The Mulatto, along with other works alluding to primitivism, in a traveling exhibition in the countries Nolde visited during his South Seas voyage. Such a decision would first de-contextualize the painting, then to re-contextualize it within its sphere of inspiration. It would be interesting to see what the reactions of the native populations would be to their portrait from the eye of a Westerner.

  MOMA New York, German Expressionism Exhibition, Summer 2011

Sources:

* Bereketli, Ezgi, “A Visit to the Sackler Museum: A tour of art historical methods of categorization, their cognitive explanations, potential problems and alternatives” Paper written for Expos 20, Spring 2009

Bruner, J. S. , Goodnow, J. J., Austin G. A. A study of thinking New York: Wiley and Sons, 1956.

Nelson, Robert S. "The Map of Art History." The Art Bulletin 79.1 (1997): 28-40.

Schubert, Karsten. The Curator's Egg : The Evolution of the Museum Concept from the French Revolution to the Present Day /. London : One-Off Press :; Distributed by Christie's Books, 2000.

  

Image Source: http://www.brigittabungard.com/German-Expressionism

Related Works

Below are three works that I thought were related to Emil Nolde's Mulatto due to their contextual and stylistic similarities (or differences). 

"Street, Dresden" by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, 1908

Oil on canvas, 59 1/4" x 6' 6 7/8" (150.5 x 200.4 cm)

Kirchner and his colleagues, in Germany, created the artistic language we know today as German Expressionism that mainly depicted reflections of German street life, mainly in Dresden, right before World War I. In this painting, like in The Mulatto the central position is occupied by women, but differently this time the women in the center are framed by a crowd in the background. In addition, in this painting, the women look directly at the viewer, whereas the woman in Mulatto avoids a direct eye contact. This differentiated relationship between the central figure and the intended audience of the works could be a reflection of the different standings of these two different groups of women in the early twentieth century German society. It could also be argued that due to the ease with which these women seem to be offering themselves to the viewer, they could be prostitutes. This ambiguity about social positioning is a parallel theme in these two works, and in many works by Brücke artists. The use of striking and bright colors is another overarching characteristic of this group of artists, which simultaneously gives the painting a vivacious and a nightmarish quality. The jarring colors and the fluctuating forms also parallel the changing society of the time, and the artistic choices reflect the artists' anxieties.

"Dialogue" (Zwiesprache) by Max Pechstein, 1920
Woodcut, 20 1/16 x 14 7/8" (51 x 37.8 cm)

Early 20th century expressionist looked outside European societies for inspiration and primitivism was a common theme explored by many artists. Far-flung tribal societies in the South Pacific and Africa were fascinating sources for these artists and they borrowed from those cultures repeatedly. In this painting, Pechstein depicts two nude figures on a beach, bringing together elements from his interest in tribal African culture and travels to Oceania. Stylistically, these two paintings have many parallels as well. As explained in Moma's guide to primitivism they borrowed "bold volumetric shapes, geometric ornamentation, decorative patterning, and flattened planes from art and objects encountered in ethnographic museums and commercial galleries, at exhibitions at World’s Fairs and zoos, and in reproductions in books and periodicals." This common interest in these distant cultures was motivated by an idyllic vision of a simpler and more primitive life, and possibly also by their liberating effect from the stifling mores and traditions of the European society. 

"The Seed of Areoi"by Paul Gauguin, 1892
Oil on burlap, 36 1/4 x 28 3/8" (92.1 x 72.1 cm)

Paul Gauguin was a post-impressionistic artist, greatly influential to the next generation of European artists, including the German expressionists. I wanted to include this work because I believe that it could be useful in identifying the roots of some stylistic and thematic trends of the early twentieth century. Gauguin traveled to the South Pacific island of Tahiti, then a French colony. He hoped to find an enchanting and peaceful paradise; however, he was disappointed to find the island tainted and corrupt by French colonialism and sickness. He was still enchanted by the people he encountered in his travels and conflated these impressions with primitivist ideas. Once again borrowing from Tate's guide, the most important ways in which he influenced the future movements can be cited as "his use of bright, flat, and unrealistic colors and his interest in recovering a "pure" subject, closer to nature."

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Through these related works, I have gained a deeper understanding of some overarching themes of  German Expressionism, sources of inspiration and historical influences. I hope to explore these further in the future.

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Sources: 
 

Barr, Alfred H. German Painting and Sculpture, exhibition cat., New York, Museum of Modern Art, 1931

German Expressionism: Works from the Collection. 2012. Museum of Modern Art.

< http://www.moma.org/explore/collection/ge/index>

Historical Context

In an attempt to discuss the historical context in which the “Mulatto” was created, I want to first explore some of the important periods in Emil Nolde’s life.

He was born as Emil Hansen in the Prussian Duchy of Schlesweig (part of Denmark since 1920). He was a self-taught artist, pursuing his dream of becoming an independent artist only after he was 31. He attempted to join Stuck’s class in Munich, but was refused. Kandinsky and Klee were students there at the time, and the refusal by the Munich Academy of Fine Arts to accept him as their equal infused Nolde with bitter disappointment that kept him away from academy for the rest of his life. In 1905 Nolde joined the first expressionistic movement in Germany, the famous “Brucke” (“Bridge”) movement group in Dresden. (Benson, 13) He was associated with this group only for 2 years, but it still had a significant influence of his art: it renewed and strengthened his interest in the arts of Africa and Melanesia. (Benson, 13) Benson describes this effect as “Nolde’s forms became more strongly individualized; his fantasy richer, his colors bolder, and more fiery.” (Benson, 13)

“The Mulatto” was painted at a particularly important time in his life: In 1913 his voyage to the South Seas by way of Moscow, Siberia, China, Japan, Java and Burma “introduced many new elements into his work.” (Benson, 14) After his return, his figures became more unusual, fantastic, sometimes even grotesque, and definitely more mask-like. Nolde wrote many years later that his heart “beat faster when he painted a Russian, a Chinaman, a South-Sea Islander or a gypsy.” (Benson, 14)  Although there is nothing specific documented about the creation of “Mulatto”, it is safe to assume that it was painted during his journey, and is the portrait of an unknown, exotic woman.

The most important historical context defining this work is that of German Expressionism. Expressionism was a movement that emerged simultaneously in various cities across Germany as a response to a widespread anxiety about humanity’s increasingly discordant relationship with the world and left an important directional and stylistic mark on many different artistic disciplines. Some famous German expressionist artists were Ernst Barlach, Max Beckmann, Heinrich Campendonk, Lovis Corinth, Otto Dix, Lyonel Feininger, Rudi Feld, Conrad Felixmüller, Heinz Fuchs, George Grosz, Erich Heckel, Vasily Kandinsky, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Paul Klee, Oskar Kokoschka, Georg Kolbe, Käthe Kollwitz, Wilhelm Lehmbruck, August Macke, Jeanne Mammen, Franz Marc, Ludwig Meidner, Otto Mueller, Max Oppenheimer, Max Pechstein, Christian Rohlfs, Egon Schiele, and Karl Schmidt-Rotluff. (MOMA) The artists of early 20^th century were preoccupied with Primitive Art. This preoccupation was prevalent in the works by Brucke group artists. They were mainly attracted to its spontaneous and uninhibited nature.

It might be helpful to contextualize this painting within the Nazi-censored art world of the day as well. Although this painting was made two decades before the Nazi movement took off, it is closely related thematically. Since Hitler rejected all forms of modernism as “degenerate art,” Nolde’s work was officially condemned by the Nazi regime. Although he was initially sympathetic to National Socialism, Nazis nevertheless confiscated 1,052 works, more than from any other artist. He was prohibited by Nazis from painting in 1941, but continued secretly in watercolor until bombs destroyed his studio in Berlin and the archive of his prints in 1944. This painting can be read as the epitome of all that the Nazis despised: she demonstrates what mixing races will produce and supplies pictorial evidence supporting the necessity of keeping German blood pure. (Bradley, Chapter 5)

All these different grounds of historical and biographical contextualization point in one direction: there is a complex network of influences shaping Nolde’s work. I am looking forward to discovering more about these influences.

Adolf Hitler and Adolf Ziegler visiting the "Degenerate Art" Exhibition. 1937.

Selected Bibliography:

Ackley, Clifford S., Timothy O. Benson, and Victor Carlson. Nolde: The Painter's Prints. Exh. cat. Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 1995.

Benson, E. M. "Emil Nolde." Parnassus 5.1 (1933): 12,14+25.

Bradley, William S. Emil Nolde and German Expressionism: A Prophet in His Own Land. Vol. no. 52. Ann Arbor, Mich.: UMI Research Press, 1986.

German Expressionism: Works from the Collection. 2012. Museum of Modern Art.

< http://www.moma.org/explore/collection/ge/index>

Moeller, Magdalena M., and Manfred Reuther, eds. Emil Nolde: Druckgraphik aus der Sammlung der Nolde-Stiftung Seebüll. Exh. cat. Berlin: Brücke-Museum, 1999.

Questions and Sources

Questions:

1) Can this painting be evaluated from a post-structuralist perspective with an emphasis on the differences between the self and the other; and the dominant and the repressed? Will a Lacanian approach reveal new meanings? 

2) Who is the woman in the painting? Is she a real or an imagined character? Is she a generalization of all that Nolde associated with exoticism?

3) Was there a disconnect between what Nolde intended and how the painting was received? Was it an intentional catalyzer for the Nazi reaction?

4) Was the painting ever privately owned? If so, by whom? Does that change our understanding?

5) What is the painting’s relationship to other paintings by Nolde made in the same period? Similarly, how is Nolde’s style related to some artistic trends in Germany and rest of Europe in the early 20^th century?

Sources: 

Barron, Stephanie, Wolf Dieter Dube, and Palazzo Grassi. German Expressionism : Art and Society. 1st ed. New York: Rizzoli, 1997. 

Benson, E. M. "Emil Nolde." Parnassus 5.1 (1933): 12,14+25.

Emil Nolde : Paintings, Watercolours, Drawings and Graphics. London: Fischer Fine Art Limited, 1976. 

“German Expressionism: Works from the Collection.” 2012. Museum of Modern Art.

< http://www.moma.org/explore/collection/ge/index>

Grijp, Paul van der, 1952-. Art and Exoticism : An Anthropology of the Yearning for Authenticity. Vol. 5. Berlin: Lit, 2009.  

Lacan, Jacques, 1901-1981. Autres Écrits. Paris: Seuil, 2001.

Laqueur, Walter. Weimar, a Cultural History, 1918-1933. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1974.

Museum of, Modern Art, Starr Figura, and Peter Jelavich. German Expressionism : The Graphic Impulse. New York: Museum of Modern Art :Distributed by D.A.P./Distributed Art Publishers, 2011.

Museums After Modernism : Strategies of Engagement /. Ed. Griselda Pollock and Joyce Zemans . Malden, MA : Blackwell, 2007.  

Nolde, Emil. Das Eigene Leben. Berlin: Rembrandt Verlag, 1931.

Seldis, Henry J. “The Nolde Paradox: Half Demon, Half Mystic: NOLDE EXHIBITION”; Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) [Los Angeles, Calif] 28 July 1963: d13.

Schmidt, Paul Ferdinand. Emil Nolde, Leipzig: Kirkhardt & Biermann, 1929.

Historical Newspaper Articles

Articles:

The Nolde Paradox: Half Demon, Half Mystic: NOLDE EXHIBITION
Seldis, Henry J. Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) [Los Angeles, Calif] 28 July 1963: d13.

Nolde: Redeemed by His Art: " Nolde's art, not his political persuasions, placed him in jeopardy during the Nazi regime."
By JAMES R. MELLOW. New York Times (1923-Current file) [New York, N.Y] 23 Sep 1973: 151.

THE PAINTINGS HITLER HATED: AND WANTED DESTROYED. ON VIEW, AT HARVARD'S BUSCH-REISINGER MUSEUM.
Robb, Christina. Boston Globe (1960-1981) [Boston, Mass] 17 Dec 1978: AA6.


Through these historical newspaper articles, I learned more about Emil Nolde’s personality, style and movement associations, and contemporary perception by critics. I believe that discovering an artist’s personality and life is the best way to understand his work. Therefore, these articles will shed light on The Mulatto as well.

The Boston Globe article explains that Nolde’s The Mulatto was part of a 1937 Nazi exhibit “that toured Germany as an example of what the party line called degenerate art.” In addition to this, the New York Times article claims “Nolde’s art, not his political persuasions, placed him in jeopardy during the Nazi regime.” His relationship to the Nazi movement is significant as it raises questions of intentions vs. perception.

In the Los Angeles article, entitled: “The Nolde Paradox: Half Demon, Half Mystic”, Nolde’s life is pictured as imbued by a sense of paradox. Paul Klee described him as “Nolde, the primeval soul. Nolde is more than a mere creature of earth. He is a demon of the earthly region. Even one who resides elsewhere senses in him the cousin of the depths, a cousin by election.” One of the most important complexes in his personality is that although he insisted that he was striving to create a new German art, none of his spiritual ancestors were German. Seldis argues “he takes his point of departure from Goya, Rembrandt and Daumier.” This point could be important in the discussion of identity, and its multifaceted relationship to a variety of sources of inspiration.

Another interesting point mentioned in this article is that he was “filled with haughty Nordic myths of racial superiority.” This is particularly important since “the Mulatto” was a particularly controversial painting and was dismissed by the Nazis on the basis that it was against their ideals of racial purity. Nolde has a very complicated relationship with ‘race’ and this surfaces in his works. I will definitely explore this in depth with the hope discovering his reasons for painting figures like The Mulatto.
The article also explains that, despite his complexities and mysterious evocations, “Nolde’s public was touched directly by the artist since contemporary faces and figures appear in his visions of the archaic and the fantastic, linking this world of myth with the present day world.” 

One common theme of all these articles is the relationship between the artist’s biography and the themes explored in his oeuvre. They suggest that his changing spheres of artistic association and interest in non-European cultures shaped the direction his art took at different periods of his life. As I move forward with my research, I will explore these themes and read some philosophers, mainly Lacan, who wrote extensively about the relationship between the self and the other.

Contextual

Emil Nolde’s Mulatto is exhibited currently in the Sackler Museum of Harvard University, and was previously exhibited as a part of the Busch-Reisinger collection. With the closing of the Fogg Museum and Busch-Reisinger for renovation, some art works have been moved into the Sackler to create the best representation of the museum’s complete collection. The relatively small size of the museum and the importance of the art works in exhibition give the museum a special character. Due to this density of important works surrounding Nolde’s Mulatto, the viewer engages in an unconscious process of comparative appreciation of the artwork. It is exhibited in the middle of Ernst’s ‘Untitled’ and Leger’s ‘Composition’, two works of very different character and style. 

Although I have been unable to find information about the specific creation process of Nolde’s Mulatto, it is safe to assume that this painting was targeted for museum-exhibition. I have two main reasons for this assumption: First, I was unable to find any information indicating that this painting was commissioned by someone or that it was ever privately owned. Second, this painting carries many similarities to other paintings by Nolde painted around the same time (subject, style, etc.), therefore, it is very likely that he intended these to be a series, exhibited together to demonstrate his stylistic and thematic trends in the period of their execution. Proceeding with this assumption, I wanted to bring in some relevant thoughts from a paper I had previously written on museums and museology.* 

A museum is a microcosm – a world of its own, the constant re-writing of art history and an experiment in concept formation and categorization.  When a visitor walks its symbolically charged spaces, built on deliberate decisions about how to position material things in the context of others, a new narrative of art is enacted. 

Museums make experiential and contextual efforts that create active and evolving spaces where the human tendency to categorize is tested against “a number of factors including the existing divisions between objects, the particular curatorial practices of the specific institution, the physical condition of the material object, and the interests, enthusiasms, and expertise of the curator in question. “(Hooper-Greenhill 6) Foucault, in an attempt to connect this observation about constraints factoring in the narrative of art to a universal truth, exclaims: “Truth is of the world: it is produced by virtue of multiple constraints.” (Foucault 13) Museums are constructed from an array of spatial, idiosyncratic and cognitive factors. Although subject to many constraints and changing circumstances, some museums create compelling stories of art and important cases for study of museology. Sackler is what we might term a meta-museum, a segmented museum of museology, simultaneously exhibiting a collection of art works and different modes of categorization and presentation.

Sources:

* Bereketli, Ezgi, “A Visit to the Sackler Museum: A tour of art historical methods of categorization, their cognitive explanations, potential problems and alternatives” Paper written for Expos 20, Spring 2009

Foucault, Michel. The Order of Things: An Archaeology of Human Sciences. New York:, 1973.

---. "The Political Function of the Intellectual." Radical Philosophy.17 (1977): 12-4.

Hooper-Greenhill, Eilean. Museums and the Shaping of Knowledge /. London ;; New York : Routledge, 1992.

--> Sackler Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA

--> Students exploring the first floor galleries of modern and contemporary art in Sackler Museum.


(image sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sackler_Museum,_Harvard_University.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/harvardartmuseum/7845933366/in/photostream/)

Artistic Agency

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The Mulatto by Emil Nolde is an oil painting. Oil painting as a genre is unique in that despite many developments in technology over the past centuries, the fundamentals of the style have remained the same. It is the process of painting with pigments bound with a medium of drying oil. It has been the principal form of painting since the 15^th century, and by the height of the Renaissance, it almost completely replaced tempera paintings. (Del Serra)

The artist starts by sketching the subject onto the canvas, and then mixes the pigments with oil and ingredients to control the drying time of the paint. (Izzo) Traditionally artists bought their canvases from markets, but mixed their own paints from raw pigments. The artist most often uses a brush to apply the paint, but other tools were used as well, such as palette knives, rags, and many other creative objects, especially in modern art. The Mulatto was painted using a big paintbrush, as the thick brushstrokes are obvious. Most artists paint in multiple layers to achieve varying hues of the same color and recreate light effects. This was the case for The Mulatto as well, since the different layers of paint are discernible.

Although I have been unable to find any specific information about The Mulatto, it is safe to assume that Nolde was the only person involved in its creation. A very important step in his artistic creation was the sketch. He used to go to bars with his drawing pad and sketch his observations, which he would then use as a starting point for his paintings. He sketched “the lighting in the rooms, the tinsel façade, the people, all of them, good or bad, the occasional inhabitants of this demimonde or the completely decadent… this dark side of life with its make-up, with its slimy dirt and its corruption.” (Nolde, 137) The inspiration for The Mulatto must have been one of these sketches, since the description fits the visuals of this painting.

A Palette (image source: wikimedia.org)

Sources:

“20^th Century Art.” Boston Museum Bulletin. Vol. 68, No. 351/352, Centennial Acquisitions: Art Treasures for Tomorrow (1970), pp. 125-170

Benson, E. M. "Emil Nolde." Parnassus 5.1 (1933): 12,14+25.

Bradley, William S. Emil Nolde and German Expressionism: A Prophet in His Own Land. Vol. no. 52. Ann Arbor, Mich.: UMI Research Press, 1986.

Del Serra, Alfio. “A Conversation on Painting Techniques” The Burlington Magazine. Vol. 127, No. 982 (Jan., 1985), pp. 4-16

Izzo, Francesca. "20th Century Artists’ Oil Paints: A Chemical-Physical Survey."Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia. Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, 2009-2010. Web. 30 Sep 2012. 

Nolde, Emil. Jahre Der Kämpfe. Berlin: Rembrandt-Verlag, 1934.

Visual Analysis

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The Mulatto, 1913

Emil Nolde

The Mulatto by Emil Nolde is oil on canvas painting, made in 1913. Its dimensions are 77.5 * 73 cm (30 ½ * 28 ¾ in.). It is a part of Busch-Reisinger Museum’s permanent collection, but it is currently exhibited in the contemporary art gallery on the first floor of the Sackler Museum. As implied by its dimensions, it is almost a perfect square, and has a dark wooden frame. The head of the woman, and the halo-like circular framing are at the center of the painting and occupy the entire area. The gradual transitions between colors and the presence of many different tones even in continuous surfaces indicate multiple layers of paint applied in thick brush strokes. The dominant geographic form of the painting is the circle, as the woman’s head, her hair and the halo-like formation around her head are all circular. It is almost suggestive of a progression of circles, focusing on the face of the woman. The different surfaces (her face, hair, the halo and the background) are clearly separated from each other with these circular borders. The circles also help create 3D space and imply negative space. This is achieved mainly by a suggestion of increasing depth: the face at the forefront, the hair adding 3D volume and the halo creating a background of extending verticality and horizontality. The painting is dominated by a color spectrum ranging from yellow to dark red. These colors bring the garish makeup and jewelry to focus. There are two isolated occurrences of blue, namely the headband and the pendant of the necklace. The colors are of high saturation and brightness and thus make the woman appear as if under spotlights or in a well-lit dressing room. The colors are not uniform, due to the uneven handling of paint. The yellow of the chain of the necklace and that of the line separating the two layers of background are almost identical, creating a parallel and the effect of a frame-within-a-frame. The outer yellow circle can also be imagined as the outline of a mirror. The light is uniformly distributed in the painting, suggesting that the light sources are evenly situated around the woman. The light is sharp and has high contrast.
 

This is a painting of a woman of mixed heritage and two cultures, as implied by its name. The woman is not idealized and creates a juxtaposition of modern nightlife (implied by the make-up and the jewelry) and an exotic subject. This is not a flattering portrait of her, and this creates a sense of intimacy, reality and relevance. Her expression evokes curiosity and mystery, and the choice of painting her eyes closed suggests a dream-like state, which is further strengthened by the halo-like structure around her head. This dreamy expression is inviting into her world, and encourages the viewer to project himself/herself into the sensory field implied by the artist’s choices. Such choices might be a satirical commentary on her social status, or on the society's treatment of people who share a similar background as her. The intention of the painting might be to attract the viewer’s attention to the artist’s interest in exotic subjects at the time of this painting’s execution. It addresses a wide range of viewers and hopes to introduce a new person, as an exemplar of the people with mixed backgrounds and heritages. The clashing bright colors of the painting indicate that Nolde had mixed feelings about this group. The painting has a complex temporal extension. The dreamy expression of the woman might suggest that something has already happened, but, at the same time, the continuous presence of “mulatto”s in the society adds a sense of timelessness to the painting.

I am particularly intrigued by the mysterious identity of the woman in this painting. Was it someone Nolde knew personally or was it an imagined character in his head? I would also want to explore whether Nolde's color choices (yellow-red spectrum) for this painting were deliberate. What emotions was he trying to convey? How different would the viewer's reaction be if a different color spectrum were used? Another question I am hoping to have answered later in the semester is the context for this painting: Was he traveling when he painted this? Was this painting a reaction to something? What were the responses of his contemporaries?

Emil Nolde  (1867-1956)

(image source: http://www.germanexpressionism.com/printgallery/nolde/index.html)