Monday, August 14, 2006
Prurient Porcelain: Nudes and Ribaldry
By Loretta Crawford
Every visual art medium from wood carving to painting, from textiles to mosaics, will sooner or later be used to glorify the human, usually female, form. Ceramics and porcelain are certainly no exception. Despite an inaccurate modern association of china with grandmotherly tea rooms and the height of propriety there have always been porcelain statuettes of nudes and suggestive scenes.
In fact, the nude form was portrayed in ceramic long before nearly anything else. Everyone has heard of the stone-age Venus figurines that are among the earliest ceramics ever made. The most widely known of the many stone-age figures of women with rotund figures and multiple breasts is the Venus of Willendorf discovered by archaeologist Josef Szombathy in 1908.
To read the rest of this article click here.
Every visual art medium from wood carving to painting, from textiles to mosaics, will sooner or later be used to glorify the human, usually female, form. Ceramics and porcelain are certainly no exception. Despite an inaccurate modern association of china with grandmotherly tea rooms and the height of propriety there have always been porcelain statuettes of nudes and suggestive scenes.
In fact, the nude form was portrayed in ceramic long before nearly anything else. Everyone has heard of the stone-age Venus figurines that are among the earliest ceramics ever made. The most widely known of the many stone-age figures of women with rotund figures and multiple breasts is the Venus of Willendorf discovered by archaeologist Josef Szombathy in 1908.
To read the rest of this article click here.
# posted by Silas Finch @ 8:59 AM 
