Facing L’Origine du Monde:

The Model’s Role in the Studio Romance

By

Elizabeth K. Franz

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of

the requirements for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

(French)

at the

UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON

2023

Date of final oral examination: 12/02/2022

The dissertation is approved by the following members of the Final Oral Committee:
Florence Vatan, Professor, French
Martine Debaisieux, Professor Emeritus, French
Nancy Rose Marshall, Professor, Nineteenth-Century Art and Visual Culture
Névine El Nossery, Associate Professor, French
Kristin Phillips-Court, Associate Professor, Italian and Art History
© Copyright by Elizabeth K. Franz 2023

All Rights Reserved

 i

Dedication

For Cookie
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Abstract

Gustave Courbet’s provocative painting L’Origine du monde is one of several points of

departure from which I examine the female model’s role in the artists’ studios depicted in six

French works of art: Honoré de Balzac’s novella “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” (1831-37); Gustave

Courbet’s paintings L’Atelier du peintre (1855) and L’Origine du monde (1866); Edmond and

Jules de Goncourts’ novel Manette Salomon (1867); Émile Zola’s L’Œuvre (1886) and J’étais

l’origine du monde (2000) by Christine Orban. Each work contains a representation of the studio

romance: an erotically charged relationship between the masculine painter and feminine model,

with the reader or viewer positioned externally as masculine voyeur. Within the stereotypically

gendered framework of the studio romance, the painter is a heterosexual male, and his artwork

expresses his virility; the female model is a willing sacrifice, giving her body and energy to

sustain the artist’s career; and the external viewer is a voyeur of the model’s nudity and of her

relationship with the painter. However, within the same works, many details and structural

elements do not align with traditional gender stereotypes. Therefore, each work also subverts

rigidly binary constructions of masculine/feminine identities and roles. The female models are

the subject of masculine artistic and erotic visual interest, but each model also has her own gaze,

symbolizing feminine subjectivity. In Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” and Courbet’s

L’Atelier, the female models are important to the organization of the work, yet they remain

predominantly within their assigned gender roles. The Goncourt brothers and Émile Zola use

their models’ point of view as an essential part of their novels’ composition, thereby portraying

women with more fully developed individuality. Christine Orban’s novel J’étais l’origine du

monde is a fictional first-person account of a model posing for Courbet’s L’Origine du monde,

making the woman’s subjectivity the dominant organizing factor in the text. In these works, the
 iii

female models gain increasing agency over time; later examples contain more richly nuanced

characters whose perspectives become part of the deliberate design of the narratives.
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Acknowledgements

I am deeply grateful to my advisor, Florence Vatan, whose perceptive guidance and

unwavering patience sustained me throughout this project. To Nancy Marshall, who offered

insightful feedback and consistent encouragement, I express heartfelt appreciation. I’m

extremely thankful to Martine Debaisieux for her astute counsel and her compassionate support.

Sincere thanks to Névine El Nossery and Kristin Phillips Court, who were instrumental in my

early graduate studies and in the completion of this dissertation. I owe a debt of gratitude to the

late and greatly missed Steven Winspur, who mentored me during my coursework and guided

the early stages of this project.

I extend a special note of thanks to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Writing Center.

The Writing Center provided invaluable training through summer dissertation bootcamp, as well

as various workshops and retreats. I am especially thankful to Angela Zito, Writing Center

teaching faculty member, for her skilled and dedicated coaching.

I am grateful to the incredible network of family, friends, neighbors, and colleagues who

have provided encouragement and support of various kinds during this process. Thanks to Amy

Gaeta for professional editing services on early drafts of this dissertation. For spiritual support

and office space, I am thankful to the congregation of Christ United Methodist Church and

former pastor, Brian Roots. I also thank the community and sisters of Holy Wisdom Monastery

for providing supportive space for contemplation and study. Many thanks to my classmates and

close friends, Lark Porter, Anne Hajek, and Rachel Tapley, who entertained, encouraged, and

enlightened me more times than I can count. To all my Franz family crew, I extend my deep

gratitude and love. I am immeasurably grateful to my wife, Cookie Erickson. Her faith, kindness,

generosity, love, and good cheer have never wavered.

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This dissertation would not have been possible without the financial support of the

Mellon-Wisconsin Summer Fellowship.

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Table of Contents

Abstract ………………………………………………………………………………….. ii

Introduction ………………………………...…………...…...…...…...…...…...…...….… 1

Chapter One: The Model Poses — “un souvenir dans ta palette” …………….………… 30

Chapter Two: The Model’s Gaze in Manette Salomon ………………………………… 70

Chapter Three: The Model’s Subjectivity in Zola’s L’Œuvre …………………….…… 111

Chapter Four: The Model Speaks — Courbet’s L’Origine du monde and Orban’s J’étais
l’origine du monde ……………………………………………………………………….. 167

Conclusion ………………………………………………………………….…….………. 219

Bibliography ………………………………………………………….…………….…….. 231

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Facing L’Origine du monde: The Model’s Role in the Studio Romance

Introduction

I stood facing Gustave Courbet’s L’Origine du monde (1866), a beautifully painted and

anatomically correct representation of a nude woman’s torso, with the figure’s legs opening

toward the viewer, her sex clearly visible. The foreshortened and cropped female body portrayed

on this 46 x 55 cm canvas has neither limbs nor head. What a shocking image it was to me, as I

stood before it on the first day of my first trip to Paris in the summer of 2003. L’Origine du

monde was displayed on the first floor of the Musée d’Orsay, and it was one of the first paintings

I saw that day upon entering the museum. Looking at it, I was stunned by Courbet’s frank and

accurate depiction of a female body. My reaction was an emotional cyclone, instantaneous and

turbulent.

Initially, the overt nudity offended both my moral code and feminist sensibilities. My

sense of personal modesty remains infused with a conservative religious upbringing and twenty-

first-century American culture, neither of which generally accepts a public display of human

genitals. I felt that this image was not meant for my eyes, that it was meant for private and

masculine viewing. Simultaneously, having studied feminist theory avidly as an undergraduate, I

was instantly alert to the gendered power structures inherent in this overt appeal to masculine

desire. As a woman raised in a society where females are disproportionately subjected to all

types of sexual abuse, knowing the body on display was like my own, I identified with the figure.

I felt a sense of helplessness and vulnerability, as if it were my own body exposed to a predatory

gaze. The figure’s missing head and limbs also deeply disturbed me; it seemed as much a
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dismembered corpse as an adored lover. Amid these turbulent emotions, as an artist and a

lesbian, I was also drawn to the painting’s beauty: It is skillfully rendered and erotically charged.

The fact that I was experiencing all these conflicting emotions while standing in a public,

visible location increased my sense of disorientation. I felt a collision between the intense

emotional intimacy of viewing L’Origine du monde and the impersonal communal context of the

museum space. Then I read the title on the museum placard, and the meaning of the painting

shifted again, from a response of shock to one of contemplation. I recognized layers of

associations in the words “l’origine” and “du monde.”1 In my own art practice, I had studied and

created images of the archetypical Mother Goddess, the mythical origin of the Earth and human

beings, and I suddenly understood Courbet’s painting as a powerful evocation of this archetype. I

considered the relationship of sexual desire to the origins, creation, and viewing of art. I

wondered if this painting was typical for the artist’s work, and about the model’s identity. Then I

moved on, to look at other paintings in the museum.

For long after that museum visit, the memory of L’Origine du monde stayed with me. It

seemed to superimpose itself onto every work of art I saw afterward in the Musée d’Orsay that

day and for the rest of my trip through France. Even more, my reaction to L’Origine du monde

affected my experience of viewing art from that moment forward. Somehow, I intuited

something that day which my research has now led me to understand and express more clearly:

Courbet’s painting simultaneously evokes the human urge to procreate and the equally human

1
The painting’s title, displayed alongside it in a museum exhibition, is part of how we, as viewers,
experience it today. It is important to note, however, that the title was probably not Courbet’s own.
Thierry Savatier estimates that the title appeared sometime between 1867 and 1882, but there’s no
indication of who assigned it to the painting (L’Origine du monde: histoire d’un tableau de Gustave
Courbet. [(2006) Paris: Éditions Bartillat, 2019], 83.) The first instance of the title “L’Origine du monde”
used in print is in 1929 (Bernard Teyssèdre, Le Roman de l’Origine. [(1996) Paris: Gallimard, 2nd edition,
2007], 401-8.)
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desire to create art. Thus, it brings to the surface and distills the deep complexities inherent to

both sexual and aesthetic desire. The frank composition of L’Origine du monde directly

confronts the viewer with the binary biological reality of human male/female reproduction.

However, Courbet’s canvas also ignites awareness that individual experiences and responses to

sexuality, bodies, and artistic creation are infinitely complex and almost always ambivalent,

defying any effort to reduce them to a simple binary structure.

Courbet’s canvas provokes this clash between the simplicity of binary thinking and the

complexity of human experience by framing the female body to eliminate the figure’s face,

thereby revealing what is usually kept hidden: “[...] non seulement le sexe d’une femme, mas LE

sexe de LA Femme, et, au-delà, toutes les femmes, amantes et mères incluses.” 2 A heterosexual

cisgendered male viewer like Savatier saw evocations of his lovers and mother when looking at

Courbet’s painting. However, the experience might be very different for other observers. In

concealing the model’s identity, Courbet effectively invites viewers to “fill in the blanks” with

projections of their own experiences and desires. Amongst my own complex responses, I could

not help but wonder about the model, her experience posing for this painting, and her reaction

when she saw it. Courbet’s faceless figure also led me to later reflect upon the status of models

in artists’ studios and upon the ways in which male artists and writers represented them in the

nineteenth century.

In this dissertation, L’Origine du monde is one of several points of departure from which

I examine the female model’s role in the artists’ studios depicted in six works of art by French

writers and painters. All of the works in question contain a representation of “the studio

romance,” which I define for the purposes of this discussion as: an erotically charged

2
Savatier, L’Origine, 11. Emphasis in the original.
 4

relationship between the male painter and female model, with the reader or viewer positioned as

external—and presumed male—voyeur.3 Included are Honoré de Balzac’s novella “Le Chef

d’œuvre inconnu” (1831-37); Gustave Courbet’s paintings L’Atelier du peintre: Allégorie réelle

déterminant une phase de sept années de ma vie artistique et morale (1855), and L’Origine du

monde (1866); Manette Salomon, by Edmond and Jules de Goncourt (1867); Émile Zola’s

L’Œuvre of 1886, and J’étais l’origine du monde (2000) by Christine Orban. All of the

nineteenth-century artists and writers were male, a fact which will play a role in our discussion.

Christine Orban’s novel serves as a more recent version of the atelier fantasy, told from the

perspective of the female model. Each work contains elements within its structures or

compositions that create a gendered role for the members of the studio trio (artist, model,

viewer). Yet, my analysis will show that these same works contain details that do not neatly align

with commonly accepted gender stereotypes. Therefore, each work of art simultaneously resists

traditional binary gender-based constructions of the artist as active (masculine), the viewer as

complicit voyeur (masculine), and the model as passive (feminine).

My analysis will focus on the woman’s gaze within these works, considering both the

woman as subject of the male artist’s and spectator’s gaze and as the owner of her own

perspective. The creators of the works in my corpus purposefully represented female models as

having subjectivity, where subjectivity means portraying the woman as an individual with

thoughts, goals, and desires separate from those of the artist. This study accepts that the role

reserved for the female model within the atelier fantasy is restrictive and heteronormative.

However, representation of feminine subjectivity via the female model’s active gaze affects the

overall composition of the works themselves. Thus, each work in the corpus obliquely challenges

3
I will also use similar terms, such as “studio fiction” or “atelier fantasy,” to refer to the same concept.
 5

underlying stereotypes about gendered roles within the studio romance. Resistance to rigidly

dichotomous constructions (due to the artist’s intentions or unconscious responses) leaves gaps

or fissures in meaning where the gender binary breaks down. These intentional or unintentional

lapses can allow us to identify new roles for the model, the artist, and the viewer—particularly

for individuals who do not fall within the gendered expectations for those roles, such as a female

artist, a woman who models for her own pleasure, or a lesbian viewer.

For the literary works in my corpus, I will use close readings and textual analysis

techniques, considering each work’s specific historical context, while also consulting critical

sources from a range of disciplines, including narratology, feminist theory, and gender studies.

Although literature is the emphasis in this dissertation, I address the visual works in a parallel

fashion, using careful visual analysis in combination with art history research methods. These

strategies allow a targeted investigation of the concepts of gender, power, art, desire, and the

gaze within the studio romance. To limit the scope of this study, I have not, for example,

included works where a woman artist looks at a male model, or those where a woman artist looks

at a female model, or examines her own image. 4 I have also limited the corpus to depictions of

painters (as opposed to representations of sculptors at work, for example) to better allow

comparisons of any applicable textual references to artist’s tools, the medium of paint, and

painterly methods.

Additionally, the artist and writers under consideration cover several generations and

span the nineteenth century and–with Christine Orban’s novel–include the late twentieth century

4
See Tamar Garb. “The Forbidden Gaze: Women Artists and the Male Nude in Late Nineteenth-Century
France.” In The Visual Culture Reader. Edited by Nicholas Mirzoeff. (London and New York: Routledge,
2002), 617–24. For an example of an image of a male model by a female painter, see Marie Bashkirtseff’s
painting In the Studio of 1881 (Museums of Dnipro, Ukraine). Marie Bashkirtseff, Berthe Morisot, and
Mary Cassatt each created portraits of mothers and children as well as self-portraits.
 6

(2000), thus affording a comparison of various iterations of the studio romance over time:

Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850), Gustave Courbet (1819-1877), The Goncourts (Edmond 1822-

1896 and Jules 1830-1870), Émile Zola (1840-1902), and Christine Orban (1957–). As we will

see, in these literary texts, the emphasis on the model’s individuality and subjectivity becomes

more observable as the century progresses. The Goncourt brothers and Zola, writing in the later

part of the nineteenth century, endow their fictional models with much more richly nuanced

individuality than Balzac does in “Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu,” and include the female character’s

point of view as an inherent part of their narrative structures. In Orban’s novel, the model-

protagonist’s shifting sense of self is part of the narrative.

Furthermore, during the nineteenth century, writers and painters often worked in dialog,

creating purposeful liaisons between images and texts. Gotthold Ephraim Lessing proposed in

his Laocoön (1766) that literature lends itself more naturally to expressing the passage of time

while painting is more suited to spatial communication.5 William Berg, however, demonstrated

that nineteenth-century writers and artists experimented purposefully with incorporating qualities

normally associated with the other medium. 6 As Berg explains, writers such as Émile Zola and

the Goncourt brothers sought to capture visual and spatial effects within their texts, using

strategies that interrupt the temporal flow of the narrative or that create a sense of space.7

Conversely, painters wanted to capture the passage of time in their canvases, as Monet did with

his cathedral series.8 Each mode of creative expression, writing and painting, thus influenced the

5
Cited in William J. Berg. Imagery and Ideology: Fiction and Painting in Nineteenth-Century France.
(Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2007), 15.
6
Berg, Imagery,16.
7
Berg, Imagery,16.
8
Berg, Imagery,16.
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development of the other. This mutual influence caused an identity crisis (“crise de plume”)

amongst the writers in question: according to Nicolas Valazza, as painters moved away from

subjects based solely on Biblical, mythological, or historical narrative, they gained independence

from the doctrine of ut pictura poesis, threatening the dominant role literature had held since the

Renaissance.9 The increasing amount of writing about painting (such as Diderot’s art criticism,

or Baudelaire’s and Zola’s reports on the Paris Salons), the evolution of the artist’s novel, and

the increasing use of visual tropes in French literature is largely a result of writers’ response to

the growing independence of artistic creation. 10 Alexandra Wettlaufer, too, addresses the

interconnections and rivalries between the writer’s pen and the artist’s paintbrush. 11 Using

Balzac and the painter Girodet as her examples, Wettlaufer parses the Pygmalion myth as a

foundational fable used by both men to confront and control the threat of the other art form

(writing or painting) and the Other that is woman.12 The interactions of image and text have

therefore long provided critics with fruitful comparisons.

Containing characters who are painters, models, and viewers of art, the works in my

corpus thus share more than the studio fantasy narrative: although each piece is viewed as artistic

creation with its own formal structures, the paintings and texts each establish an interplay of

gazes among the characters or figures and the external viewer/reader. These gazes are frequently

9
Ut pictura poesis, translates from Latin as “as is painting, so is poetry.” First proposed in Horace’s Ars
Poetica (c. 19 BCE), ut pictura poesis became a paradigm asserting the supremacy of letters over visual
art and remained a powerful cultural belief until the late eighteenth century (Nicolas Valazza. Crise de
plume et souveraineté du pinceau: écrire la peinture de Diderot à Proust. [Paris: Classiques Garnier,
2013], 12-13).
10
Valazza, Crise, 18-20.
11
Alexandra Wettlaufer. Pen vs. Paintbrush: Girodet, Balzac, and the Myth of Pygmalion in Post-
Revolutionary France. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan), 2001.
12
Wettlaufer, Pen, 25-30.
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tied explicitly to gender roles and relate to the acts of creating art, posing for a painter, and/or

viewing art.

I. The Studio Romance: Inherent to the Artist’s Novel

The studio romance implies a fantasized sexual relationship between a male painter and a

female model, with the reader/viewer positioned as unseen external voyeur. Such relationships

were not necessarily an accurate depiction of nineteenth-century atelier life.13 However, painters

and writers alike found a rich source of dramatic potential in artists’ attachment to the women

who inspire their work. Exploring “[…] the artist’s purported problem with his models allowed

writers [and painters] to grapple with issues of sexuality and representation.”14 The atelier

fantasy itself is merely one aspect of a larger framework. Representations of artists and models in

a studio space were common in French painting and literature during the nineteenth century. 15

The studio fantasy reoccurs powerfully as one common trope within these texts and canvases.

Examples of paintings that fall into this popular subgenre include Raphael et la Fornarina by

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, and Jean-Léon Gérôme’s The Artist Sculpting Tanagra.16

13
Frances Borzello. The Artist’s Model. (London: Junction Books, 1982), 122-136.

Marie Lathers. Bodies of Art: French Literary Realism and the Artist’s Model. (Lincoln: University of
14

Nebraska Press, 2001), 4.

15
See Giles Waterford, The Artist’s Studio, (London: Hogarth Arts and Compton Varney, 2009) for an
extensive study of paintings depicting artists’ workspaces.
16
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, Raphael et la Fornarina (1813, Fogg Museum, Harvard University);
Jean-Léon Gérôme, The Artist Sculpting Tanagra (1890, Dahesh Museum of Art, New York). For a study
of the theme of the artist’s model in nineteenth- and twentieth-century British painting and photography
see: Martin Postle and William Vaughn. The Artist’s Model, from Etty to Spencer. (London. Merrell
Holberton Publishers, 1999).
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Theodore Robert Bowie identified 42 French literary works in which painters appear as

characters, beginning in 1803 with Charles Nodier’s Le Peintre de Saltzbourg, to the 1938

publication of André Billy’s Nathalie.17 Of course, Balzac’s novella “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu”

is included on Bowie’s list, as are the Goncourts’ Manette Salomon and Zola’s L’Œuvre. These

three works deserve our scrutiny because they echo one another, and they paradigmatically

illustrate the recurring romance schema.

According to Bowie, ten tropes are common to the nineteenth-century artist’s novel in

France. Only Manette Salomon and L’Œuvre contain all ten tropes, which he lists as follows:

1) a description of the painter’s early days and of his training in art school
2) a description of his milieu, which breaks down into:
a. his studio […]
b. his points of contact with Nature […]
c. his points of contact with fellow-craftsmen, usually cafés
3) the faithful notation of shop-talk with other painters and with models and dealers […]
4) lengthy discussions of esthetic and technical questions […]
5) a tendency, beginning with the Goncourts, towards violent criticism of the entire
official system and the academic tradition
6) lengthy accounts of Salons and exhibitions […]
7) the introduction of literary figures as foils to the painter
8) involvement of the artist in sentimental complications, usually of a kind which
threatens his artistic integrity
9) the introduction of actual painters, either under their own names or transparent
disguises […]
10) […] showing the painter at work on a painting […]. 18

In many respects, Christine Orban’s novel J’étais l’origine du monde (2000) fits nicely into the

subgenre of the artist novels as defined by Bowie. Jo, Orban’s protagonist, is the supposed model

for L’Origine du monde, and the story recounts her romantic relationship (#8) with a

17
Theodore Robert Bowie. The Painter in French Fiction. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina
Press, 1950). Project MUSE. muse.jhu.edu/book/49744. 57-9. Nodier’s short story is about a painter
suffering from the death of his beloved and Billy’s novel is about several painters who become involved
in a plot to assassinate Napoleon III. Further examples of similar works not discussed in this study
include Balzac’s novel Le chat qui pelote (1829) and Guy de Maupassant’s novella “Le Modèle” (1883).
18
Bowie, Painter, 5-7.
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fictionalized version of Gustave Courbet (#9). It also includes their conversations while he is at

work on L’Origine du monde (#10). Jo describes Gustave’s studio and the café where he meets

up with his painter friends (#2). Gustave speaks of an experience while at art school (#1) and

discusses his planned painting in detail with Jo (#4). Thus, containing six of Bowie’s ten criteria,

Orban’s book can be considered a late twentieth-century addition to the tradition of the French

artist’s novel.

This study will focus on the eighth trope on Bowie’s list: the “involvement of the artist in

sentimental complications, usually of a kind which threatens his artistic integrity,” or the studio

romance. Most of the relevant critical studies on Balzac, the Goncourts, and Zola have focused

on the artist’s perspective and on the issue of failed genius. Our inquiry, by contrast, will bring

the model’s perspective to the foreground.

Models and their role in French art and literature have already been the subject of several

studies. Frances Borzello’s historical study of modeling demonstrated that the assumption

models were always women who always posed nude is a myth, largely based on masculine erotic

fantasy.19 Susan Waller further deconstructed the stereotype of the sexually available female

19
Borzello, Model, 5. In fact, male models formed the foundation of most French academic art training.
Only male nude models were permitted at the École de Beaux Arts until 1863 (Susan Waller. The
Invention of the Model: Artists and Models in Paris, 1830-1870. [Aldershot, England and Burlington, VT:
Ashgate, 2006], 1). Of course, one purpose of limiting the sex of posers in the classroom was the concern
that the young male students might fall into temptation (Claire Maingon. L’Œil en rut: Art et érotisme en
France au XIXe siècle. [Paris: Éditions Norma, 2021], 97). Furthermore, according to traditional
academic theory, masculine bodies more clearly displayed important anatomical features such as
musculature, tendons, and skeletal structures, which meant they were more appropriate to artistic study
(Borzello, Model, 21). Behind the design of this official training were Renaissance ideals regarding
masculine and feminine gender roles: male bodies were believed to be stronger than female ones, more
active, capable of maintaining a wider variety of poses, and therefore able to embody humanity’s nobility
more effectively (Waller, Invention, 4-5 and Borzello, Model, 21). In fact, artists’ desire to have easy
access to female nude models was part of what motivated a nineteenth-century movement toward
studying and working in private studios (Maingon, L’Œil, 97). This meant that male painters were now
more frequently alone with beautiful and naked young women, increasing the erotic potential for their
otherwise professional exchange and fueling fantasies (Lathers, Bodies, 3-4). The studio model was
different from the academy model because in the academy, nude male models were part of a professional
 11

model, contrasting the myth with the actual practices in nineteenth-century ateliers. She proposed

that models were not simply “the passive objects of the gaze of artists and caricaturists, but

[were] active participants in the artist/model transaction,” and that these transactions were mostly

temporary and strictly commercial.20 Wendy Steiner revealed the changing history of Western

definitions of the female model, seeing the model as an active agent in the communicative

exchange between the artist, model, and viewers of the work.21 Most relevant to the current study

is Marie Lathers’ Bodies of Art: French Literary Realism and the Artist’s Model (2001), as well

as her extensive scholarship regarding the history and representation of models in nineteenth-

century France. Lathers describes a model’s work and purpose thusly:

Models are professional self-objectifiers. Their job is to pose, to simulate the

stillness and formal artistry of an image. They actively make themselves passive,
we might say, but […] they do so in the service of art rather than lust […]. 22

Lathers identifies repeated tropes and categories of female models that were popular in French

art and literature. Models were classified according to contemporary stereotypes of their class

and race, notably Jewish, Italian, and Parisian women.23 Lathers argues that the representation of

the model’s body in literature “parallels the growth and aging of the female body:” her “birth”

occurs in Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” she is a mother in her middle years in the

group interaction in an environment of brotherhood, while in the studio the nude female posed in a private
interaction where she became the Other, subject to both a professional and a personal gaze (Martin Postle.
“Behind the Screen: The Studio Model.” In The Artist’s Model: From Etty to Spencer. [London: Merrell
Holberton Publishers, 1999], 55).
20
Waller, Invention, xvi and 18
21
Wendy Steiner. The Real Real Thing: The Model in the Mirror of Art. (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 2010).
22
Lathers, Bodies, 1.
23
Lathers, Bodies, 7-13.
 12

Goncourts’ Manette Salomon and Zola’s L’Œuvre, while Guy de Maupassant’s Fort comme la

Mort presents an aged model with a grown child.24 My work extends Lather’s analysis by

questioning the gendered representation of fictional models, identifying areas in the works where

the masculine/feminine binary breaks down.

II. Gender Roles in the Studio Romance

Each iteration of the studio romance creates specifically gendered roles for the members

of the atelier triad, evoking a binary conceptual framework. This can be traced in the paintings

and literary texts under consideration, and we will identify and compare similar gendered power

structures among the three characters in the studio fantasy (artist/model/viewer). In each novel,

the painters and the other artists included in the narrative–such as the sculptor Mahoudeau in

Zola’s L’Œuvre–are male. Eroticized visions of creative life directly link masculine genius to

virility. The creation of art is the painter-protagonist’s supreme goal, and the model’s identity is

determined by her effect on his creative powers, which are metaphorically linked to his sexual

prowess. Even qualities usually associated with femininity, such as sensitivity and intuition,

become absorbed into the myth of the virile male artist. In fact, “The history of artistic identity,

from [the end of the eighteenth century] onwards, can be seen to a certain extent as the attempt to

control and contain the feminine connotations of creativity.”25 The artist/model relationship

24
Lathers, Bodies, 14.
25
Lynda Nead. “Seductive Canvases: Visual Mythologies of the Artist and Artistic Creativity.” Oxford
Art Journal 18, no. 2, (1995): 61.
 13

becomes a powerful narrative, imbued with the erotic energy of fantasy, and exploited in artistic

representations by writers and painters alike.

Common to all versions is a male artist seeking artistic inspiration and finding it in the

beautiful body of his nude female model.26 An assumption that the female model is sexually

available to the male painter is also inherent to the studio romance.27 The woman’s role is to be

both muse and lover, willingly sacrificing herself for the artist’s career.28 Another recurring trope

in the representation of the female model is a persistent conflation of woman (representing life)

and canvas (representing art), beginning with Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” wherein

Frenhofer believes that he has created a living being on the canvas in his studio.29 Each literary

work in the corpus also contains instances of fragmentation of the female body, a strategy that

enacts masculine castration anxiety and reduces the woman to a collection of manageable,

fetishized parts that can be reassembled to the artist’s specifications.30 Often, the fetishization of

the young female body is paired with a rejection of aging and maternal bodies. Erotic desire

turns into disgust, an emotional response that epitomizes the ambivalence of desire. Manette

Salomon, L'Œuvre, and J’étais l’origine du monde all contain examples of male painters who

experience revulsion towards the formerly inspiring body of their female models. Furthermore,

in both L'Œuvre, and J’étais l’origine du monde the models themselves are repulsed by their

lovers’ representations of their bodies. Christine (from L'Œuvre), and Jo (from J’étais l’origine

26
Borzello, Model, 128.
27
Borzello, Model, 128.
28
Borzello, Model, 5.
29
Nead, “Seductive Canvases,” 59.
30
Roland Barthes. S/Z. (Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1970), 112-113.
 14

du monde) also experience moments of shame towards their own bodies. Additionally, the studio

romance is often constructed to appeal to an understood masculine viewer of the intended

finished masterpiece and/or of the process of its creation, thereby extending the female model’s

role as an object of masculine viewing pleasure: she exists to be seen by the artist and by the

beholder.

Because the atelier drama inherently links the male painter’s sexual desire to possess the

body of his female model to his equally strong desire to create great art, human procreation

becomes a recurring metaphor for artistic production in each of the works in the corpus. The

man’s desire to create lifelike art might be interpreted as a kind of womb envy because the artist

wishes to appropriate woman’s ability to give birth.31 This desire finds a foundational myth in

the story of Pygmalion, who fell in love with his own sculpture and was rewarded for his piety

when Venus brought the cold marble to life. The writers of the nineteenth century removed the

goddess from the story and chose instead to “portray the male artist as not only the creator of the

art object, but also as the one who, through the quasi-magical powers of his genius, breathes life

into that object.”32 Balzac’s Frenhofer attributes the life-giving power to the sculptor when he

says: “Nous ignorons le temps qu'employa le seigneur Pygmalion pour faire la seule statue qui

ait marché!”33 Such a reframing of the Pygmalion myth places the creative power in the hands of

31
Brady, Patrick. Interdisciplinary Interpretation of Art and Literature: The Principle of Convergence.
With Illustrative Essays on Watteau, Delacroix, Manet, Zola, Proust, Camus. (Knoxville, TN: New
Paradigm Press, 1995), 56-9.
32
Juliana Starr. “Pygmalion Politics in Balzac’s ‘Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu.’” French Studies Bulletin,
30, no. 110, (March 2009): 17.
33
Honoré de Balzac. “Le Chef-d’œuvre Inconnu.” In La Comédie Humaine, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade,
vol. 10. Edited by René Guise. (Paris: Gallimard, 1976), 425. All page numbers refer to this edition.
 15

the male artist and reinforces patriarchal dominance.34 In order to succeed, the painter must have

access to a beautiful female body, a woman who willingly poses for him and allows him to

appropriate her image. The risk, however, is to give precedence to sexual desire over creative

labor. The artists who fall in love with their model and who conflate aesthetic research with

erotic passion are doomed to failure.35 With all its promises and pitfalls, the atelier fantasy is

heteronormative.

The gender roles and power structures within the studio depend upon who is the owner of

the gaze and who is the object of it. In the studio romance, the act of looking is a masculine

position assigned to the artist and the presumed male viewer, while the feminine role is to be the

object of the gaze.36 An artist’s studio is a place of purposeful looking, a space where the sense

of sight is used deliberately and with precision. Looking closely and learning from careful visual

observation is a hallmark of the painter’s profession.37 Then, with the skills and tools of his craft,

the artist creates an object to communicate with others using visual means. Studio visitors are

there to see something or someone: to meet the painter, to see his work, or perhaps to observe the

process of creation. For example, much of the plot of Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu”

revolves around the fictional male artists visiting each other’s workrooms. The tale begins with

34
Starr, “Pygmalion Politics, 17.

Stéphane Gougelmann. “Manette Salomon, Allégorie (Anti-) Sémite.” Cahiers Edmond et Jules de
35

Goncourt Manette Salomon, no. 12, (2014): 166.

36
See James Conlon, “Men Reading Women Reading: Interpreting Images of Women Readers.”
Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 26, no. 2, (2005): 37–58; Berger, John. Ways of Seeing. (London:
Penguin Books, British Broadcasting Corp, 1973); Lynda Nead, The Female Nude: Art, Obscenity, and
Sexuality. (New York: Routledge, 1992); Marcia Pointon, Naked Authority: The Body in Western
Painting, 1830-1908. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); and Postle, Martin. “Behind the
Screen,” 55–65

Roxana Monah. “Les Enjeux du regard dans Le Chef-d’oeuvre inconnu.” Thélème. Revista
37

Complutense de Estudios Franceses 27, no. 0, (May 2012): 267

 16

the young painter, Poussin, and the master, Frenhofer, arriving simultaneously at Porbus’ home

and studio, while the closing scene takes place in Frenhofer’s atelier. Studio space also features

in Zola’s L’Œuvre, where visitors to Claude Lantier’s studio include an art dealer, friends and

colleagues, and potential models. Claude also visits others’ ateliers. Just as Poussin and Porbus

visit Frenhofer’s workspace to view his closely guarded masterpiece, most people are in the

studio to see. However, the model’s specific role is to be seen.

Private studios are places of creation, mirrors of the interior world of the artist and

frequently a manifesto of artistic beliefs.38 Therefore, the presence of a model, the type of model

chosen, and the particular poses the painter expects are essential parts of a studio’s organization.

To portray a model posing before a painter invites observers to witness art in the making. In the

novels we consider, the ongoing fascination with the studio romance signals that beyond the

erotic plot, writers are interested in the act of creation itself. Their work tells a story about art and

the creation of art.39 It is a representation of the process of creation, of the process of seeing and

being seen, and of the impact of human desire upon these processes played out in the painter’s

atelier. Representations of studio scenes deliberately put nudity on display just as the art itself is

created for display. In the studio romance, art is infused with erotic energy both for the artist and

the beholder. When artists paint a nude model, the spectator is put in the position of a voyeur,

meaning someone who can observe or imagine the physical intimacy between the artist and the

model. Inherent to the role of voyeur is holding a position outside of the central action, a

perspective that is built into visual works of art, which are generally created with the intention of

Emilie Sitzia. L’artiste entre mythe et réalité dans trois œuvres de Balzac, Goncourt et Zola. (Finland:
38

Åbo Akademis Förlag, 2004), 56.

39
Borzello, Model, 165; and Giles Waterfield. “The Artist’s Studio.” In The Artist’s Studio. Edited by
Giles Waterfield. (Hogarth Arts and Compton Varney, 2009, London), 165.
 17

exhibition, even if only privately rather than in a gallery or museum. For the spectators, then, a

presumed sexual relationship between the artist and his model adds to the erotic aura of the

atelier fantasy narratives.40 The voyeuristic point of view is also fundamental to the novel, which

the writer creates purposely for others to read. Certainly, the act of looking at an image of an

unclothed human fits neatly into the definition of “voyeur,” and watching intimate acts between

others is also an act of voyeurism. Even more, in nineteenth-century painting, there was a

presumed relationship between the model and the observer, and many male patrons of the Salons

regarded the nudes as sort of a display of bodies accessible to them.41 In this case, the appeal of

the images is due to an assumption that the bodies on view were available to the artist, and

therefore could be available to other men (i.e., spectators).

Each of the works under consideration in this dissertation contains at least one

manifestation of the external observer, an inherent part of the studio romance framework. For

example, in Courbet’s L’Atelier, the painter is Courbet himself, with his nude female model

standing close behind him and a young boy observing the proceedings. The boy is a surrogate for

the external viewer. If his youth minimizes the presumed eroticism of his look, it also casts him

as a naive observer. In this case, as a central figure in his studio allegory, Courbet provides the

example of a masculine spectator who is ready to receive the master’s lessons, a role thus offered

to everyone who views the painting. When the text or painting adopts the point of view of the

male painter, the external masculine viewer’s gaze is allowed, even invited. Thus, on the surface

it may seem like the studio romance is yet another trope that can only reinforce the same

traditional gender roles propagated in the Western world. As such, key points of my analysis

40
Borzello, Model, 72.
41
Waller, Invention, 59, and Steiner, Real Thing, 20.
 18

attend to the frequent shifts and variable changes in gendered expectations for each character in

the studio romance.

III. Gender as a social construct

The primary and critical works discussed in this dissertation exhibit a perpetual tension

between binary gendered structures and individual nuances that multiply, change, and slip

beyond the confines of traditional masculine and feminine classifications. The existence and

reinforcement of binary representations betray the desire to contain, control, and define reality

into comprehensible and readily identified categories. Yet, as noted psychoanalyst Joyce

McDougall says, “The remarkable aspect of human beings in their psychic structure–as in their

genetic structure–is their singularity.”42 No one fits neatly into either gendered category,

regardless of their biological sex. So why do the gendered stereotypes seem to reassert

themselves so stubbornly? These persistent stereotypes are the result of Western culture’s

division of human qualities according to notions of what is “masculine” or “feminine,”

superimposed onto the biological reality of sexual reproduction. As Judith Butler reminds us,

“The presumption of a binary system implicitly retains the belief in a mimetic relation of gender

to sex whereby gender mirrors sex or is otherwise restricted by it.” 43 As such, these gendered

associations seem unavoidable in Western discourse, perhaps because they are so linked to the

inevitable necessity of a male and female human to create a child, investing them with a similar

42
Joyce McDougall. The Many Faces of Eros: A Psychoanalytic Exploration of Human Sexuality. (New
York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1995), 172.
43
Judith Butler. Gender Trouble. ([1990] New York: Routledge, 2007), 9.
 19

permanence. Thus, we need to take the gender binary as a provisional starting point in order to

understand its role in the studio romance, even if the ultimate goal is to question its rigidity.

This study assumes that gender roles are a societal construct rather than biologically

determined, meaning individual personality characteristics are not inherently linked to sex. The

binary concept of masculine/feminine (and all the associated matrices of active/passive,

culture/nature, public/private) is destined to break down as soon as it is constructed because

these dichotomies are false simplifications of complex human experiences. As Judith Butler

explains:

The very complexity of the discursive map that constructs gender appears to hold
out the promise of an inadvertent and generative confluence of these discursive
and regulatory structures. If the regulatory fictions of sex and gender are
themselves multiply contested sites of meaning, then the very multiplicity of their
construction holds out the possibility of a disruption of their univocal posturing.44

Expressing ideas outside the binary of gender stereotypes is a form of conscious or unconscious

resistance to their restrictions. Therefore, any work of art that contains narrative or compositional

elements that do not conform to these stereotypes can be said to resist or subvert them. One

powerful way that the texts and paintings in my corpus subvert patriarchy and the gender binary

is to portray female models who have their own perspective on the atelier fantasy, represented by

picturing a woman as the holder of a gaze or creating a female literary character whose point of

view becomes the focus of the narrative.

44
Butler, Trouble, 44.
 20

IV. The Gendered Power Structure of the Gaze within the Studio Romance

It is important to define in more detail the meaning of the term “the gaze” because the

gaze is more than simply the act of looking at someone or something; it is the power inherent in

the act of looking and it has traditionally been a power reserved for the male painter within the

fantasized studio drama. Most notably, Laura Mulvey described the masculine gendered role of

the gaze in cinema and its effects on the visual portrayal of women, and Mulvey’s work has more

broadly informed feminist visual and literary theory beyond film studies. Mulvey built upon

Freud’s definition of scopophilia, meaning the active power and erotic pleasure in looking at

another human being, to describe the social power of the male gaze in her essay “Visual Pleasure

and Narrative Cinema.”45 She argued that in Western cinema, the image on the screen is

deliberately constructed to appeal to male viewers. Mulvey’s analysis focuses on masculine

reaction to the sight of female bodies. Additionally, she uses the words male/female

interchangeably with masculine/feminine, thereby conflating physical sex with cultural gender.

Mulvey explains the gaze as follows:

In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split

between active/male and passive/female. The determining male gaze projects its
fantasy onto the female figure, which is styled accordingly. In their traditional
exhibitionist role, women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their
appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to
connote to-be-looked-at-ness.”46

According to Mulvey, the masculine spectator not only projects his sexual fantasy on to the

female character on screen (as described above), but he also adopts the male protagonist as a

45
Laura Mulvey, Visual and Other Pleasures, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989, 14-26.
46
Mulvey, Pleasures, 19.
 21

representation of himself: the man on screen is a surrogate for the masculine viewer, who can

thereby vicariously experience the actions of the protagonist.47 The confluence of identification

with the male hero and erotic pleasure in looking at the female body allows the observer to

indirectly possess the woman on display.48 The eroticism of looking, the merging of visual and

sexual pleasure, is the cornerstone of the studio romance. Just as the masculine moviegoer can

imagine himself as the action hero in a blockbuster, the viewer of a studio romance painting or

the reader of a text can assume the position of the artist and enjoy fantasized access to the

model’s body.49

In nineteenth-century France, the studio romance was part of a larger cultural framework

that explicitly targeted the heterosexual male spectator. Men were not only the primary producers

of art of all kinds, they also held the economic power to control the market; therefore, masculine

desires determined the content of paintings—nude female bodies—and the manner of

representation—nude female bodies displayed for maximum visual effect.50 As John Berger

47
Mulvey, Pleasures, 21.
48
Mulvey, Pleasures, 21.
49
Mulvey later acknowledged that the gendered binary understanding of the gaze was limited in its ability
to explain the complex dynamics of human interactions. It was useful, she explains, in the early stages of
feminist studies, but grew less useful as it became apparent that being locked into the binary analysis was
merely a result of being trapped in a phallocentric world view: merely reversing the male/active vs.
female/passive binary opposition can accomplish nothing towards a more nuanced analysis (Mulvey,
Pleasures, 162). Thus, Mulvey’s essay “Changes: Thoughts on Myth, Narrative and Historical
Experience,” written in response to her own earlier “Visual Pleasures and Narrative Cinema,” proposed
the possibility of creating a narrative model based on something other than a binary or polarization
(Mulvey, Pleasures, 159-76). For example, rather than insisting on dénouement, closure, and a return to
stability, a story could focus on the transition states and middle phases (Mulvey, Pleasures, 160-2). The
actual phrases “transition states” and “middle phases” are only loosely defined in Mulvey as potential
alternative narrative structures to the parabolic rising action, climax, and falling action of traditional plot
formats (Mulvey, Pleasures, 167-9). What’s important about Mulvey’s proposal is that she engaged in
this process of acknowledging the binary and attempting to think outside of it.
50
Linda Nochlin. “Eroticism and Female Imagery in Nineteenth-Century Art.” In Woman, Art, and Power
and Other Essays. (New York: Harper & Row, 1988), 138-9.
 22

claimed: “In the average European oil painting of the nude the principal protagonist is never

painted. He is the spectator in front of the picture, and he is presumed to be a man.”51 As such,

erotic art of the nineteenth century consisted mostly of images of women created by and for

men.52 Even when such images depicted women in homoerotic scenes, such as in Courbet’s

Sleep, the lesbian viewer was not the intended audience.53 We can therefore assume, unless the

text or image indicates otherwise, that the intended reader/viewer of nineteenth-century works of

art is likewise masculine.

Beyond the specific cultural and historical context, the masculine gender of both the artist

and the viewer are encoded in other ways as well. For one, women’s bodies depicted in art

frequently face the viewer of the painting, or turn provocatively towards him.54 Kenneth Clark

reminds us that the human body as a subject in art “…is rich in associations, and when turned

into art these associations are not entirely lost.”55 Thus, the physical reality of lived sexuality is

an essential part of one’s experience creating and/or viewing art. Although scholars can and do

analyze the “associations” of the body from many perspectives, in the context of the quoted

section, Clark is clearly referring to specifically male and thus, according to his paradigm, also

masculine associations of what it means to live in a male body and to look upon a female body.

Given this context, Clark maintains that erotic feelings inspired by nudes are a definitive part of

51
Berger, Ways, 54.
52
Nochlin, “Eroticism,” 137.
53
Nochlin, “Eroticism,” 137.
54
Berger, Ways, 53-6. See, for example, Titian’s Venus of Urbino (c.1534, Uffizi Gallery, Florence,
Italy).
55
Kenneth Clark. The Nude: A Study in Ideal Form. (New York: MJF Books, 1996), 16.
 23

“good” art.56 Human (masculine) erotic instincts come to the surface with the nude so that visual

art can “hold in solution” a high level of erotic content and make it simultaneously visible yet

socially acceptable.57 Clark contends that the masculine desire to paint and look at unclothed

women is part of a natural desire “to grasp and be united with another human body.”58 However,

in these paintings, Berger contends that nudity is not “a function of [the female model’s]

sexuality, but of the sexuality of those who have access to the picture.”59 Thus, the poses of most

nudes communicate submission, passivity, and availability.60 Courbet’s L’Origine du Monde is a

supreme example of a female figure composed to invite the fantasies of masculine viewers.

Likewise, in literary texts, the masculine reader is encoded in nude scenes which are constructed

to appeal to his fantasies.

While Clark’s and Nochlin’s analyses present the nudes in art as potential sexual partners

for the viewer, Berger argues that some paintings of loved women are not “nudes” — per his

definition of “nude” as nakedness on display for the observer — because the viewer is not

presented with the unclothed female body as a potential partner, but instead is invited to witness

the loving relationship between the artist and his model. 61 As an example, he specifically cites

Rubens’ portrait of his wife wrapped in fur, Het Pelsken (c.1630, RKD, The Hague,

56
K. Clark, Nude, 8.
57
K. Clark, Nude, 8.
58
K. Clark, Nude, 8.
59
John Berger "The Past Seen from a Possible Future" in Selected Essays and Articles, (New York:
Penguin 1972), 215. Cited in Nochlin, “Eroticism,” 143.
60
Nochlin, “Eroticism,” 142.
61
Berger, Ways, 57-8.
 24

Netherlands).62 Berger says that “The way the painter has painted her includes her will and her

intentions in the very structure of the image, in the very expression of her body and her face.”63 It

matters that she is loved, as Berger points out above, because her desire plays a part in the

construction of the image. However, despite the limited amount of flesh on view in Rubens’

portrait, or in other similarly themed images, this present study proposes that the presumed

sexual relationship between the artist and his model is part of what drives the eroticism of these

paintings — at least within a heteronormative schema — because the masculine viewer can

imagine himself in the place of the artist: loved, admired, powerful and in possession of the

woman on display.

The masculine identity of the artist and viewer means that the male is the subject, or the

person doing the action in the scenario. One can understand this patriarchal structure through a

grammatical analysis of the following sentence: “The artist and the viewer look at the model.”

Here the artist and viewer are the subjects of the sentence, and the object is the model. But

“artist,” “viewer,” and “model” are not merely words playing grammatical roles, because, at least

in nineteenth-century works, these words reinforce the idea that the subjects are masculine and

the object is feminine. As James Conlon explains:

This identification of the male with subjectivity is evident not just in the content
of the image, but in the imaging process itself. Thus, the spectator of an image is
usually assumed to be male, and the image is structured around the male gaze.
The gaze itself, as a fundamental act of consciousness, as subjectivity, is
conceived as masculine. The feminine then becomes inherently constituted as
merely an object of the male gaze, as itself lacking the fundamentals of
subjectivity.64

62
Berger, Ways, 57-8.
63
Berger, Ways, 58.
64
Conlon, “Men Reading,” 46.
 25

If works of art including nude women are meant to entice male spectators, then female figures

positioned to block the viewer’s access to their bodies and women characters who demonstrate

agency and/or their own sexual desires are potential challenges to the role of woman as a passive

object of the masculine gaze. Furthermore, if individual subjectivity itself is defined as

inherently masculine, then works of art resist traditional gender power structures when they

include female subjectivity, desire, and choice.

Without crediting male creators of the nineteenth century with any proto-feminist

leanings (that are not only anachronistic but are not borne out by extended study of their lives

and works), we can recognize that they did not completely ignore the perspectives of the women

in question—the female models in the studio. Instead, as this study will show, the feminine

perspective was viewed and skewed through the masculine point of view. Even more, it was

heavily encoded into the myth of studio romance. Representing studio models as having their

own gaze in a painting or ascribing a point of view to female characters in texts nevertheless

introduces subjectivity and a multiplicity of perspectives on the myth of the studio romance.

However, ultimately, within this multiplicity, in the works by nineteenth-century male artists, the

woman in the studio romance fiction remains the object of the artist’s gaze.

V. The Model’s Gaze: Undermining Patriarchal Paradigms

Despite the prevalence and power of the various myths, stereotypes, and cultural beliefs

about studio models, literary and visual strategies can serve to undermine them and to present

alternatives. One technique used by many painters is to portray the model returning the gaze of
 26

the spectator, a gesture that marks her as an individual.65 A reciprocated gaze indicates self-

awareness and represents the active choice to look at something or someone. A powerful

example of this strategy can be seen in Édouard Manet’s Olympia (1863, Musée d’Orsay, Paris).

Here, the main female figure directs her look towards the viewer, emphasizing her personhood.66

This look asks the viewer to acknowledge his own gaze.67 This same gesture can be repeated in

literary compositions by giving the model her own point of view, thereby introducing an element

of subjectivity. In Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” for example, when the model, Gillette,

explains her thoughts and feelings about posing for Frenhofer, her perspective is acknowledged

within the narrative even if the male characters discount it. Although a woman’s gaze in a work

of art or her voice/point of view in a narrative are still constructions of a male painter or writer,

readers and viewers are given a glimpse of perception outside the dominant masculine-active and

feminine-passive dichotomy.

Another strategy to question the validity of the gender stereotypes is to present the female

model as somehow active or dominant, thus overturning associations of passivity.68 Courbet’s

drawing Model Reading in the Studio (c. 1849, Art Institute of Chicago) for example, depicts the

model as the central figure in the composition. Although her bared breast undoubtedly eroticizes

the image and emphasizes her as an object of display, she owns a gaze that is focused on the

65
Borzello, Model, 164.
66
Borzello, Model, 164.
67
T. J. Clark. “Olympia’s Choice.” In The Painting of Modern Life: Paris in the Art of Manet and His
Followers. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf Inc., 1984), 131-2.
68
Borzello, Model, 165.
 27

pages of a book. That she has chosen to read and engage with the text suggests an element of

active, deliberate choice and therefore individuality.

A third strategy for disrupting traditional gender boundaries emerges when observers and

critics provide reinterpretations of the act of posing. For example, one can interpret modeling as

an artistic interaction where the model has an active role; she has chosen to pose.69 Recognizing

her privileged position of intimacy and knowledge about details of the studio, the work, the life

of the artist, and the process of creation of the work can also underline the active participation of

the model.

In this dissertation, I will argue that in spite of the stereotypical objectifying

representations of artist models in studio romance, each work in the corpus also resists traditional

binary gender-based constructions of the male artist as active, the presumed male viewer as

complicit voyeur, and the female model as passive sacrificial victim. Each of the works uses

compositional tropes to represent the woman’s subjectivity, portraying the fictional models as

having desires and goals that drive their choices. As mentioned earlier, the models gain

increasing agency over time, with the later works containing more richly nuanced characters

whose perspectives become part of the deliberate design of the narratives.

The first chapter will focus on the artist’s model primarily as an object to be seen in two

of the earliest nineteenth-century works that portray the model in the artist’s studio. The first

work is Gustave Courbet’s L’Atelier du peintre. Allégorie réelle déterminant une phase de sept

années de ma vie artistique et morale (1855). L’Atelier contains a portrait of Courbet himself,

seated before his easel, with a nude female model standing behind him. The second work,

discussed in conversation with Courbet’s L’Atelier, is Honoré de Balzac’s novella “Le Chef

69
Steiner, Real Thing, 2-3
 28

d’œuvre inconnu” (1831-37), a story of a young painter who bargains his mistress’ posing

services for a peek at an older master’s greatest work. Both L’Atelier and Balzac’s tale are firmly

rooted in patriarchal paradigms, yet each also contains elements that do not entirely support a

binary gender schema, producing what I refer to as ‘gaps.’ These gaps allow us, as present-day

readers and viewers, to see the model as more than merely a passive recipient of the artist’s gaze.

As this study proposes, Courbet’s L’Atelier centralizes the female model using an underlying

compositional structure shared with many of the painter’s other works, including L’Origine du

monde. Additionally, I will offer insight into the meaning of the title of Balzac’s tale,

demonstrating that Gillette herself is an unknown masterpiece.

The second chapter will focus on Edmond and Jules de Goncourt’s novel Manette

Salomon (1867). Here again, the authors activate existing myths and stereotypes about the male

painter and his female model while simultaneously creating or allowing gaps in meaning that

undermine strict gender categories. In Manette Salomon, the authors go further than Courbet or

Balzac because their fictional model, Manette, is endowed with a subjectivity and an agency that

is more emancipating than Gillette's role in Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu. Although the Goncourts

unfortunately use many negative anti-Semitic and misogynistic stereotypes in their portrayal of

Manette, they also created a character who can be read against the grain. The present study

highlights how Manette can also be seen as a representation of powerful feminine subjectivity.

Chapter three will examine the essential role of the character Christine in the narrative

and composition of Émile Zola’s novel, L’Œuvre (1886). Beginning in the first few paragraphs,

the text shifts perspective between the painter, Claude, and his model and eventual wife,

Christine. This exchange in focalization between the artist and model creates two co-existing,

interdependent, and competing narrative threads. I offer an analysis of four important scenes
 29

when Christine poses, demonstrating the importance of her point of view to the structure of

Zola’s text. The author assigns the model a central role in the narrative and frequently uses her

perspective to create emotional ambiance in important scenes. Incorporating the female model’s

gaze in the organization and structure of the novel undermines the myth that she is merely a

passive object and invites a multiplicity of readers into the space of the text.

The final chapter analyzes the artist’s model as a fully realized literary character with her

own voice in Christine Orban’s novel J’étais l’origine du monde (2000). I read this literary work

by a twenty-first century woman writer in conjunction with its source of inspiration, Gustave

Courbet’s L’Origine du monde (1866). Orban’s novel gives a voice to the model, whom the

author presumes is Joanna Hiffernan. Orban’s novel directly activates gender binaries, like

Courbet’s painting, and confronts socio-cultural myths about the artist, the model, and the studio

romance. Yet, within these dichotomous structures and even with all the heteronormative and

gender stereotypes intact, Orban uses Courbet’s painting as a starting point for a literary

portrayal of a model who creates her own work of art in writing her memoirs, her first-person

narrative encompassing the entire novel. Orban sees the model as an individual acting in

accordance with her own desires and motives, and the text presents a variety of ambivalent

emotions, motives, and reactions that undermine gender dichotomies.

 30

Chapter One: The Model Poses -- “un souvenir dans ta palette”

“Entrons, ce sera vivre encore que d’être toujours comme un souvenir dans ta palette.”70

She stands behind the painter in Gustave Courbet’s L’Atelier du peintre: Allégorie réelle

déterminant une phase de sept années de ma vie artistique et morale (1855). She holds a demure

pose with her head tilted, looking down upon the artist’s work like a benevolent saint or

protective goddess. Various elements of the composition call attention to her nudity. First, the

light tones of her skin contrast starkly with the rest of the painting. She also holds a piece of

cloth in front of her body while her own clothing is piled on the floor before her, emphasizing

the absence of dress, especially in contrast to the other fully clothed figures in the painting. The

placement of the nude woman creates a visual and spatial comparison with a richly dressed

female figure standing confidently in the right foreground, further emphasizing the model’s

nakedness. We, the viewers of this work of art, cannot help but notice this undressed woman

standing near the painter and his canvas, so close to the artist that she is in contact with the back

of his chair. Her place designates her role as an important one. If we know this work is meant to

depict the painter’s studio, as announced in the title, her presence can only be explained if we

read her as an artist’s model. Yet, the painter is not looking at her, nor is her figure depicted in

the canvas he is working on. Perhaps she is posing for the painting we are viewing, since she is

clearly not modeling for the one on the artist’s easel. Why is she there? What is her role in this

painting?

Scholars have interpreted Courbet’s model in a wide variety of ways: as an object of

erotic desire, an artistic necessity, a symbol of Art, a painter’s muse, a wife or mistress, a mother

70
Balzac, “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” 433.
 31

of Art, or a representation of Nature and Truth (each of which will be detailed later in this

chapter). So many distinct readings of one figure may seem illogical or inconsistent. However, as

Linda Nochlin explains, this mutability of meanings assigned to Courbet’s model is not

exceptional because “[…] the sign ‘woman’ is infinitely malleable in the representation of

representation, and can stand for any or all of these positions in its anonymous objecthood.”71 In

other words, within patriarchy, the woman is whatever the man needs her to be, a construction

fueled by whatever desires he projects upon her, regardless of her own wishes or self-

understanding. Courbet’s L’Atelier seems, therefore, to primarily reinforce the dominant

patriarchal paradigm in its construction of the role of the artist’s model. Nochlin also reexamines

Courbet’s painting from a personal and feminist scholarly perspective. 72 She focuses her analysis

on a figure placed behind the easel in L’Atelier, the Irish woman nursing a child. 73 This figure

had previously been largely ignored within the critical discussion of the canvas. In Nochlin’s

analysis, the Irish woman becomes a symbol of class and gender oppression.74 This exploration

of Courbet’s painting from a new perspective creates a paradigm shift that allows Nochlin to

discover areas of new meaning. Similarly, this study identifies vantage points from which

readers can recognize feminine agency and likewise question the myth of masculine genius.

This chapter will examine the role and representation of the artist’s model in nineteenth-

century French literature and art by focusing on two iconic works: Honoré de Balzac’s novella

“Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” (c. 1831- 45), and Gustave Courbet’s painting L’Atelier du peintre:

71
Linda Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory: Rereading The Painter’s Studio,” in Representing Women.
(New York: Thames and Hudson, 1999, New York), 129.
72
Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 106-51.
73
Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 121-4.
74
Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 125.
 32

Allégorie réelle déterminant une phase de sept années de ma vie artistique et morale (1855).

Balzac’s text and Courbet’s painting both present a female model whose symbolic role can be

interpreted in a variety of ways that seem to shift and multiply. Each work activates various

stereotypes and myths regarding the nude woman in an artist’s studio, maintaining a patriarchal

power structure in their representations of painters and models. In spite of this masculine-

centered paradigm, both works contain gaps that invite us, as a present-day audience, to see the

model as more than a passive recipient of the artist’s gaze. An alternative reading identifies the

model’s power and redefines her as an active agent rather than merely a victim of patriarchal

domination. When understood from this perspective, Gillette emerges as a previously

unacknowledged powerful heroine. She is thus an unknown masterpiece and one possible

manifestation of Balzac’s title. Similarly, Courbet’s nude model becomes a meaningful

evocation of feminine strength.

I. Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu:” A Tale of Contradictions and Paradoxes

Balzac published several versions of “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” (c. 1831-45), beginning

with its appearance in L’Artiste in 1831. Balzac re-worked the novella numerous times and

included it in his Études philosophiques in 1837.75 This last version was changed very little when

it was included in the 1847 publication of Le Provincial à Paris. The story begins when the

young painter, Poussin, visits the home of an admired and successful artist, Porbus. While these

first two characters are based on actual painters (Nicolas Poussin 1594-1695 and Frans Porbus

75
The Pléiade edition (“Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu:” “L’histoire du texte” and “Notes et variantes,” pages
1401-1428 by René Guise) contains extensive information about the variations in each published version
of Balzac’s text.
 33

1569-1622), the third artist, Frenhofer, whom Poussin meets on the doorstep at Porbus’ home, is

fictional. Frenhofer is a master painter who explains his theories of art to the two younger men.

Adding his own brushwork to Porbus’ painting Marie égyptienne, Frenhofer demonstrates

techniques that will allow the younger men to add a sense of life to their figures. Frenhofer also

speaks at length about his own unfinished masterpiece—which he has spent ten years attempting

to perfect—entitled La belle noiseuse. It supposedly depicts a well-known courtesan, Catherine

Lescault. He describes it in terms that portray the painting as a living being, even a lover and

wife. The younger artists are understandably curious and wish to see the work, but Frenhofer

guards it jealously. Poussin decides to offer the modeling services of his beautiful mistress,

Gillette, in exchange for a view of Frenhofer’s mysterious portrait. Gillette initially resists but

finally agrees to model for Frenhofer. Poussin and Porbus wait outside the studio door while

Frenhofer is alone with La belle noiseuse and Gillette. When they finally enter the room, they

ignore Gillette herself and instead study Frenhofer’s work. Instead of a masterful portrait, they

see nothing more than confusing layers of paint obscuring everything but one perfect foot in a

corner. Their comments anger Frenhofer, who claims they are merely jealous of his talent and

throws them all out of his studio. The next morning, Porbus discovers that Frenhofer died in the

night after burning all his paintings.

Balzac’s tale is a labyrinth of paradoxes, contrasts, and dualities, beginning with the title

of the novella itself. Indeed, the phrase “le chef-d’œuvre inconnu” is a paradox. The quality of

being unknown (“inconnu”) negates the definition of a masterpiece (“chef d’œuvre”), which is

defined as a work that is among an artist’s highest-quality and usually best-known

achievements.76 Balzac also frequently emphasizes the differences among characters using

76
Claude E. Bernard, “La problématique de l’échange dans ‘Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu,’” L’Année
Balzacienne 4, (Jan. 1983): 201.
 34

dualities and contrasts. For example, Poussin’s youth and poverty are a foil to Frenhofer’s age

and wealth. Even more, the novella is built on dualisms that ultimately oppose carnal desire with

aesthetic desire, or more simply, life and art. The tension between these two poles is played out

upon the female model’s body, which becomes the male artists’ main object of desire, the

principal commodity exchanged among the men, and the primary subject of artistic

representation.

“Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” was written before Balzac began his overarching literary

project, which he called La Comédie humaine and described in his Avant-Propos, published in

1842. Although Balzac used verifiable facts (such as the identities of the painters Poussin and

Porbus) and the names of known locations (like the address of Porbus’ studio), the tale retains

elements of the supernatural that link it to Hoffmannesque Romanticism.77 It is also a powerful

narrative that has influenced artists, writers, scholars, filmmakers, and thinkers. More than any

other of Balzac’s work, it has become a springboard to launch creators’ imaginations.78 Paul

Cézanne (1839-1906) identified with Balzac’s failed painter, famously saying “Frenhofer c’est

moi.”79 Cézanne felt Frenhofer’s relentless quest was similar to his own difficulties representing

visual sensations.80 Pablo Picasso, too, identified strongly with Frenhofer. 81 He even rented a

77
See note #101, page 46, below.
78
Thierry Dufrêne. “Faire voir le chef-d’œuvre inconnu,” in Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu: Texte intégral.
(Paris: La Maison de Balzac, Paris-Musées, 2021), 43.
79
Michael Doran, Conversations avec Cézanne. (Macula, Paris. 1978), 65. Cited in Dufrêne, “Faire voir,”
56 and Jon Kear, “‘Frenhofer, c’est Moi:’ Cézanne’s Nudes and Balzac’s ‘Le Chef-d’oeuvre inconnu.’”
Cambridge Quarterly 35, no. 4, (2006), 346.
80
Kear, “Cézanne’s Nudes,” 345-6.
81
“Picasso ne peut qu’être touché par ce roman dont le sujet principal est l’insatisfaction perpétuelle du
créateur devant sa propre création qu’il retouche sans cesse pour la perfectionner, mais, ce faisant, la rend
illisible” (Jeanne-Yvette Sudour. “‘Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu’ illustré par Pablo Picasso.” Le Chef-
d’œuvre inconnu: Texte intégral. [Paris: La Maison de Balzac, Paris-Musées, 2021], 77).
 35

studio on the rue des Grands-Augustins, mistakenly believing it to be the location of Frenhofer’s

atelier.82 His connection to Frenhofer culminated in his creation of a series of illustrations for a

1931 edition of “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” published by Ambroise Vollard. The French

director, Jacques Rivette (1928-2016), was also inspired by “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” for his

1991 film La Belle Noiseuse, titled after Frenhofer’s beloved painting. More recently, Portuguese

painter Paula Rego (1935-2022), created a series of paintings based on Balzac’s tale. Each

creator or scholar who responds to “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” adds another layer to the rich

tapestry Balzac created.

A. The Pygmalion Myth: Revered and Revised

Balzac calls upon a well-known fantasy of masculine creative and sexual power when his

character, Frenhofer, compares himself to Pygmalion. This is indeed a notable comparison since

the conflict between physical love and artistic passion seems to be resolved and fulfilled in the

Pygmalion myth. Ovid’s Pygmalion was a sculptor “shocked at the vices/Nature has given the

female disposition.”83 He lived alone alongside a perfect woman he sculpted in ivory. He “gave

it greater beauty/Than any girl could have, and fell in love/with his own workmanship” (242).

Ovid details Pygmalion’s extensive investment of emotional and erotic energy in his ivory

sculpture. The sculptor dressed his figure, bought it gifts, caressed, and kissed it. Pygmalion

82
In “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” it is Porbus’ studio that is located on the rue des Grands-Augustins.
This studio was where Picasso painted Guernica, one of his best-known works (Kear, “Cézanne’s
Nudes,” 345; and Yves Gagneux. “‘Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu:’ interprétations, adaptations, inventions,”
in Le Chef-d’oeuvre inconnu: Texte intégral. [Paris: La Maison de Balzac, Paris-Musées, 2021], 65).
83
Ovid. Metamorphoses. Translated by Rolfe Humphries. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1955),
241-2. All subsequent page numbers refer to this edition.
 36

sometimes thought his statue truly lived: he “believe[d] his fingers almost le[ft]/An imprint on

her limbs, and fear[ed] to bruise her” (242). As an artist so skilled that his work seemed alive,

Pygmalion embodies the highest of artistic achievements. When the goddess Venus rewards

Pygmalion’s piety by giving life to his sculpture, he is also able to fulfill his erotic longings.

Thus, in the Pygmalion myth, erotic desire merges seamlessly with the desire to create art.84 In

“Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” on the other hand, sexual and aesthetic desire cannot comfortably

co-exist.

The primary attraction of the Pygmalion myth is the ability to control the body of the

other as an object of desire.85 This fantasy object is “a woman who is not a woman, but rather a

man-made creation, a projection of the imagination rather than an independent entity.”86 This

fictional creature proves much easier to control and therefore much more attractive than any real

woman. Speaking of his Belle noiseuse, his mysterious painting, Frenhofer tells Poussin that he

has worked for ten years to perfect his work, making an explicit reference to “le seigneur

Pygmalion” (425). Frenhofer thus compares himself to Pygmalion, claiming to have created life

in his portrait of the Belle noiseuse. He says his mentor, Mabuse, taught him the secret of

painting figures that seem to breathe, and further, like Pygmalion, he seems to believe his own

creation has, at times, come to life: “Hier, vers le soir, dit-il, j’ai cru avoir fini. Ses yeux me

semblaient humides, sa chair était agitée. Les tresses de ses cheveux remuaient. Elle respirait!”

(424). Frenhofer treats his painting in many ways as his wife.87 He calls her “mon épouse,”

84
Diana Knight. Balzac and the Model of Painting: Artist Stories in “La Comédie Humaine.” (London:
Legenda, 2007), 1.
85
Wettlaufer, Pen, 24.
86
Wettlaufer, Pen, 24.
87
Wettlaufer, Pen, 98.
 37

saying, “Voilà dix ans que je vis avec cette femme, elle est à moi, à moi seul, elle m’aime” (431).

Frenhofer sublimates his sexual desires into the creation of his art, causing him to be abnormally

attached to his painting and to fantasize that it is alive.

Indeed, Frenhofer’s fetishistic obsession with his Belle noiseuse, and more broadly, the

relationship of male artists to their female models in Balzac’s tale, can be defined along the lines

of Pygmalion’s story: the artist is masculine while the object of his desire is simultaneously his

own work of art and an idealized feminine figure. While the artist’s erotic energy drives the

creative process, it is essentially an autoerotic fantasy because the painter invests that energy in a

projection of himself. Pygmalion’s and Frenhofer’s wish to be creator – i.e., both god and father

– as well as lover to the perfect woman is, as Lynda Nead describes it, a “fantasy of what may be

called male autogenesis.”88 This fantasy establishes the role of supreme creator for the male artist

and narrowly defines the woman’s role. As such, both in Ovid’s tale and Balzac’s story, the

woman is a pure creation of the artist’s imagination. Ovid says Pygmalion gave his ivory statue a

form more beautiful than any real girl could possess. Similarly, Frenhofer bemoans the

inadequate models available for his would-be masterpiece:

[…] il m’a manqué jusqu’à présent de rencontrer une femme irréprochable, un

corps dont les contours soient d’une beauté parfaite, et dont la carnation … Mais
où est-elle vivante […] cette introuvable Vénus des anciens, si souvent cherchée,
et dont nous rencontrons à peine quelques beautés éparses ? (426)

No individual woman possesses enough beauty to satisfy Frenhofer because the woman he

envisions is a non-existent perfect being. With Frenhofer’s reference to Pygmalion, Balzac thus

88
“Seductive Canvases,” 59. See also Olivier Bonard. La Peinture dans la création Balzacienne.
Invention et vision picturales de ‘La Maison du chat-qui-pelote’ au ‘Père Goriot.’ (Geneva, Switzerland:
Librairie Droz, 1969), 83.
 38

calls upon a set of cultural conceptions of artistic creation that portray the female model as a

passive repository for masculine desire.

In accordance with the Pygmalion myth, the woman’s wishes or motives are never

considered, but Balzac’s novella subverts parts of the original myth. In Ovid’s version, the

goddess Venus brought the sculpted figure to life.89 In the Balzacian nineteenth-century male-

dominated paradigm of artistic creation, however, “the male artist [is] not only the creator of the

art object, but also […] the one who, through the quasi-magical powers of his genius, breathes

life into that object.”90 “Elle a une âme, l’âme dont je l’ai douée,” proclaims Frenhofer (451). He

therefore describes his own talent as god-like, able to give a soul to a two-dimensional figure.

Further diverging from Ovid’s myth, Gillette’s physical presence challenges the idealized

imaginations Frenhofer relied upon. Gillette was supposed to help him achieve his masterpiece

by providing a model body that was close to the perfect beauty he had envisioned. Instead, she

contributes to the unraveling of his elaborate fantasy and delusion of being able to create life,

alone, in his studio. His dream of perfection is revealed as not only misguided but ultimately

destructive—and fatal. Thus, in Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” the Pygmalion myth is

both celebrated and undone.

B. The System of Exchange as a “Marché de Dupes”

Porbus’ painting entitled Marie égyptienne introduces the theme of exchange and

prostitution as a central trope in the text. Balzac’s invented canvas is based on the tale of Marie

89
Starr, “Pygmalion Politics,” 17.
90
Starr, “Pygmalion Politics,” 17.
 39

l’Égyptienne, a fifth-century saint who gives up a life of prostitution for a life of prayer in the

desert. Not having the fare for the boatman to carry her across the Nile, she must sell herself one

last time to gain access to her sacred goal.91 Balzac’s choice of a narrative of prostitution for the

subject of Porbus’ painting foreshadows the request that Poussin will make of Gillette. 92 She will

be asked to make her body available for a higher purpose, to pay the price of her lover’s passage

into the status of the professional artist. The painter, too, metaphorically resembles a prostitute

because he must use his talent to please his clients.93 In the economics of Balzac’s tale, the

women become objects of exchange for the artists’ potential gain, while the men decide what is

valuable and worthy of exchange. As Juliana Starr explains, citing Luce Irigaray’s analysis of

patriarchal economy, in Balzac’s story “all means of artistic production, knowledge and

exchange are controlled exclusively by men.”94 The painters value knowledge and artistic ability,

as well as fame and the resultant economic gain. Porbus trades access to his Marie égyptienne for

increased knowledge; Poussin offers Gillette’s naked body to Frenhofer as the price of

professional training; and Frenhofer offers his companions the right to view his Belle noiseuse in

exchange for Gillette’s posing. Thus, the female figures in the novella are traded among the men

like interchangeable objects, as Porbus says, “femme pour femme” (432). However, as Claude

Bernard explains, each of the characters in Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu falls victim to a fool’s

bargain, a “marché de dupes” because no one gets what he or she wants in the end: When the

Belle noiseuse is perceived as meaningless by the younger painters, Frenhofer’s claim to have

91
Lathers, Bodies, 97.
92
Bernard, “problématique,” 205.
93
Michael D. Huston. “L’Artiste comme prostituée dans ‘Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu’ d’Honoré de
Balzac.” Romance Notes 37, no. 1, (Fall 1996): 91.
94
Starr, “Pygmalion Politics,” 17.
 40

achieved a new depiction of beauty is called into question; Porbus and Poussin gain no new

knowledge of artistic techniques; Poussin’s career is not “made” by this moment as he and

Gillette hoped it would be; and Gillette’s sacrifice is useless.95

In Balzac’s tale, the painting Marie égyptienne becomes the focus of economic, social,

and professional exchange. The figure of the saint passes through the hands of all three of the

artists: Porbus paints her, Poussin sketches her and Frenhofer enlivens her figure.96 Balzac’s

narrator explains that the painting was created for Marie de Médicis and sold “aux jours de sa

misère” (416). This emphasizes the purely economic and transactional value of art. However,

Frenhofer is already wealthy and Porbus is an established painter. Poussin equates their financial

security with their superior artistic skills. He speaks of his wish to be a great artist, yet this desire

is directly linked with wealth and celebrity. Poussin’s first words to Gillette when he returns to

his studio indicate the high value he places on the interdependence of fame and money:

… Je me suis senti peintre! J’avais douté de moi jusqu’à présent, mais ce matin
j’ai cru en moi-même ! Je puis être un grand homme ! […] nous serons riches,
heureux! Il y a de l’or dans ces pinceaux! (428).

Poussin has thus longed for the gold coins his paintbrushes might produce, seeing it as a

guarantee of happiness. The young painter, who has very little in his own atelier, is hypnotized

by the variety and the number of supplies in Porbus’ studio, well before the portrait of Marie

égyptienne captures his attention. The expensive tools and materials of the artist represent his

dreamed-of future.97 Thus, it was not until Poussin saw Porbus’ and Frenhofer’s wealth, equated

95
Bernard, “problématique,” 209.
96
Knight, Balzac, 18.
97
Michel Butor. “L’Atelier du peintre: ‘Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu.’” Energeia: Recherches Doctorales 2,
(Jan. 1996): 10.
 41

with their artistic ability and renown, that he felt himself an artist and believed in his future—that

one could make a living as a painter.

The scene of Frenhofer’s retouching of Marie égyptienne also underscores and reinforces

fraternal social interactions in the text. The professional knowledge exchanged between the

master and the younger artists centers on the representation of a nude female figure. The saint’s

body thus becomes a site for the enactment and display of masculine power. Although the

painting they are discussing contains two figures, the boatman and the saint, the men focus their

attention on the representation of the woman’s body.98 Their gaze is therefore both erotic and

aesthetic, while Frenhofer’s brushwork heightens the sensuality of the image.99 Frenhofer boasts

of his ability to depict the satin suppleness of the young woman’s flesh, as he gives the figure

lifelike dimensions and “l’unité de ton que voulait une ardente Égyptienne” (422). The word

“ardente” suggests both sensuality and eroticism. Frenhofer uses the body of Marie égyptienne as

an eroticized aesthetic object to demonstrate his painting techniques and therefore further

establish himself as the master.

The painters value knowledge and artistic ability, as well as the master’s validation of

their skill. Porbus’ response to Frenhofer’s criticism is to request further knowledge and

commentary, calling him respectfully “mon cher maître” (417). When Frenhofer begins his

lesson, neither of the younger men protests at all and Porbus permits the retouching of his work.

Both men stand, unmoving, on either side of the canvas as Frenhofer lectures and demonstrates,

both soaking up the lesson, “plongés dans la plus véhémente contemplation” (421). Because

Frenhofer’s brushwork is, in fact, effective—so much so that “on aurait dit une nouvelle peinture

98
Monah, “Les enjeux,” 263-4.
99
Monah, “Les enjeux,” 263-4.
 42

trempée de lumière,” the younger artists look to him for further knowledge (421). In fact, they

are so enamored with Frenhofer that Poussin almost immediately begins to contemplate the trade

of his mistress for a view of Frenhofer’s unseen Belle noiseuse. As for Frenhofer, he hopes to

perfect his painting at last and thereby gain more than mere artistic power. His identification with

Pygmalion demonstrates his desire to breathe life into his Belle noiseuse, gaining god-like

powers and realizing his erotic fantasy of creating the perfect body. Alas, the exchange is

ultimately worthless and destructive.

C. Conflicting Desires: A Painter Cannot Serve Two Mistresses

In Balzac’s tale, erotic and artistic desire are melded, but incompatible—like the paradox

contained in the title: “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu.” In the world of the text, one cannot

successfully be both artist and lover. Yet to be an artist is to be devoted to one’s creative

pursuits, and this devotion is dangerously similar to romantic attachment. Ultimately, the artist’s

erotic energy needs to be sublimated toward the completion of the work of art. Otherwise, the

artist faces creative sterility and failure. The first paragraph establishes a connection between

erotic and artistic desire that is maintained throughout the text by a consistent blending of the

two lexicons. Balzac’s novella begins with the young Poussin pacing, hesitating to approach the

home and studio of the great painting master, Porbus. Here, Balzac compares Poussin to an

inexperienced youth, shy before his first mistress. Poussin falters “avec l’irrésolution d’un amant

qui n’ose se présenter chez sa première maîtresse, quelque facile qu’elle soit” (413).

Additionally, the narrative voice compares Poussin’s feelings in this moment to passionate love:
 43

“Parmi nos émotions fragiles, rien ne ressemble à l’amour comme la jeune passion d’un artiste

commençant le délicieux supplice de sa destinée de gloire et de malheur” (414).

Balzac further merges the lexicons of sexuality and painterly technique in the scene

wherein Frenhofer retouches Marie égyptienne. The artist’s emotional and physical investment in

both the act and the product of creation is marked by erotic imagery. The narrator emphasizes the

physicality in the act of painting and the perceived tangibility of the represented figure’s body,

imagining intimate touch. Speaking about Porbus’ painted nude and its lack of lifelike

dimension, Frenhofer says: “Il me semble que si je portais la main sur cette gorge d’une si ferme

rondeur, je la trouverais froide comme du marbre!” (417). Mentioning the “gorge” of the figure

draws attention to the figure’s uncovered breasts and increases the eroticism of Balzac’s

description.

In this same scene, Frenhofer talks about the process of painting a lifelike figure the way

one would talk about a planned seduction. He tells Poussin, “vous ne la poursuivez pas avec

assez d’amour et de persévérance dans ses détours et dans ses fuites” (418). He continues,

explaining that to attain beauty, one must pursue it relentlessly: “l’épier, la presser et l’enlacer

étroitement pour la forcer à se rendre” (418). Here, Balzac’s character includes hunting and

predatory metaphors of watching, pressing and finally entrapping the prey, forcing it to

surrender. Continuing the theme of seduction and rape, Frenhofer then uses militaristic imagery,

calling successful painters “les victorieux lutteurs” and “ces peintres invaincus” saying: “ils

persévèrent jusqu’à ce que la nature en soit réduite à se montrer toute nue et dans son véritable

esprit” (419). Thus, in the schema Frenhofer creates, the painter becomes a combination of

persistent lover, determined hunter, and successful soldier, which, in all, provide a

quintessentially stereotypical example of domineering masculine virility.

 44

As soon as Frenhofer prepares himself to paint, the evocative imagery increases in

frequency and intensity. As Diana Knight remarks, the scene when Frenhofer retouches Marie

égyptienne “contains elements of the erotic Pygmalion phantasy played out in a Parisian

brothel.”100 First, his movements become more pronounced and even uncontrolled as emotion

and even pathological excitement take over: “Le petit vieillard retroussa ses manches avec un

mouvement de brusquerie convulsive” (420). He acts possessed and seems threatening, his

pointed beard emphasizing his masculinity: “et sa barbe taillée en pointe se remue soudain par

des efforts menaçants qui expriment le prurit d’une amoureuse fantaisie” (420). He is overcome

with passion: “Il travaillait avec une ardeur si passionnée que la sueur se perlait sur son front”

(421). He utters expressive sounds that punctuate the narrative: “Paf, paf paf!” and “Pon, pon,

pon!” (422). Balzac’s portrayal of Frenhofer’s frenzy is a dramatic representation of a painter’s

sublimated sexual energy.

The author further appeals to masculine fantasies of the possession and control of

women’s bodies when Poussin brings Gillette to Frenhofer’s home. Porbus pulls Gillette into the

room, presents her to Frenhofer, and declares her better than all the masterpieces in the world.

The reader then observes as Poussin watches Frenhofer appraise Gillette’s body:

Frenhofer tressaillit. Gillette était là, dans l’attitude naïve et simple d’une jeune
Grégorienne innocente et peureuse, ravie et présentée par des brigands à quelque
marchand d’esclaves. Une pudique rougeur colorait son visage, elle baissait les
yeux, ses mains étaient pendantes à ses côtés, ses forces semblaient l’abandonner,
et des larmes protestaient contre la violence faite à sa pudeur. En ce moment,
Poussin, au désespoir d’avoir sorti ce beau trésor de son grenier, se maudit lui-
même. Il devint plus amant qu’artiste, et mille scrupules lui torturèrent le cœur
quand il vit l’œil rajeuni du vieillard, qui, par une habitude du peintre, déshabilla,
pour ainsi dire, cette jeune fille en devinant les formes les plus secrètes. Il revint
alors à la féroce jalousie du véritable amour. (433)

100
Knight, Balzac, 8.
 45

While Gillette is fully clothed here, the description of her stance as “naïve et simple” and the

comparison of her situation to that of a kidnapped and ravished woman being sold at a slave

market heightens the emotionality of the moment and emphasizes the implicit commodification

of her body. The physical description of Gillette emphasizes her feelings, focusing on her

hanging arms, downward look, and teary eyes that protest “contre la violence faite à sa pudeur.”

Yet, the interplay of gazes in this scene effectively erases Gillette, even while her body is central

to the action. The men’s emotional investment in possessing her becomes predominant, and they

regard her as a treasured object: “ce beau trésor.” Frenhofer undresses her with his suddenly

younger painter’s eye, as his “oeil rajeuni” perceives the secret shapes of her body. The

implication is that Gillette’s beauty awakens his desire both as a man and as a painter. Poussin’s

awareness of Frenhofer’s desire arouses his jealousy and possessiveness, although he is the one

who proposed “lending” Gillette to the older painter in exchange for a look at the hidden

masterpiece. Through the artists’ simultaneously erotic and aesthetic gaze, Balzac’s story entices

the reader, creating space for fantasies and encouraging continued engagement with the text.

D. Frenhofer’s Failure: Authority’s Downfall

Despite their seeming omnipresence, these fantasies of masculine superiority and

domination prove to be destructive. Frenhofer’s over-investment in his work and his eroticization

of the process result in failure and death. Although Poussin and Porbus see Frenhofer as a

respected master with enviable talent and skill, Balzac alerts the reader to his dangerous nature at

the start of the novella. When Poussin first perceives Frenhofer on the steps of Porbus’ home, he

looks at him closely hoping to see “la bonne nature d’un artiste” in his face, but instead “il y
 46

avait quelque chose de diabolique dans cette figure” (414). Using the word “diabolique”

immediately gives Frenhofer an air of evil and foreboding.101 Comparing the aged painter to the

devil likewise suggests his artistic skill might be supernatural and even predicts the seductive

temptation of increased knowledge that leads Poussin to sacrifice Gillette. When Frenhofer is

retouching Marie égyptienne, Balzac describes his manners and movements with a vocabulary of

illness, suggesting imbalance and insanity. First, before beginning to paint, “Le petit vieillard

retroussa ses manches avec un mouvement de brusquerie convulsive” (420). Balzac emphasizes

the suddenness of Frenhofer’s behavior, underlining its menacing unpredictability:

sa barbe taillée en pointe se remua soudain par des efforts menaçants qui
exprimaient le prurit d’une amoureuse fantaisie. […] Puis il trempait avec une
vivacité fébrile la pointe de la brosse dans les différents tas de couleurs (421)

This paragraph contains more medical language, and thus reinforces the reader’s sense of

Frenhofer’s mental imbalance. A “prurit” is an itch, but with the implication of a disease.

101
The description of Frenhofer as “diabolique,” is reinforced several times within the text with
references to his bizarre behavior, as if he were possessed by a demon (422) and descriptions of his
“violence passionnée” (432). These characteristics, along with Balzac’s original subtitle of the tale as “un
conte fantastique,” suggest “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” was influenced by the popular tales of German
writer E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776-1822). His tales were widely read throughout Europe, particularly during
the 1830s. For a detailed, chronological account of French translations of Hoffmann and contemporary
commentaries on his work, see Elisabeth Teichmann, La Fortune d’Hoffmann en France. E. Droz, 1961.
For example, Hoffmann authored The Nutcracker and the Mouse King (Nussknacker und Mausekönig,
1816), the inspiration for Tchaikovsky’s well-known ballet, The Nutcracker. The first French translation
of Hoffmann’s works appeared in a short-lived journal (le Gymnase), of which Balzac was the editor
(Pierre Laubriet, “Influences Chez Balzac: Swedenborg, Hoffmann.” Les Études Balzaciennes 5, [Dec.
1958]: 172). Balzac overtly referred to reading Hoffmann in letter to Mme Hanska on 2 novembre 1833:
“J’ai lu Hoffmann en entier,” (cited in Peter Whyte, “Le Chef d’oeuvre de Balzac: Esthétique et Image.”
In Text(e)/Image, [Durham, NC: University of Durham, 1999], 100). Although he also claimed not to
have read Hoffmann’s works until after conceiving his own (See Whyte, “Esthétique,” 100-101. See also
Lucie Wanuffel, “Présence d’Hoffmann dans les oeuvres de Balzac (1829-1835).” L’Année Balzacienne
0, [Jan. 1970]: 45). Many scholars have demonstrated the intertextuality between the two writers, noting
Hoffmannesque elements throughout Balzac’s body of work. In addition to those sources cited above, see
for example, the following: René Guise, “Balzac et l’Étranger.” L’Année Balzacienne 0, [Jan. 1970]; and
Dominik Müller, “Self-Portraits of the Poet as a Painter: Narratives on Artists and the Bounds between
the Arts (Hoffmann-Balzac-Stifter).” In Text into Image: Image into Text. Edited by Jeff Morrison,
(Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1997), 169–74.
 47

“Prurit” can also indicate a pleasurable sensation, thereby further suggesting that Frenhofer finds

erotic pleasure in the act of painting. The adjective “fébrile,” meaning “feverish,” is another

word from the domain of medicine. These words carrying connotations of disease and desire,

combined with the sudden, aggressive movements of Frenhofer’s pointed beard and his

paintbrush, add an undercurrent of sexuality to this sequence. Balzac skillfully emphasizes the

blending of erotic and aesthetic in the retouching of Marie égyptienne. Furthermore, he

demonstrates Frenhofer’s volatile personality and questionable mental status: the purported

master is dominated by uncontrolled passions and compulsions.

Frenhofer is ostensibly the prime authority, the patriarch of his profession, and the

embodiment of artistic mastery. His effective retouching of Porbus’s Marie egyptienne, the

exceptionally fine works Poussin and Porbus see in Frenhofer’s home, and the perfection of the

recognizable foot on the surface of his Belle noiseuse clearly demonstrate Frenhofer’s skill. In

fact, some scholars have interpreted Poussin’s and Porbus’ inability to see a recognizable figure

on Frehofer’s canvas not as a mark of the master’s impotence, but as a sign of their blindness and

ignorance.102 Poussin and Porbus fail to understand Frenhofer’s lessons.103 In these readings,

Frenhofer is a visionary, and Balzac becomes a kind of prophet, predicting the development of

abstract expressionism and other forms of non-figurative visual art.104 These interpretations are

102
Bongiorni, Kevin. “Balzac, Frenhofer, ‘Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu:’ ut poesis pictura.’” Mosaic: An
Interdisciplinary Critical Journal 33, no. 2, (2000): 88.
103
Bongiorni, “Balzac,” 89-90.
104
Yves Gagneux cites Ségolène Le Men (1985), Françoise Pitt-Rivers (1993), and Michel Serres (1987)
are scholars who have proposed this theory (“interprétations,” 67-69.) See also: Dario Gamboni, “Tu ne
troueras point.” In Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu: texte intégral. (Paris: Paris-Musées, La Maison de Balzac,
2021), 129-137; and Jean-Luc Filoche. “‘Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu:’ peinture et connaissance.” L’Année
Balzacienne 1, (Jan 1980): 47-59.
 48

insightful and acknowledge Balzac’s literary skill in creating such a rich text that it continues to

prove fruitful and inspiring for scholars and artists alike. However, they ultimately rely on

anachronisms and credit Balzac with knowledge to which he could not have had access.105 Only

in a world where Pablo Picasso, Wassily Kandinsky, and Jackson Pollock have already

revolutionized visual representation can Frenhofer’s painting become a prediction of abstract art.

Furthermore, the theme of the failed artist peppers Balzac’s work, demonstrating that the author

most likely conceived of Frenhofer along the same lines.106 Whether we assign the deficit to

Poussin and Porbus or to Frenhofer, the master’s demise suggests a failure of creative expression

and communication. Frenhofer’s downfall undermines his position as master and authority.

Frenhofer’s fall represents a collapse of masculine authority. The painters do not see the truth,

yet, as artists they are supposed to have superior vision. Furthermore, the patriarchal model is

also questioned by Gillette’s character. From a strictly feminist vantage point, treating Gillette as

a transaction object seems to make her nothing more than a victim of patriarchy. However, she is

also the catalyst for Frenhofer’s downfall and her lucidity contrasts with Poussin’s blind

devotion to Frenhofer, in fact, she may be viewed as the true hero of “Le Chef d’œuvre

inconnu.”

E. Gillette: A Truly Unknown Masterpiece

As “une de ces âmes nobles et généreuses qui viennent souffrir près d’un grand homme”

(428), Gillette is a woman who accepts traditional gender roles. Even so, she is also an active

105
Gagneux, “interprétations,” 66-7.
106
Gagneux, “interprétations,” 68.
 49

character with a voice, personal choice, and power; an astute participant who is more aware of

nuances than the male characters; and a dominant figure in the text because her choice to pose

drives the narrative action. Her role within the narrative thus resists reductive gender stereotypes.

Although Gillette does not appear in the narrative until the end of the first section, Balzac used

her name as the title of the first half of his novella, which signals her importance to the text.

Interestingly, the narrator never describes Gillette’s physical appearance. All the details provided

are external ones, relatively brief and presented in general terms– there is no specific description,

for example of her hair or eye color, just that she is beautiful, “parfaite.” For example, the

narrator compares Gillette to the light in the poor attic where she lives with Poussin, with a smile

that “dorait ce grenier et rivalisait avec l’éclat du ciel” (428). Radiant and lovely, she is “parée de

toutes les richesses féminines et les éclairant par le feu d’une belle âme” (428). On the one hand,

Balzac’s portrait of Gillette depersonalizes her and allows her character to be more freely

allegorized.107 Lacking individual physical characteristics, Gillette is primed for projection of the

painters’ and readers’ fantasies. On the other hand, Balzac endows her with qualities that resist a

reductive definition. Gillette is not a silent victim. In fact, most of what readers learn about her

comes from direct discourse, a narrative strategy that gives the model her own voice. She speaks

her mind, naming her feelings and voicing her thoughts. Additionally, the third-person

omniscient narrator usually reinforces or extends Gillette’s words. One powerful example is at

the end of the first section. The narrative voice says Gillette thinks to herself: “Il ne m’aime

plus” (430). Then, she begins to wish she had not given in and agreed to pose for Frenhofer:

“Elle croyait aimer déjà moins le peintre en le soupçonnant moins estimable qu’auparavant”

107
“[...] le narrateur dépouille Gillette de toute caractéristique personnelle: figure conventionnelle dans un
cadre d’idylle parisienne, elle est vouée à l’indéfini, apte à s’allégoriser, et ne fait l’objet d’aucune
description détaillée; femme-synthèse, elle rassemble les charmes épars dans tous les corps féminins […]”
(Bernard, “problématique,” 207).
 50

(430). The adjective “estimable” implies a value judgment, and succinctly communicates

Gillette’s own depreciation of this man who would so easily trade her away.

Furthermore, Gillette’s active choice to pose, even after Poussin repeatedly withdraws his

request or tells her that she is not obligated to do it, establishes Gillette as a thinking character

with her own motivations for her decisions. She explains some of her reasons when she and

Poussin arrive at Frenhofer’s studio. She hesitates at the doorstep and Poussin offers to take her

home, but she persists, saying: “[…] si notre amour périt, et si je mets dans mon cœur un long

regret, ta célébrité ne sera-t-elle pas le prix de mon obéissance à tes désirs? Entrons, ce sera vivre

encore que d’être toujours comme un souvenir dans ta palette” (433). Balzac’s inclusion of this

scene clearly demonstrates that Gillette makes a deliberate decision, thereby rejecting the idea

that she is merely a passive muse. Instead, the author uses direct citations that mark Gillette as a

thinking individual and express her perspective far more directly than would have been

accomplished by a description focused only on her physical appearance.

Additionally, Gillette is more aware of the nuances and the ramifications of posing than

are any of the men. She is particularly attuned to how the male characters treat her.108 Early on,

she says she will no longer pose for Poussin because she recognizes that her lover does not truly

see her when he is painting. She is fully aware that her lover wants to sacrifice her for his own

fame. She understands further that he does not value her sacrifice as he should, and that he treats

her like a child who must be cajoled and cannot make up her own mind: “Suis-je à moi quand tu

me parles ainsi? Oh! non, je ne suis plus qu’une enfant” (433). Later, when they are at

Frenhofer’s home, she notices Poussin engrossed in studying a painting. She realizes that he

looks at the art with more passion than he shows when looking at her: “Il ne m’a jamais regardée

108
Knight, Balzac, 22.
 51

ainsi” (434). As Max Milner explains, Gillette is aware of the absorbing power art holds for the

painters: she witnesses “l’intensité et la profondeur du drame du regard.”109 She thus is more

than simply one-dimensional, even in her brief appearances.

Gillette’s choice to pose or not drives the entire narrative, from Poussin’s asking her to

pose for Frenhofer, her decision to do so, and the build-up to the scene where she finally disrobes

in the master’s studio.110 This makes Gillette a dominant feature of the novella and therefore

moves her character to a position outside of the strictly gendered binary structure. The actual

nude scene takes place beyond the visual frame of the narrative, as Porbus, Poussin, and the

reader are excluded from Frenhofer’s studio. Gillette's decision to disrobe for Frenhofer does not

extend to the other artists or to the reader, reinforcing the significance of her choice. Unlike what

we will see in L’Œuvre and Manette Salomon, there is no description of Gillette’s nudity, and so

there is no great lingering on the details of her body. Yet, this absence of detail enables the

imagination of the reader to freely picture Gillette’s nakedness, according to one’s own desires.

Thus, her disrobing is the narrative climax that not only engages the reader’s fantasies, but

initiates the revelation of Frenhofer’s painting, its failure and his death.

Although one may assume that the “chef d’oeuvre inconnu” in the title of Balzac’s story

refers to the great painting with which Frenhofer is obsessed and the portrait for which Gillette is

meant to model, Gillette herself is at least one possible interpretation of the title. 111 She, the

loving and living woman, is the true “chef d’oeuvre inconnu.” Numerous textual signals indicate

109
Max Milner, “Le peintre fou,” Romantisme, 66 Folie de l’art, (1989): 6-7.
110
Lathers, Bodies, 95.
111
My reading of Gillette expands Marie Lathers’ work: "Frenhofer's sacrifice as prophet of modern art
loses its central importance in this reading, whereas the model/mistress Gillette's sacrifice of her naked
body appropriates the pivotal position of the unknown masterpiece” (Lathers, Bodies, 49).
 52

that Gillette is an unknown masterpiece: the author’s use of the title words “chef d’œuvre”

throughout the text, as well as her final status as “oubliée;” the male painters’ lack of

understanding of Gillette’s value and their failure to recognize her sacrifice; and her symbolic

role as a foil to the men’s unrealistic fantasies.

Throughout the text, the term “chef d’œuvre” appears only four times, none of which

refer to Frenhofer’s painting. Besides the title, the first instance is in the introductory section,

which describes Poussin’s feelings before entering Porbus’ home. The young painter finds

himself trembling with love for art as if approaching a true genius or “quelque chef-d’œuvre”

(414). Twice “chef d’œuvre” is used to refer to Porbus’ painting Marie égyptienne: first, by the

narrator when Poussin first enters Porbus’ home: “Ce chef-d’œuvre, destiné à Marie de Médicis

[…]” (416); secondly, Frenhofer uses the term to deny the greatness of Porbus’ work: “C’est un

chef-d’œuvre pour tout le monde, et les initiés aux plus profonds arcanes de l’art peuvent seuls

découvrir en quoi elle pèche” (420). Then, when Poussin takes Gillette to Frenhofer’s home,

Porbus pulls her before the master and says: “Ne vaut-elle pas tous les chef-d’œuvres du

monde?” (433). These uses of the title words “chef-d’œuvre” create a chain of reference that

leads from “Marie égyptienne” to Gillette, then merely by extension to Frenhofer’s Belle

noiseuse. Yet, on the level of the vocabulary used within the text, Frenhofer’s canvas is called

many things: “mon oeuvre” (424), “ma peinture” (431), and “mon épouse” (431) for example,

but never a “chef-d’œuvre.” The title terminology can be presumed to refer to Frenhofer’s

portrait, but it is used directly to refer to Gillette and never to the portrait itself. Additionally, the

word “oubliée,” used to describe Gillette in the final climactic scene, can be considered a

synonym for “inconnu,” particularly with regards to artistic celebrity where “connu” and

“renommé” would serve as direct antonyms to “inconnu.” Gillette is therefore referred to within
 53

the text using vocabulary that directly repeats or invokes the title, and thus can be interpreted as a

“chef-d’œuvre inconnu.”

In terms of her subjectivity, Gillette is also unknown or “inconnue” to the men in the text.

Poussin, who as her lover should know her intimately, seems largely unaware of the depth of her

feelings for him and her discomfort in posing for Frenhofer. Although he apologizes and

repeatedly declares his love for her, the fact that he looks more closely at the artwork than at

Gillette demonstrates that his true passion does not lie with Gillette. As for Porbus, he only looks

at her beauty, dismissing her individuality and the sincerity of her love for Poussin. In Gillette’s

presence, just before she enters the studio with Frenhofer, Porbus tells Poussin “Les fruits de

l’amour passent vite, ceux de l’art sont immortels” (434). He plays the roles of procurer and

voyeur, first convincing Frenhofer to consider using her as a model, then standing at the door of

the studio and describing, step by step, the posing scene, which takes place behind closed doors.

Porbus recounts: “Ah! elle se déshabille, il lui dit de se mettre au jour!” (434). He sees Gillette

merely as currency that will buy the artists a view of Frenhofer’s work. Frenhofer considers

showing his painting in exchange for Gillette’s modeling as “une horrible prostitution” (431). He

believes Gillette will betray Poussin sooner or later, but his painting will always be faithful

(432). The painters, who supposedly possess superior abilities to discern visual nuances, are

blind to Gillette’s qualities beyond her beauty.

Furthermore, Gillette’s symbolic role as the only living woman in the text (the others are

painted figures) is equally underplayed. To the best of the reader’s knowledge, Frenhofer uses

Gillette only as a comparison to his Belle noiseuse.112 As a mediator between the real and the

Marie Lathers. “Modesty and the Artist’s Model in ‘Le Chef-d’oeuvre inconnu.’” Symposium: A
112

Quarterly Journal in Modern Literatures 46, no. 1, (1992): 56.

 54

ideal, Gillette could serve to anchor Frenhofer’s work in reality. Yet, Frenhofer persists in his

fantasy, and “Gillette, whose role should be the crucial one of model and lover, turns out to be a

pretext for a theory of art that excludes the real woman.”113 Gillette is correct when she says “Tu

ne penses plus à moi, et cependant tu me regardes” (429). None of the men see Gillette as a

valuable, living person but only as an object of exchange so she remains forever unknown to

them.

II. Courbet’s L’Atelier du peintre: A Shifting Allegory of Artistic Creation

Courbet created L’Atelier du peintre: Allégorie réelle déterminant une phase de sept

années de ma vie artistique et morale for the Paris World’s Fair of 1855. The work is currently

held at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris and underwent extensive restoration in 2016. 114 It is an

unusual picture, simultaneously compelling and disconcerting. The odd arrangement of figures,

the lack of interaction among them, and the hazy, hovering background create a dream-like

scene. It is quite large—about twelve by twenty feet—and the figures are approximately life-

sized. The composition is divided into four main areas: a compact grouping of people on the left

side, a central area where an artist is shown at his easel, a second set of figures to the right of the

easel, and the wall space in the background. Due to an episode of jaundice, Courbet was unable

to complete the painting before the deadline, even with a two-week extension; he submitted it

113
Lathers, Bodies, 94.
114
See the Musée d’Orsay’s publication “L'Atelier du Peintre de Gustave Courbet restauré” for an
account of the restoration process and a photographic comparison of the painting before and after
restoration. (Musée d’Orsay. L’Atelier du peintre de Gustave Courbet restauré. [Paris: Centre de
Recherche et de Restauration des Musées de France. December 13, 2016.]).
 55

unfinished, and although he had plenty of time to alter it later had he wished to, he never did.115

As a result, some of the figures are more richly rendered than others, and parts of the image—the

background, for example—seem hazy or dissolved, even in updated photos of the recently

restored painting.

Critics have tried to identify not only the figures themselves but also the specific source

materials used to construct the image. In an essay published as part of the Louvre’s Courbet

retrospective in 1977-8, Hélène Toussaint identified most of the figures on the left and traced

Courbet’s visual source materials, finding that he included many recognizable faces among those

on the left of the easel, including Emperor Napoleon III, portrayed as the seated figure with

hunting dogs on the far left.116

Courbet discussed L’Atelier in several letters, the most detailed of which is a letter to his

friend Jules Champfleury wherein he described the work, identifying many of the figures and the

main compositional elements.117 He explained that it was meant to express his “manière de voir

la société dans ses intérêts et ses passions” by showing “la société dans son haut, dans son bas,

115
Benedict Nicolson. Courbet: The Studio of the Painter. (New York: Viking Press, 1973), 77; and
Linda Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 117.
116
Hélène Toussaint. Gustave Courbet: 1819-1877: An Exhibition Organized by the Réunion des Musées
Nationaux, at the Royal Academy of Arts, 19 January-19 March 1978. (London: Arts Council of Great
Britain, 1978), 248-85. Beyond Toussaint’s description, a more complete catalog of the figures in
Courbet’s L’Atelier, including comparisons with the various source materials, can be found in several
critical texts. See: Nicolson, The Studio, 14-60; James Henry Rubin, Courbet. ([1997] London: Phaidon,
2003), 135-54; and Klaus Herding, Courbet: To Venture Independence, translated by John William
Gabriel, (New Haven CT: Yale University Press, 1991), 46-7.
117
The full text of this letter is provided in Correspondance de Courbet, Edited by Petra ten-Doesschate
Chu. (Paris: Flammarion, 1996), 121-3. Jules Champfleury (1821-89) is the nom de plume of Jules-
Antoine-Félix Husson, a Realist critic and author. He frequented the same circles as Courbet, Baudelaire
and Proudhon (Rubin, Courbet, 333).
 56

dans son milieu.”118 Courbet claimed that L’Atelier would show the world “je ne suis pas encore

mort, et le réalisme non plus:”

C’est le monde qui vient se faire peindre chez moi. […] La scène se passe dans
mon atelier à Paris. Le tableau est divisé en deux parties. Je suis au milieu
peignant. À droite sont les actionnaires, c’est à dire les amis, les travailleurs, les
amateurs du monde de l’art. À gauche, l’autre monde de la vie triviale, le peuple,
la misère, la pauvreté, la richesse, les exploités, les exploiteurs, les gens qui vivent
de la mort.119

In this letter, Courbet lists the figures to the left of the easel according to their occupation or

station, purposefully including a wide range of social levels: a Jew, a priest, a poor withered old

veteran, a hunter, a reaper, a strong-man, a buffoon, a textile peddler, a workman’s wife, a

worker, a death’s head on a newspaper, an Irishwoman suckling a child, an artist’s dummy, and a

cloth peddler. He then describes the central grouping and the figures on the right as follows:

Puis vient la toile sur mon chevalet, et moi peignant avec le côté assyrien de ma
tête. Derrière ma chaise est un modèle de femme nue. Elle est appuyée sur le
dossier de ma chaise, me regardant peindre un instant; ses habits sont à terre en
avant du tableau. […] À la suite de cette femme vient Promayet,120 avec son
violon […] Par derrière est Bruyas, 121 Cuenot,122 Buchon,123 Proudhon124 (je

118
Rubin, Courbet, 139.
119
Courbet, Correspondance, 121-3.
120
Alphonse Promayet (1822-1872) was one of Courbet’s lifelong friends. He was a violinist and taught
music to Courbet’s sisters. He frequently posed for the artist and is an identifiable figure in many of
Courbet’s major works, such as L’Enterrement à Ornans (1849, Musée d’Orsay, Paris) and Une après-
dînée à Ornans (1849, Palais des beaux-arts, Lille, France) as well as L’Atelier (Nicolson, The Studio, 40-
2).
121
Alfred Bruyas (1821-77) was the son of a wealthy banker. He believed that he could use patronage of
the arts as a method for improving society. Bruyas became an avid collector of Courbet’s work and one of
the foremost patrons of Realist art (Rubin, Courbet, 140).
122
Urbain Cuenot (1820-67) was Courbet’s schoolmate, a political liberal who was imprisoned in 1851
and temporarily exiled to Algeria. He lived in Ornans and frequently accompanied Courbet on his travels
(Rubin, Courbet, 140).
123
Max Buchon (1818-69) was Courbet’s schoolmate, a Realist poet and political writer. Buchon wrote
the first article about Courbet’s art, calling him an artist of the people (Rubin, Courbet, 140).
 57

voudrais bien avoir aussi ce philosophe Proudhon qui est de notre manière de
voir, s’il voulait poser j’en serais content; si vous le voyez, demandez-lui si je
peux compter sur lui). Puis vient votre tour en avant du tableau. Vous êtes assis
sur un tabouret, les jambes croisées et un chapeau sur vos genoux. À côté de vous,
plus au premier plan encore, est une femme du monde avec son mari, habillée en
grand luxe.125 Puis à l’extrémité à droite assis sur une table d’une jambe
seulement est Baudelaire126 qui lit dans un grand livre. […] [Mais] je vous ai fort
mal expliqué tout cela, je m’y suis pris au rebours. J’aurais dû commencer par
Baudelaire, mais c’est trop long pour recommencer: vous comprendrez comme
vous pourrez. Les gens qui veulent juger auront de l’ouvrage, ils s’en tireront
comme ils pourront.127

The final version of the painting does not correspond exactly with the description Courbet sent to

Champfleury. First, in this same letter, Courbet said he was going to include a self-portrait and

that he would be painting “un tableau d’ânier qui pince le cul à une fille.”128 In the final version,

instead, he chose a landscape from his native Franche-Comté and added several figures he did

not mention, most notably the two children: the one staring up at the canvas and the other lying

on the floor, drawing. Additionally, there was originally a female figure near Baudelaire on the

far right: “À côté de [Baudelaire] est une négresse qui se regarde dans une glace avec beaucoup

de coquetterie.”129 It was probably a portrait of Baudelaire’s mistress Jeanne Duval, whose

124
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809-65) was an economist and philosopher (Rubin, Courbet, 140). His
philosophy of social egalitarianism greatly influenced Courbet, who was an admirer and friend.
125
The well-dressed woman and her husband are probably the singer Caroline Sabatier-Ungher and her
husband François Sabatier, who both admired Courbet’s work and were patrons (Rubin, Courbet, 140).
126
Charles Baudelaire (1821-67) was a poet and art critic, the author of Les Fleurs du mal (1857), Le
Peintre de la vie moderne (1863) and many critical essays on literature and visual art (Rubin, Courbet,
140).
127
Courbet, Correspondance, 121-2.
128
Courbet, Correspondance, 121.
129
Courbet, Correspondance, 122.
 58

image may have been painted over at the request of the poet, perhaps because their relationship

was fading.130 The woman’s face has become visible as the paint has thinned over time.

A. Courbet’s Model: Her Many Roles

To sufficiently parse the role of the model in this painting, layered as it is with meanings

and with decades of art historians’ interpretations, it is helpful to survey previous scholarship on

Courbet’s nude. Hélène Toussaint’s identification of the figures included an analysis that

proposed a hidden Masonic role for Courbet’s model. According to this schema, the model

serves as one of the two pillars of the Masonic Lodge: she represents the pillar of Boaz or the

eternal feminine while the male artist’s dummy behind the canvas is the masculine, the pillar of

Jachin.131 Klaus Herding built on Toussaint’s research and proposed a reading of L’Atelier as an

“adhortatio ad principem,” an exhortation to the ruler.132 Herding suggested that Courbet used

L’Atelier and the occasion of the Paris World’s Fair to offer an image of peaceful co-existence

among diverse social types where the artist serves as a visionary messenger and mediator

between them.133 Within Herding’s framework, the model is one part of this diverse society.

Similarly, James Rubin identified the artist’s role as society’s redeemer in his analysis of

Courbet’s painting as a Proudhonian allegory.134 Finally, in her extensive work on Courbet,

130
Rubin, Courbet, 140.
131
Toussaint, Gustave Courbet, 261.
132
Herding, Independence, 57.
133
Herding, Independence, 57.
134
Rubin, Courbet, 145-53.
 59

Nochlin analyzes the relationships between gender and power in Courbet’s painting. 135 She sees

the central grouping of Courbet, the nude model, and the young boy as a “group in which the

major players literally replicate the Oedipal triangle.”136 The composition of this group of figures

is arranged in a triangle, with the three points of the triangle being the model’s head, the boy’s

head, and the model’s feet. Therefore, the three figures form a physical triangle as well as a

psychological one. Nochlin asserts that in Courbet’s allegory, the creative power is centered in

the male artist and is purposefully opposed to the passive female body. 137 Taken together, this

body of scholarship allows us to construct an understanding of L’Atelier as a deliberate social

commentary on the painter’s position in society.

Over time and with the changing perspectives of viewers and art historians, the painting

can be perceived as a work that ultimately undermines its own overt ideology. The numerous

contrasts and dualities in the composition establish a shifting role for Courbet’s nude model. In

this painting, whether we read her role as political, erotic, and/or symbolic, it is defined

according to her relationship to the male artist. Just as Balzac’s use of the Pygmalion myth

activates a series of existing and widespread cultural expectations regarding the studio romance,

Courbet’s juxtaposition of the unclothed female figure next to a self-portrait paradigmatically

depicts the artist and the model according to their social and symbolic gender roles.

The most obvious explanation for Courbet’s representation of a voluptuous unclothed

woman is to titillate the viewer, which is important to consider because the roles of gender,

135
For example: “The Invention of the Avant-Garde: France, 1830-80,” (1968); “Courbet's L'origine du
monde: The Origin without an Original” (1986); “Courbet’s Real Allegory: Rereading the Painter’s
Studio,” (1988); and Courbet, (2007).
136
Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 128.
137
Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 128-29.
 60

eroticism, and desire are inherent to any investigation of depictions of painters at work with

women posing before them. Rubin argues that Courbet purposely activated heterosexual male

desire and that Courbet’s female nudes subvert all the spiritual and historical pretense, unlike

most contemporary representations of naked women as idealized goddesses or historical figures:

Courbet’s nudes show that inherent sexuality and desire are at the root of all representations.138

Painting the female body, in particular, served Courbet’s Realist artistic project:

It was Courbet’s masterful ability to recreate in paint the sensuousness of the flesh
that was the basis of his figures’ powers of seduction, and it may be possible to
argue […] that he frankly accepted the fact of woman as an appropriate, perhaps
exemplary, object of Realism since, for the heterosexual male, no other form
could be so physically compelling. 139

When read in this way, then the exposed female figure directly addresses the desire of the

heterosexual male viewer, creating a compelling reason for him to spend time contemplating the

canvas. Courbet’s canvas, like Balzac’s story, entices the masculine spectator, creating space for

his fantasies and thus encouraging his continued engagement with the work of art.

Generally, in representations of the painter’s studio, the presence of an unclothed female

model is entirely unremarkable; she is part of the expected furnishings like the canvases, easel,

brushes, and palette.140 Moreover, frequent access to women’s bodies was also considered as one

significant advantage of being an artist.141 In Courbet’s time, the historian Théophile Silvestre

138
Rubin, Courbet, 178-9.
139
Rubin, Courbet, 180.
140
Butor, “L’Atelier,” 20.
141
Rupert Christiansen. “Imagining the Artist: Painters and Sculptors in Nineteenth-Century Literature.”
In Rebels and Martyrs: The Image of the Artist in the Nineteenth Century, (London and New Haven, CT:
National Gallery Company/Yale University Press, 2006), 34-5. Although Christiansen was speaking
about British literature and art when he made this statement, I believe it is appropriate in a larger context,
including French works.
 61

described the nude woman in L’Atelier as a personification of “the living model.”142 A naked

woman shown in an atelier could therefore stand-in for “studio doings,” or normal studio

activities, particularly when these activities are of questionable morality.143

The presence of beautiful women also can inspire male creativity. William Vaughn

explains that the nineteenth-century model frequently functioned as both muse and soulmate to

the artist.144 Since the mythological Muses were all female, any woman shown near someone

engaged in a creative act can be interpreted as a representation of the Muse. Therefore, the

placement of Courbet’s model so close to the painter at work establishes one of her many

potential roles as that of the artist’s muse. 145

Although Courbet used traditional imagery, like representing inspiration with a female

“muse,” he rejected idealized bodies in art. Courbet’s goal was to paint the real human body in

an everyday context. In his own words, he sought to “traduire les mœurs, les idées, l’aspect de

mon époque, selon mon appréciation, en un mot, faire de l’art vivant.”146 Painting an imperfect

body in a contemporary situation—as opposed to the idealized female figures of classicism—is

Théophile Silvestre. Histoire des artistes vivants français et étrangers: Études d’après nature.
142

Première série illustrée de 10 portraits pris au daguerréotype et gravés sur acier. Introduction et
Catalogue par M. L. de Virmond. (Paris: 1855). Gallica. http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k1085893.
264.
143
Richard Redgrave as cited in Nicolson, The Studio, 81-2.

William Vaughn. “Models and Muses.” In The Artist’s Model: From Etty to Spencer. (London:
144

Merrell Holberton Publishers, 1999), 79.

145
The Musée d’Orsay website includes this reading in their description of Courbet’s Atelier, calling her
“une femme-muse.” (Musée d’Orsay. “Gustave Courbet: L’Atelier Du Peintre.” https://www.musee-
orsay.fr/fr/oeuvres/latelier-du-peintre-927. Accessed October 21, 2022.)
146
Courbet’s 1855 statement opens the pamphlet that accompanied his exhibition during the World’s
Fair : “Exhibition et vente de 38 tableaux et 4 dessins de l’œuvre de M. Gustave Courbet.”
 62

one way to reconcile the ideal and reality because it creates an in-between space where reality is

captured, framed, and mediated. As Rubin explains:

All representations of goddesses and other idealized nudes ultimately embody a

fixation on female sexuality under the guise of spirituality. Courbet infuses his
figures with a heightened charge of voluptuousness that subverts this spiritual
pretense and brings us closer to understanding why the nude becomes an ideal in
the first place – that is because, despite its displacement of desire, sexuality is still
at its root.147

Thus, it can be argued that the role of Courbet’s model is similar to Gillette’s: she serves as a

bridge between the real and the ideal.

Because artists who seek to create portrayals of human figures are dependent upon

models to pose for them, models could be considered to be essential partners in the creative

process. In the heteronormative schema of the studio romance, human procreation is a metaphor

for artistic creation: a human male and female are needed to create a child, and a male painter

and a female model together similarly engender a work of art. When Courbet places a nude

female model near the center of L’Atelier du peintre, juxtaposed with the canvas, the artist at

work, and the figure of a child, she becomes a visual metaphor for the source of artistic

generativity.148 The male painter and the female model are visually and symbolically coupled,

and the product of their union is a work of art rather than an infant—a male creative production

instead of a female procreative reproduction. He forms her image in the womb of his atelier.

As an extension of Courbet’s unclothed model’s association with reproduction, and the

process of creation, the model can also represent Truth and Nature as abstract concepts. Nicolson

interprets the model in this painting as a spirit of truth guiding Courbet’s brush so that he will not

147
Rubin, Courbet, 212.
148
Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 128-9.
 63

create anything out of harmony with the natural, everyday world.149 Yet, the woman is not the

only representation of nature on this canvas. Courbet places a large landscape painting at the

center of L’Atelier and shows himself in profile against it, with the model standing behind him.

The painting of the Franche-Comté countryside—a representation of nature—and the woman are

in close spatial proximity yet in opposing positions with the painter between them. This

juxtaposition invites direct comparisons between the woman and the landscape, a connection

further reinforced with Courbet’s original intention of showing a mule driver pinching a

woman’s bottom. The visual connection between the female model and the natural world can be

read in several ways. Rubin interprets it as Courbet’s turning away from base desire—

represented by the female model—to focus his efforts instead on art.150 In interpreting the

placement of woman and landscape in L’Atelier as a substitution of nature for woman, Nochlin

suggests that “One might say that Courbet goes so far as to cross out woman in the Lacanian

sense by substituting ‘nature’ for her as the signifier of his creation on the canvas-within-the-

canvas.”151 In his study of the nude in art, Kenneth Clark includes Courbet’s model in his chapter

on the Natural Venus, which, according to Clark, is “a naked woman as a symbol of creative and

generative life.”152 This suggests that he, too, sees this model as a representation of Nature. In

Clark’s interpretation, “nature”—as represented by an unclothed woman—and heterosexual male

erotic desire are so interconnected as to be synonymous. He calls Courbet “the archrealist:”

whose own impulse to grasp, to thump, to squeeze or to eat was so strong that it
communicates itself in every stroke of his palette knife. His eye embraced the

149
Nicolson, The Studio, 31.
150
Rubin, Courbet, 219.
151
Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 129.
152
K. Clark, Nude, 118.
 64

female body with the same enthusiasm that it stroked a deer, grasped an apple or
slapped the side of an enormous trout. 153

In Clark’s understanding, the fact that Courbet’s model is shown as a lumpy, imperfect human

form is far more representative of natural humanity than other more idealized female bodies.

Another reason to associate the unclothed woman with Nature is that the gendered

opposition of nature and culture is a recurrent theme in Western art and literature, wherein

women are associated with raw nature and men are linked with civilization and culture.154 In this

sense, the male painter is then the instrument of culture, creating art from the raw material of

nature represented by the naked female body. Balzac’s Frenhofer seems to agree that art

supersedes nature, arguing: “La mission de l’art n’est pas de copier la nature, mais de l’exprimer!

Tu n’es pas un vil copiste, mais un poète! […] Autrement un sculpteur serait quitte de tous ses

travaux en moulant une femme!” (418). By controlling the power of physical creation, the male

artist, who cannot physically give birth to a child, claims the woman’s body as a product of his

own power and then symbolically possesses the life-giving ability of the female body.155 Many

of the metaphors for the artistic creative process focus on masculine virility: the male artist

becomes lover to the female muse and father to the work of art, thereby capturing the power of

creation. Absent from such metaphors is the woman, usually constructed as an object of desire

and therefore of artistic inspiration, who is essential to the establishment of the masculine artistic

identity. The creative power of the female must be present, even if subverted and controlled by

the male artist.

153
K. Clark, Nude, 163.
154
Pointon, Naked Authority, 20.
155
Pointon, Naked Authority, 101-2.
 65

B. Courbet’s Model: “Je suis l’origine.”

While Courbet’s model may seem entirely passive at first glance, there is evidence of her

active choice, physical engagement and spatial centrality, even compositional dominance. Since

the artist is sitting and she is standing, she is placed above him, in a hierarchical position

compositionally and spatially. Her head is at the top of a pyramid formed of the model, the artist,

and the child. Furthermore, her figure dominates the image in that she immediately draws the

viewer’s attention, and the compositional elements continually pull the focus back to her. The

physical act of standing also suggests her choice and engagement. Although her tilted head

seems pensive, the muscles of her legs and buttocks are taut. She also holds her arms tightly,

with the shadows of her muscles showing clearly. In sum, her position does not seem to be one

of permanent stillness but arrested movement, as if at any moment she might pull the white cloth

further over her or let it drop.

The model’s gaze is focused on the painter’s hand and paintbrush, almost as if she guides

his brushstrokes. Clearly, the composition aims attention at this suspended act of creation: the

viewer’s eye is directed toward the painter’s hand, then to the face and body of the little boy. The

white of the boy’s shirt and the shape of the white cat with its sinuous tail and outstretched paw

then direct the viewer’s gaze to the swirling froth of clothing at the woman’s feet. From there,

the sharp triangular shape of the white cloth she holds guides observers’ eyes back up the

model’s body toward the lighter areas of the sky on the canvas in progress. This movement

creates a counterclockwise spiral around the artist’s body, moving the focus away from him to

form a circle of light embracing the artist and his work. The round shape of the medallion placed

above the model’s head reinforces this encircling shape like a metaphorical womb. The model’s
 66

body is oriented so that her front is pressed up against his back, her generative center pouring

forth creative energy that he absorbs and channels outward through his paintbrush. We can

therefore read her as the power behind the art. He may be the body physically doing the painting,

but it is her creative and nurturing energy that infuses him; he thus becomes merely a tool.

As my analysis proposes, L’Atelier predicts Courbet’s later paintings casting the female

as the origin and source of artistic creation in several ways. Specifically, these works are

L’Origine du monde (1866) and La Source (1868).156 First, L’Origine directly calls upon sexual

drive as the center of the human urge to create. Courbet’s message and the beliefs of his time

may have been focused on heterosexual male desire, but Courbet does not ignore female erotic

and creative energy that can be read as a source of creative power. L’Atelier also anticipates

L’Origine in its basic compositional structure, and there are even some similarities with the

design of La Source de la Loue (1864).157 In each of these three paintings, there are two main

groupings on either side that create visual lines leading to the center area (See figures 1-3

below). The lines of the overall composition in L’Atelier mirror the lines of the riverbank leading

to the mysterious cave in La Source de la Loue —which can be understood as a symbolic

vagina—as well as the shapes of the open legs leading to the central opening, the womb of

creation in L’Origine du monde.

156
As we have discussed, L’Origine du monde (1866, Musée d’Orsay, Paris) is a foreshortened view of a
nude woman’s torso and genitals. La Source (1868, oil on canvas, 128 x 97.5 cm, Musée d’Orsay, Paris)
depicts a nude woman seen from the rear. She is in a natural setting and is holding her hand under the
flow of water from a spring.
157
La Source de la Loue (1864) is one of a series of paintings that represent the cave from which the river
Loue emerges. It is located near Courbet’s hometown of Ornans. The particular version that is used in this
discussion is held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. For more information about the
series see Lorenz Eitner. French Paintings of the Nineteenth Century. Part 1: Before Impressionism.
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 118-126.
 67

Figure 1: The basic composition of L’Atelier (1855).

Figure 2: The basic composition of La Source de la Loue (1864).

Figure 3: The basic composition of L’Origine du monde (1866).

When mindful of L’Atelier’s compositional centrality, spatially hierarchical placement,

and similarity to Courbet’s later works that more overtly highlight female creative power, we can
 68

consider that the model is not looking at him with a passive acceptance of her fate. Instead, she is

aware of her power, seemingly saying: “I am l’Origine and La Source. You, dear painter, have

access to creative and generative power only when I choose to grant it.”

III. A New Script

Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” and Courbet’s L’Atelier contain fissures in meaning

that undermine the rigidity of socially imposed gender roles. Admittedly, it is difficult to ascribe

any truly empowering view of women to either of these two works or to Courbet and Balzac

themselves. This reading becomes possible if we claim the right to read the works from one’s

own perspective as a present-day spectator, as Nochlin does when she insists on her right to

“collaborate in the production of meaning in Courbet’s allegory,” particularly as a female viewer

and “a reader who has been shut out of the house of meaning.”158 Viewer and reader

participation in making meaning of works of art prevents the fixing or closing of a work’s

interpretation, allows us to re-define and re-evaluate both sides of the gender binary, and may

offer multiple interpretations that inherently destabilize binary thinking. After all, the definition

of woman as a passive partner in the creative process falls apart if we, the readers and viewers,

refuse to accept the traditional patriarchal binary paradigm. If the woman is not painting or

writing, is she necessarily passive, less important, powerless, and compliant? Even if the

patriarchal values of the nineteenth century would assign her those attributes, we do not have to

interpret everything according to that schema. With present-day perspectives, we can search for

gaps in meaning, traces of unstable binaries, spaces between the lines and shapes that the

158
Nochlin, “Courbet’s Real Allegory,” 112.
 69

painter/writer has left. We can use these lapses to re-write the script for the female model, the

feminine or non-binary viewer, and ultimately also for the masculine artist and viewer.
 70

Chapter Two: The Model’s Gaze in Manette Salomon

Sous des sourcils très arqués, dessinés avec la netteté d’un trait et d’un coup de
pinceau, [Manette] avait [...] des yeux bleus mystérieux qui, dans la fixité,
dardaient, de leur pupille contractée et rapetissée comme la tête d’une épingle
noire, on ne savait quoi de profond, de transperçant, de clair et d’aigu. 159

Manette, the titular character in Edmond and Jules de Goncourt’s 1867 novel, Manette

Salomon, is a female model who demonstrates purposeful gaze and active choice. In the citation

above, the authors emphasize the unknowable depths of Manette’s mysterious blue eyes. Her

sharp, clear look assigns her a visual perspective different from the observer’s. No longer merely

an empty object of others’ contemplation, she becomes a representation of an individual with an

internal world of her own. In the Goncourts’ text the model’s point of view does not simply

exist, it is used as an integral part of the novel: Manette’s perspective and decisions play a central

role in the narrative. Her choice to pose nude before Coriolis, the male painter-protagonist, is as

essential to the progression of the story as it is to the eventual success of Coriolis’ canvas. Like

Courbet in L’Atelier and Balzac in “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” the Goncourts employ the studio

romance trope, activating existing myths and stereotypes about the male painter and his female

model which reinforce binary thinking and patriarchal power structures. The authors build

narrative tension that focuses the reader’s attention on Manette’s nude poses. Appealing to

stereotypically masculine scopophilia, this strategy crystalizes active, visually-based sexual

desire into dramatically intense scenes, freezing “the flow of [narrative] action in moments of

erotic contemplation.”160 The painter wishes to see the woman’s body for sexual reasons as well

as artistic ones; likewise, the text is simultaneously erotic and literary. In Manette Salomon,

159
Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt, Manette Salomon, edited by Stéphanie Champeau. (Paris:
Gallimard, 1996), 297. All page numbers refer to this edition.
160
Mulvey, Pleasures, 19.
 71

when the model first undresses, the action slows down while both the artist’s and the reader’s

gaze linger on details of the female body. In that regard, the intended reader seems to be

primarily a heterosexual male, according to the prevailing nineteenth-century gender

representations. Yet, by introducing Manette’s individual point of view, the authors undermine

strict gender categories through their fragmentary use of the model’s gaze as a narrative device.

In this chapter, we will explore how the Goncourt brothers simultaneously employ and

challenge contemporary stereotypes. On the one hand, they rely on gendered, antisemitic, and

racist stereotypes to portray Manette as a “belle Juive” and a stifling maternal figure, while also

providing a racist portrait of Coriolis as a failed artist. On the other hand, they add complexity to

the character of the model. As my analysis of two important nude scenes demonstrates, Manette

is endowed with a subjectivity and an agency that is more emancipating than Gillette's role in

“Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu.”

I. Manette Salomon: A Seductive and Fragmentary Narrative

Edmond de Goncourt (1822-1896) and Jules de Goncourt (1830-1870) are known for

their labyrinthine and fragmentary style of writing, much of it based on their journals. The

brothers lived and wrote together until Jules’ death in July of 1870. Their works were written

collaboratively, including the novel Manette Salomon. The novel first appeared as a serial in Le

Temps beginning January 18, 1867 and then in book form in November of the same year.161 The

Goncourts sought to create literature based entirely on direct observation of the world around

161
Michel Crouzet, “Préface,” in Manette Salomon (Paris: Gallimard, 1996), 8.
 72

them.162 As socialites and regulars among the bohemian crowds of Paris, they associated with

many artists and writers of their day, including Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve, Gustave Flaubert

and Théophile Gautier.163 Their familiarity with the art world of mid-nineteenth-century Paris

provided autobiographical details and anecdotes that appear in their journals and infuse Manette

Salomon.164 They compiled pieces of the qualities and histories of various friends and

acquaintances to create characters in the novel. Additionally, the Goncourt brothers wrote

extensively about eighteenth-century painters, showing admiration for Chardin’s work in

particular.165 They used details from their own experiences to anchor their fictional creations in

the physical world.

Three characters take center stage in Manette Salomon: the young Creole painter and

primary protagonist, Naz de Coriolis;166 his classmate and companion, Anatole Bazouche; and

Coriolis’ model, mistress, and eventual wife, Manette Salomon. Anatole and Coriolis are

students at Langibout’s studio, where Anatole is known as the lively joker of the group and

Coriolis is a more serious student who comes from a wealthy family. The working title of the

novel was L’Atelier Langibout.167 The early chapters focus on studio life and the camaraderie

162
Olin H. Moore. “The Literary Methods of the Goncourts.” PMLA 31, no. 1, (1916): 45.
163
André Billy, The Goncourt Brothers, (London: A. Deutsch, 1960), 124.
164
See: Moore, “Literary Methods,” 50 and Billy, Goncourt, 154.
165
Valazza, Crise, 143-5.
166
A possible inspiration for the character of Coriolis is the painter Théodore Chassériau (1819-1856),
who was Créole like Coriolis, painted scenes similar to those attributed to Coriolis in the novel, and who
was “tourmenté, humilié, subjugué” by his courtesan mistress (Crouzet, “Préface,” 22).
167
Robert Ricatte, La Création romanesque chez les Goncourt, 1851-1870, (Paris: Armand Collin, 1953),
307.
 73

among the young students.168 Two friends, Chassagnol and Garnotelle, also enter the narrative

from time to time. Chassagnol, whom critics often consider to be “le ‘porte-parole’ des

Goncourts,” is the great theorist of the group.169 Garnotelle is a fellow student at Langibout’s

studio. A mediocre but hard-working artist, Garnotelle is accepted to the École de Beaux Arts

and wins the Prix de Rome. He serves as a foil to both Anatole, the talented but lazy artist, and

Coriolis, who is gifted but inconsistent, and whose talent is compromised by his relationship with

Manette.

Early in the novel, Coriolis, feeling Paris is too familiar and full of too many distractions,

decides to “[se] promener in Orient,” leaving Anatole in Paris (155). The narrative focuses on

Anatole’s adventures while Coriolis sends him a few letters documenting his travels. Anatole

later accompanies his uncle to Marseille, where he enjoys lively society and helps nurse the sick

during a cholera epidemic. He is walking along the port one day when he meets Coriolis, who

has just returned from his travels. Coriolis brings with him a pet monkey named Vermillion.

They return to Paris, where Anatole moves in with Coriolis and Vermillion. Coriolis can afford

to rent a large studio and furnish it well. He does not like to be alone and is willing to provide

Anatole with room and board in exchange for his humorous companionship.

Manette enters the novel first as a child whose mother, a former model, is hoping

someone will hire the beautiful little girl to pose. The text does not identify her just yet, and she

does not reappear until many years later, when Coriolis is seeking the perfect model to inspire

168
Langibout, the Goncourt’s fictional owner of a private art school, may have been modeled after Martin
Drolling (1752-1817), “dont il a l’académisme proverbial et l’indépendance absolue” (Ricatte, Création,
344). Students wishing to enter the École de Beaux Arts often studied at private teaching studios to
prepare for the rigorous entrance examinations. For a detailed description of these studio schools and the
program at the École de Beaux Arts, see John Milner, The Studios of Paris: The Capital of Art in the Late
Nineteenth Century, (New Haven CT: Yale University Press, 1990), particularly pages 17-25.
169
Crouzet, “Préface,” 41.
 74

the masterpiece with which he plans to launch his career. Coriolis catches sight of Manette on an

omnibus one evening. When she disembarks before he can approach her, he combs the city to

locate her. He discovers that she is an experienced model, and she eventually agrees to pose for

him. Having sworn he will never marry because he believes marriage kills artistic inspiration,

Coriolis nevertheless soon finds himself possessive and jealous of Manette. From the moment of

the first modeling session, he does everything he can to keep her to himself, jealous even of

paintings she had posed for before they met. Coriolis eventually convinces Manette to live with

him and to stop posing for others. Manette has goals of her own, the narration makes clear,

because she is a Jew and—as the Goncourts’ antisemitic depiction suggests—is motivated

primarily by money. When the painting for which she first posed, Le Bain Turc, is a great

success, Manette sees the potential for wealth in Coriolis’ achievement, and her interest in him

increases.

Coriolis, Anatole, and Manette spend several months at a Barbizon inn, where the artists

immerse themselves in nature. After their return to Paris, Manette announces her pregnancy.

With the birth of the child, she becomes obsessed with money. Bit by bit, Manette takes control

of Coriolis’ life. She expects him to paint only simple canvases that are guaranteed to sell.

While the couple are living in the south of France, ostensibly for Coriolis’ health but more

because Manette wants to solidify her control over him, the narrative again focuses on Anatole

and his descent into poverty. Eventually Coriolis and Manette return to Paris. When one of his

earlier paintings sells for a high price, Coriolis sees that his relationship with Manette has

thwarted his dreams of making true Art. He burns his canvases in anger and tosses the molten

mineral remains, still hot, into Manette’s lap. He does not leave her, however, and marries her
 75

without inviting his friends to the ceremony. The novel ends with Anatole having become an

employee at the Jardin des Plantes.

The novel is thus divided into two clear parts that can be represented by Manette

Salomon’s name: the first half recounts the days of bohemian freedom and artistic creativity

when the lovely Parisienne, Manette, is an inspiring muse; the second half–represented by her

family name Salomon–focuses on the negative effects of her Jewish heritage and her steady

erosion of the artist’s freedom.170 The name “Salomon,” further foreshadows the destructive

power she wields because it is phonetically close to the name “Salomé,” the seductive dancer

who requested the head of John the Baptist when King Herod offered her a reward because he

was pleased with her dancing.171

A. The Goncourts’ Innovative Literary Strategies

In Manette Salomon, the Goncourts rely on a decentralized narrative technique that

creates multiple perspectives and thematic threads. This visual and multifaceted style passes

from one highly detailed scene to another, with snippets of interconnecting exposition and

dialogue. The brothers deliberately deconstruct traditional literary forms.172 Their collaboration

itself breaks the tradition of the solitary author. Additionally, Manette Salomon’s 155 chapters

offer highly-varied and non-linear textual forms: prose poetry, monologues, letters, social

history, journal notes, dialogues–all filled with innumerable seemingly useless and insignificant

170
Gougelmann, “allégorie,” 180.
171
Gougelmann, “allégorie,” 177.
172
Crouzet, “Préface,” 44.
 76

details.173 Throughout the novel, and with each shift in the type of text, “the baton of

subjectivity” passes frequently from one character to another.174 For example, several chapters

consist entirely of the Coriolis’s letters describing his travels to Anatole. While Coriolis is absent

from Paris, he remains present in the chronology of the text. His first letter (Chapter XII)

interrupts an account of Langibout scolding Anatole for his laziness. Chapter XI ends: “Et la

semonce finissait toujours par le refrain: ‘Petit cochon, vous ne travaillez pas,’ qu’il jetait dans

l’oreille d’Anatole en lui tirant assez rudement les cheveux” (122). After the text of Coriolis’

message, the next chapter (XII) picks up Anatole’s story exactly where it left off: “Langibout

avait raison: Anatole ne travaillait pas [...]” (127). Thus, Coriolis’ letter assumes the “baton of

subjectivity” briefly before returning it to Anatole. With the strategy of inserting personal

correspondence into the narrative, the Goncourts break the expectations of a central protagonist,

disrupt the linear chronology of the text, and dramatically switch settings from the Parisian

studio-classroom to exotic locations and back again.

Reading Manette Salomon can be compared to strolling through a gallery of paintings,

rather than experiencing a structured narrative.175 The fleeting impressions the brothers sought to

create with words echo the compositional strategies of their contemporaries among French

painters; thus, the novel can be seen as “an exercise in literary impressionism.”176 However, the

Goncourts sought to do more than merely describe visual phenomena: they wished to create

173
Crouzet, “Préface,” 44.
174
Carol Armstrong, Manet Manette, (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2002), 54.
175
Therese Dolan. “Musée Goncourt: Manette Salomon and the Nude.” Nineteenth-Century French
Studies18, no. 1/2, (1989): 182-3.
176
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 173.
 77

within their readers the sensory experience of what they were describing by using metaphors of

synesthesia.177 Synesthesia is a sensory phenomenon. It occurs when a person experiences a

reaction in one of the five senses when a different one is stimulated. For example, someone

might perceive flavors when they see colors. A painter’s ability to evoke the physical sensation

of touch with skillful representations of objects is another example of synesthesia.178 Using

synesthesia in writing was a new conception of literary mimesis: “Ce n’est plus tant la

représentation de la réalité qui importe que la sensation éprouvée par la personnalité du peintre

ou de l’écrivain.”179 The Goncourts incorporate sensory details throughout Manette Salomon,

frequently further reinforcing the effect they wish to create with other literary strategies.

Coriolis’ description of the omnibus ride when he first sees Manette serves as an

excellent example of the Goncourts’ innovative style. The chapter effectively incorporates

sensory description and uses linguistic rhythms that echo the content. 180 Coriolis describes his

experience using the first person as part of a dialog with Anatole, although the long section in

question is primarily a monologue. The focalization shifts to his internal perspective so that the

177
Valazza, Crise, 154.
178
The Goncourts attributed this ability to Jean Simon Chardin (1699-1799), about whom they wrote an
extensive monograph published in their multi-volume work L’Art du XVIIIe siècle (Valazza, Crise, 146-
152). Chardin painted many still lifes, the most well-known of which is La Raie (The Skate, 1728,
Louvre, Paris). They were following in the footsteps of Diderot, who admired Chardin’s ability to create
life-like images (see Valazza, Crise, 23-64). Valazza explains: “[...] les [Goncourts] constatent que l’effet
essentiel atteint par la peinture de Chardin est obtenu grâce à une variété de teintes apparemment
discordantes [...]” (Crise, 150). That is to say, Chardin placed contrasting colors side-by-side: “Il ose,
comme la nature même, les couleurs les plus contraires. Et cela sans les mêler, sans les fondre: il les pose
à côté l’une et l’autre” (E. et J. de Goncourt, L’Art du XVIIIe siècle, 114. Cited in Valazza, Crise, 150).
179
Leduc-Adine, Jean-Pierre. "Effets de picturalité dans Manette Salomon." In Les frères Goncourt: art et
écriture. Édition préparée par J.-L. Cabanès. (Bordeaux: Presses universitaire de Bordeaux, 1997), 413.
Cited in Valazza, Crise, 155.
180
Chapter XLVIII, 263-266.
 78

reader sees through his eyes. The authors use fragments of sounds, smells and sights delivered

rapidly, interspaced with ellipses and exclamations to create the rhythmic feeling of riding in a

horse-drawn omnibus. Coriolis repeats “Zing!” at various intervals to express the rapidity of the

passing sensations (263-6). He mimics the conductor’s calls as the omnibus passes through

various stops along the route: “La Bastille! l’Odéon! Montmartre! Saint-Laurent!” (263). He

adds odors to his description: “Ça sent toujours le chat mouillé, un omnibus!” (263). Among the

overwhelming sights, the women seem all the same, sexless repetitions of each other: “Des

femmes… des femmes sans sexe, des femmes à paquet… Zing!” (263). This collection of

sensory experiences, recounted rapidly, increases the reader’s sense of disorientation and

mounting tension. Additionally, Coriolis’ fleeting impressions of the various sights during the

voyage echoes the seemingly disjointed structure of the overall novel:

[…] Je regardais stupidement des maisons, des rues, de grandes machines

d’ombre, des choses éclairées, des becs de gaz, des vitrines, un petit soulier rose
de femme dans une montre, sur une étagère de glace, des bêtises, rien du tout, ce
qui passait… J’en étais arrivé à suivre mécaniquement, sur les volets des
boutiques fermées, l’ombre des gens de l’omnibus qui recommence
éternellement… une série de silhouettes… […]. (263)181

The silhouettes of the passengers, reflected in shop windows as the omnibus passes, are like a

series of portraits of the same people, the windows framing each flickering image like paintings

in a moving gallery. Coriolis’ omnibus ride is a microcosm of the structure of the novel itself,

with its variable textual forms and moving center of focus. The authors use analogous repetitions

and amplifications throughout Manette Salomon, creating an overall effect of fragmentary

deracination that reinforces the novels’ eclecticism.182 The Goncourts therefore dissolve textual

181
Ellipses outside brackets are in the original text.
182
Armstrong, Manet Manette, 55.
 79

expectations with their creative collaboration and their deliberate deconstruction of traditional

literary forms.

While the authors challenge rigid expectations of linear narrative in the unconventional

formal structure of Manette Salomon, they reinforce gender and racial binaries at the thematic

level with the stereotypical portraits of their characters, as the studio romance between Manette

and Coriolis reveals.

B. Masculine Fantasies and Prejudices in Manette Salomon

The Goncourts’ documented misogyny and anti-Semitism infuse their novel, Manette

Salomon. The brothers’ journals and published works contain numerous examples of their

prejudice.183 Stéphanie Champeau explains that the Goncourts ardently believed women were

inherently greedy and manipulative. 184 The brothers also shared a popular belief that the

demands of a committed relationship to a woman would destroy an artist’s career. They believed

all female sexuality was inherently unrefined and base–like the reproductive and maternal

instincts of animals; women were therefore particularly prone to being ruled by the lowest, most

183
For example, the following journal entry describes how the brothers felt when a Jewish former
classmate approached them in public: “J’avais envie de lui dire: ‘Mais de quel droit me connaissez-vous,
me parlez-vous, me demandez-vous ma poignée de main? [...] vous êtes Juif, je n’aime pas les Juifs. C’est
un sacrifice pour moi que d’en saluer un.’” (E. and J de Goncourt, Journal, 2 September 1866, cited in:
Dorian Bell. “The Jew as Model: Anti-Semitism, Aesthetics, and Epistemology in the Goncourt Brothers’
Manette Salomon.” MLN 124, no. 4, [2009]: 825–47, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40606293. 31).
184
Stéphanie Champeau traces the theme of revulsion towards mothers through the Goncourts works and
their journals in the article “Manette Salomon, Renée Mauperin, et les autres, réflexions sur la femme et
la jeune fille chez les Goncourt.” Cahiers Edmond et Jules de Goncourt, Manette Salomon, no. 12,
(2014): 48.
 80

animalistic qualities of humanity.185 They write: “La femme est toute sensation. Elle n’a qu’un

sentiment, le sentiment maternel, parce que ce sentiment est bestial. C’est un sentiment de chair

et de sang.”186 Thus, according to the Goncourts, once she has children, a woman is entirely

“bestial,” reduced solely to her reproductive role.187 Worse is a mother who has a son, for she

will try to live vicariously through him.188 True to the Goncourts’ unflattering view of

womanhood, especially of mothers, in Manette Salomon, Manette’s destructive influence on

Coriolis’ artistic career begins when she announces her pregnancy. 189

The brothers’ portrayal of Manette as a negative force in the novel combines their

misogyny with their hatred of Jews. Manette initially personifies the seductive stereotype of the

“belle Juive,” but she becomes avaricious and devious after the birth of her son, transforming

into a combined stereotype of the rapacious Jewish merchant and the smothering Jewish mother.

According to Marie Lathers, the “belle Juive” was thought to be a beautiful and exotic

collaborator in the painter’s art, but also dangerously adept at dissimulation.190 Antisemitic

185
Champeau, “Manette,” 48.
186
Edmond et Jules de Goncourt, Journal, Mémoires de la vie littéraire. Paris, Robert Laffont,
“Bouquins” 1989. T.I. 23 juillet 1865: 1176. Cited in Champeau, “Manette,” 46.
187
Champeau, “Manette,” 46. Champeau elaborates: “Mis à part la figure sacrée de leur mère, toutes les
maternités révulsent les Goncourt (...)” (“Manette,” 48). See also: Stéphanie Champeau, La notion
d'artiste chez les Goncourt (1852-1870), (Paris: H. Champion, 2000), especially the chapter entitled
“Portrait de la femme d’après l’artiste,” (297-316).
188
Champeau, “Manette,” 47.
189
To avoid this pitfall, the brothers had a regular arrangement with a woman named Maria. “On sait que
les Goncourt avaient, quant à eux, réglé le problème une fois pour toutes, en se partageant les faveurs de
Maria une fois par semaine chacun” (Champeau, La Notion, 282). In their journal they record the
following, dated 23 June 1858: “Dîner avec Maria, elle fait comme le public: elle accepte notre
collaboration” (Vol I, 366, cited in Champeau, La Notion, note #42, 282).
190
Marie Lathers. “Posing the ‘Belle Juive’: Jewish Models in 19th-Century Paris.” Woman’s Art Journal
21, no. 1, (2000): 31.
 81

prejudices depicted Jewish women as lacking the morality and refinement of Christian beliefs:

they were supposedly unafraid of posing nude, as well as presumably more sexually available.191

Manette is certainly beautiful, embodying all the physical stereotypes of the beautiful Jewess.192

The authors specify that Manette has fine features, curly light brown hair, blue eyes, and rosy

cheeks glowing on her pale skin (297). They associate these characteristics specifically with her

heritage, saying it is a coloration “des juives” (297). Manette’s appearance and her unashamed

nude modeling exemplify aspects of the “belle Juive” ideal. The Goncourt’s depiction of

Manette’s Jewish heritage thus serves to reinforce her perilous attraction.

Another aspect of Manette’s powerful effect on Coriolis is her “Oriental” beauty.

Coriolis’ attraction to anything he considers “Oriental” is a trope found throughout Manette

Salomon, beginning with his lengthy voyage abroad during the first third of the novel. Edward

Said explains that in France, the word “Oriental” refers more frequently to the Middle East and

northern Africa, although most Americans consider the “Orient” to be East Asia, primarily China

and Japan.193 Jews originate from the so-called “Bible lands” in the Middle East, and thus retain

an association with the “Orient.” French painters of the mid-nineteenth century favored

“Oriental” models who could pose for their chosen subjects of “harems, baths, slave markets,

and North African, Turkish, and Greek battle scenes.”194 Coriolis’ obsession with the exotic was

therefore not uncommon. In fact, the Goncourts themselves had a passion for collecting Asian

191
Lathers, “Posing,” 27.
192
Gouglemann, “Allégorie,” 171.
193
Edward W. Said. Orientalism. ([1978] New York: Vintage, 2014), 3.
194
Lathers, Bodies, 36-7.
 82

artifacts, although they gave Coriolis more of an interest in objects from Muslim lands.195 The

authors frequently show Manette in situations where she is juxtaposed with exotic objects. For

example, the painting for which Coriolis hires Manette to pose is a Bain turc. It is a typical

Orientalist scene depicting a nude white woman emerging from the bath, surrounded by

billowing steam and attended by a nearly naked black woman (258).196 Manette also wears a silk

ensemble to Coriolis’ masquerade ball, “un des costumes rapportés d’Orient par Coriolis” (320).

Furthermore, the Goncourts repeatedly describe Manette using the word “orientale” specifically,

associating a variety of characteristics with her heritage. Her uneducated, superstitious beliefs are

described as “idées d’Orientale” (300). When Manette undresses alone in front of the mirror, the

narrator mentions her “pieds d’Orientale,” which she takes in her hand (304). Manette’s

“oriental” qualities increase her attractiveness because they are associated with the foreign and

exotic cultures Coriolis loves.

Coriolis is strongly drawn to things that remind him of distant lands due to his Île de

Bourbon (Réunion) upbringing. “Venu tout enfant en France, Coriolis avait toujours eu le

sentiment, la passion de l’exotique, la nostalgie, le mal du pays des pays chauds. [...] L’Orient

l’avait toujours appelé, tenté” (313). The Goncourts tie his passion and sensuality to his créole

background, which makes him especially vulnerable to Manette’s seductive machinations. Being

a Créole also means Coriolis is inherently more feminine than other men, according to

contemporary prejudices:

195
Ricatte, Création, 321.
196
“La baigneuse, sur son séant, se présentait de face. [...] Ses deux mains se croisaient dans ses cheveux,
au bout de ses bras relevés qui dessinaient une anse et une couronne” (258). Although Jean-Auguste-
Dominique Ingres painted a well-known Bain turc (1863, Louvre, Paris), Coriolis’ painting is closer to La
Toilette d’Esther by Théodore Chassériau (1841, Louvre, Paris) (Stéphanie Champeau, ed, Manette
Salomon [Paris: Gallimard,1996], note p 258 #1, 611).
 83

Dans ces hommes des colonies, de nature subtile, délicate, raffinée, mettant dans
les soins de leur corps, leurs parfums, l’huile de leurs cheveux, leur toilette, une
recherche qui dépasse les coquetteries viriles [...] il y a, en dehors des mâles
énergies et des colères un peu sauvages, une si grande analogie avec la femme, de
si intimes affinités avec le tempérament féminin, que l’amour chez eux ressemble
presque à de l’amour de femme. Ces hommes aiment, plus que les autres hommes,
avec des instincts d’attachement et d’habitude tendre, avec le goût de
s’abandonner et de sentir possédés, une espèce de besoin d’être caressés,
enveloppés continûment par l’amour, de s’enrouler autour de lui, de se tremper
dans ses lâches douceurs, de s’y perdre, de s’y fondre dans une sorte de paresse
d’adoration et de molle servitude heureuse. (285)

In describing how a Créole man is inherently effeminate, the authors also reveal their

biased view of feminine sexuality. The desire the brothers describe is narcissistic: the

Créole/woman seeks not to love, but to be loved. They presume that Créoles and women

desire to be passively enveloped in a soft and pleasing adoration, one to which they can

abandon themselves and feel they belong completely to their lover. This aspect of

Coriolis’ personality contributes to his artistic failure and it weakens his ability to resist

Manette. Furthermore, with this list of feminine qualities they attribute to Coriolis, the

Goncourts foreshadow the steps Manette will later take when she strategically fulfills

Coriolis’ need for comfort and coddling to disguise her intentions.

Coriolis’ gradual subjugation can be traced in the ways he embraces conjugal life,

a mode of living he initially viewed as incompatible with artistic creation:

Le travail de l’art, la poursuite de l’invention, l’incubation silencieuse de l’œuvre,

la concentration de l’effort lui paraissaient impossibles avec la vie conjugale, aux
côtés d’une jeune femme caressante et distrayante, ayant contre l’art la jalousie
d’une chose plus aimée qu’elle, faisant autour du travailleur le bruit d’un enfant,
brisant ses idées, lui prenant son temps, le rappelant au fonctionnarisme du
mariage, à ses devoirs, à ses plaisirs, à la famille, au monde, essayant de reprendre
à tout moment l’époux et l’homme dans cette espèce de sauvage et de monstre
social qu’est un vrai artiste. (226-7)

In spite of his professed aversion to living with a woman, Coriolis paradoxically clings to

Manette from the moment during her first modeling session when he refuses to allow his
 84

friend and housemate, Anatole, to work on a commissioned drawing for which her pose

would be perfect (274). Subsequent chapters recount, step by step, Coriolis’ efforts to

control, contain and ultimately possess Manette’s body, with numerous examples and

descriptions. Ironically, Coriolis’ desire to dominate Manette leads to his own downfall

because he will, in turn, be manipulated by his spouse. Once the couple’s child is born,

Manette enacts all the stages of slow destruction of the artist mentioned in the sentence

cited above. In fact, the entire novel can be read as a series of amplifications built around

this very statement about marriage.

Manette, the belle Juive, turns out to be a mere mirage of beauty, a cliché

inherited from the Romantic novels of Walter Scott.197 She reveals her “true” nature

when her son is born:

En devenant mère, Manette était devenue une autre femme. Le modèle avait été
tué en elle. La maternité, en touchant son corps, en avait enlevé l'orgueil. [...] Des
entrailles de la mère, la juive avait jailli. Et la persévérance froide, l’entêtement
résolu, la rapacité originelle de sa race, s’étaient levés des semences de son sang,
dans de sourdes cupidités passionnées de femme rêvant de l’argent sur la tête de
son enfant. (424)

Manette’s negative qualities are described as unavoidable, encoded in the “semences de son

sang.” Her desirable exterior hides a revolting interior. Her body, now touched by maternity and

age, is no longer that of a young, attractive muse, therefore it becomes a source of disgust. From

the “entrailles de la mère” (her innermost parts, her womb), the hidden Jewess “avait jailli”

(burst or gushed forth). This is a reversal of Christian imagery related to the Virgin Mary and the

birth of Jesus. Mary’s kinswoman, Elizabeth, was post-menopausal and miraculously pregnant

with John the Baptist. When Elizabeth sees Mary, who is pregnant with Jesus, the child in

197
Gougelmann, “Allégorie,” 173.
 85

Elizabeth’s womb moves in response. She is filled with the Spirit and cries out “Tu es bénie

entre toutes les femmes et le fruit de tes entrailles est béni” (Luke 1:42). In Manette’s case,

instead of giving birth to a Savior, as her son is born Manette also births herself as a greedy

Jewess.

As further evidence of her deceptive and manipulative nature, Manette deliberately

disguises all signs of the postpartum change in her personality, while she plans her progressive

possession of Coriolis’ life (424). She reenacts the Biblical scenario of Potiphar’s wife and

Joseph, tricking Anatole into a romantic encounter just when Coriolis is bound to witness it, thus

convincing Coriolis to separate from Anatole (439-41). She steadily makes small changes:

moving Coriolis away from Paris and the artistic community (498-9); bringing her cousins to act

as servants in the household (503-4); and making the household so unwelcoming that no one will

come to visit (502).

To accomplish her objective, Manette first surrounds Coriolis with comfort and loving

attention, showing herself to be supportive and submissive (416-17). She impresses him with her

knowledge of studio life and her awareness of his needs: “Les choses du métier de l’art lui

étaient familières: elle en connaissait le nom et l’usage. Elle ne disait pas de bêtises bourgeoises

devant une toile. Elle respectait le silence d’un homme à son chevalet” (416). She creates a

pleasing, calming environment: “Elle était pour lui dans sa vie du calme et du repos, une

compagnie bonne pour ses nerfs d’artiste” (417). She soon no longer behaves like a mistress

whose bags are always packed, and instead becomes “la femme à demeure, ancrée dans le

domicile;” she is completely at home, “elle est chez elle chez son amant”(423). Manette’s

gradual insinuation into Coriolis’ life is nearly imperceptible. The narrative recounts each step

without revealing–until just before Manette gives birth–how purposeful her actions have been:
 86

Manette n'avait eu à peine besoin de travailler à ce changement. Il s’était fait

presque tout seul, par le courant naturel des choses, par la lente et progressive
infiltration de l’influence féminine, par l’habitude, par l’oreiller, par la succession
de ces accroissements, pareils aux alluvions du concubinage, grandissant la
position, le pouvoir, l’initiative de la maîtresse avec tout ce qui détache à la
longue, dans l’amollissement du ménage, de la force de l’homme pour aller à la
faiblesse de la femme. (423-4)

The incremental process of change and Coriolis’ need for pampering make him blind to the

effects of Manette’s premeditated actions.

Coriolis’ feminine qualities and Manette’s domination of him reverse gender roles. The

narrative emphasizes the gradual softening (“amollissement”) of Coriolis’ masculine strength

with the metaphor of alluvial deposits, comparing Manette’s growing power to the slow build-up

of silt and grit on a riverbank. As Manette’s power in the relationship grows, Coriolis is

weakened: she steadily erodes his manly strength. In a reversal of Coriolis’ jealous campaign to

obtain Manette’s promise to model exclusively for him, to live with him and be his mistress,

Manette pursues her goal of household domination with equal–yet, far more subtle–persistence.

Whereas Coriolis overtly desires to possess and control Manette, she dissimulates, hiding her

purpose behind false acquiescence and deceptive nurturance. “C’est [...] moins par les charmes

de l’amante que par les douceurs de la mère que Manette parvient à soumettre Corolis.”198 In

becoming a controlling maternal figure, Manette now embodies the stereotype of the stifling,

shrewish Jewish mother.

The authors create an underlying battle between Créole and Jew, “race contre race.”199

When Coriolis secretly follows Manette to the synagogue one evening, he recognizes that he had

been ignoring her Jewish identity: “C’était la première fois que cette perception lui venait de voir

198
Gougelmann, “Allégorie,” 176.
199
Ricatte, Création, 321.
 87

une juive dans Manette, qu’il avait sue pourtant être juive dès le premier jour” (292). This

realization causes indefinable negative feelings: “[...] il se dégageait en lui, du fond de l’homme

et du catholique, des instincts du créole, de ce sang orgueilleux que font les colonies, une

impression indéfinissable” (292). Coriolis therefore carries deep antipathy towards Manette’s

religion because of his ancestry. Manette, too, holds inherited prejudice against Coriolis of which

she is unaware: “Sans qu’elle en eût conscience, sans qu’elle s’en rendît compte, la juive, en

revenant aux préjugés des siens, revenait peu à peu aux antipathies obscures et confuses de ses

instincts” (522). Her Jewish soul rises up against the Christian in Coriolis, rejoicing in his

subjugation as symbolic of the triumph of her race and her sex, reveling in seeing “Coriolis sous

le talon de sa bottine” (522). The Goncourts created both Coriolis and Manette through the lens

of their own biased beliefs.

Thus, in the Goncourts’ paradigm of prejudice, Manette is exponentially threatening

because she will inevitably embody the manipulative characteristics of both woman and Jew.

Coriolis, too, exemplifies the Goncourts’ bias. If his Créole heritage gives him the sensitivity

behind his artistic talent, it also compromises his virility, making him effeminate and therefore

weak. Manette is a femme fatale precisely because the Goncourts designed her to have an

appealing “belle Juive” exterior covering a stereotypically greedy Jewish value system.

However, while we as readers are confronted with the limitations of the Goncourts’ personal

beliefs and the effects of those beliefs on the novel, we are not required to interpret Manette from

that perspective alone. Instead, readers can also understand Manette as an example of

transgressive and powerful feminine subjectivity. This power is particularly present in the scenes

when Manette poses nude.

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II. Visual Seduction: Manette’s Nude Poses

In Manette Salomon, the Goncourts use several literary techniques that focus the reader’s

attention on the scenes where Manette poses nude, thus increasing their erotic potential. Therese

Dolan believes the authors actually wished to show that when a model poses, her nudity is

transformed “into the ethereal world of art” in order to minimize or erase “any notion of the

erotically voyeuristic” that might occur during a nude posing session.200 Dolan also states: “The

Goncourts believed that woman was the premier object of desire and therefore subject of art.”201

However, the authors’ effort to deflect the desiring gaze neither eliminates it nor minimizes it. In

fact, it paradoxically serves to emphasize the sexual appeal inherent to the studio romance. The

Goncourts structure the novel to create mounting erotic tension and a sense of suspense building

up to the actual moment Manette poses. During the first modeling scene, the authors shift

perspective between the model and the painter, peppering the descriptions with sexually

suggestive details and vocabulary. The result is a sense of continual hovering between the

painter’s professional observation and the male’s desiring gaze.

According to Stéphane Gougelmann “(...) les descriptions du corps de Manette sont

parmi les plus flamboyantes du roman et trahissent l’auto-excitation que procure aux deux

Pygmalion l’invention de leur Galatée.”202 Gougelmann thus compares the Goncourts themselves

to Pygmalion, and Manette to the statue he created and loved. As a literary work of art, certainly,

there are characteristics in the descriptions of Manette’s body that evoke a purposefully painterly

200
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 175.
201
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 181.
202
Gougelmann, “Allégorie,” 172.
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look. One of these characteristics is a focus on the coloration of Manette’s skin, which Dolan

believes is the Goncourts’ deliberate response to Manet’s Olympia.203 When they wrote Manette

Salomon, the Goncourts were reacting to Manet’s painting, particularly his choice of what

contemporary critics saw as un ugly model and the pallor of her skin.204 “Their lengthy evocation

of [the] nuanced tone and sculpturesque form [of Manette’s body] provides a real alternative to

the brutal color contrasts and abstract flatness that the critics saw in Olympia.”205 The Goncourts

preferred the soft and rounded tones of the female bodies in paintings by François Boucher

(1703-1770): “Nothing could be further from Goncourts’ ideal nude than Manet’s Olympia, with

her harsh gaze and bony anatomy striped of any feminine seductiveness.”206 They may also have

used the name “Manette” as a reference to “Manet” to emphasize their opinion of “his role as the

destroyer of the nude in the art of their time.”207

203
Manet’s famous painting Olympia was painted in 1863 but not shown at the Salon until 1865 (Alan
Krell, Manet and the Painters of Contemporary Life, [London: Thames and Hudson, 1996], 47). It depicts
a reclining nude woman attended by a black servant who holds a bouquet of flowers, while a black cat
arches its back at the foot of the bed. The nude woman engages the viewers with her gaze, while her left
hand, firmly posed, covers her genitals. Contemporary viewers found the painting shocking, seeing a
frank depiction of prostitution and, worse, working-class ordinariness. For more details see: T.J. Clark
“Olympia’s Choice,” in The Painting of Modern Life: Paris in the Art of Manet and his followers. (New
York: Alfred A. Knopf Inc., 1984), particularly pages 96-99.
204
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 177. Several contemporary critics compared the color of Olympia’s skin to
that of a corpse, saying she looked “dead of yellow fever and already arrived at an advanced state of
decomposition” (Victor Fournel, cited in T.J. Clark, “Olympia’s Choice,” 97).
205
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 177.
206
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 182.
207
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 182. A possible source for the name of the Goncourts’ character is an 1865
caricature by Bertall, which mockingly refers to Manet’s painting Olympia as “Manette, ou la Femme de
l’Ébéniste” (Armstrong, Manet Manette, 51). The cartoon in question was part of a series called
“Promenade au Salon de 1865,” published in Le Journal Amusant, 27 May, 1865 (Armstrong, Manet
Manette, 45). “Bertall” was the pen name of Charles Albert d’Arnould (1820-1882).
 90

Two scenes in Manette Salomon will serve to demonstrate the encoded eroticism that

marks the presumed reader as masculine. We will also see that parts of these scenes resist the

gendered roles of the studio romance schema. The first segment is Manette’s initial nude pose,

including important parts of the surrounding text. Here, we will see that even when the narrative

voice implies or states that the artist’s gaze is dispassionate and professional, the text contains

numerous elements that contradict this statement and appeal to a presumed masculine reader.

The second sequence is one in which Manette poses alone before a mirror. The model’s point of

view is the organizing factor of the narrative in this chapter, as the mirror recalls the mythical

image of Narcissus and of women’s presumed vanity. The mirror also invokes the threatening

image of Medusa, representing the masculine viewer’s simultaneous attraction to and fear of

feminine sexuality. A third interpretation of the mirror is a projection of Manette’s own gaze,

and therefore potentially that of an external feminine observer. Both scenes demonstrate the

importance of the authors’ choice to include a subjective reality for the model as a narrative

device.

A. Manette’s First Nude Pose: “le rayonnement d’un chef d’œuvre” (272)

The narrative builds the reader’s anticipation, pointing towards the moment when

Manette will finally reveal her nudity to Coriolis. First, the artist bemoans the lack of acceptable

models in Paris. A similar theme appears in Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” and in Zola’s

L’Œuvre, where painters seek inspiration through female beauty, hoping to find an ideal woman

who can model the entire figure rather than being forced to compose a perfect body by

combining only the best parts of many women. According to Coriolis: “Il n’y a plus un corps à
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Paris... Voyons ! voilà six mois que nous n’avons pu avoir un modèle propre…” (259). Coriolis

constantly searches the city for the perfect model or spends days flipping through his albums of

Japanese prints looking for just the right woman for his paintings: “Coriolis feuilletait toujours:

et devant lui passaient des femmes […]” (262). The catalog of his efforts to locate the ideal

body to pose for him, recounted in the Goncourts’ amplifying style, increases the sense of

tension as he fails again and again.

After Coriolis spots Manette during his fateful omnibus ride, which he describes to

Anatole in detail (as discussed above), he hopes to locate the lovely young woman whose profile

so captivated him and convince her to pose for him. Anatole knows who she is and agrees to

write to her. But again, Coriolis’ desires are thwarted and the narrative sense of tension continues

to increase, since Manette neither arrives for the proposed modeling session nor responds to the

letter (266-9). In rejecting his initial approach, Manette insists upon her personal choice from the

very beginning of her relationship with Coriolis. This is a warning that she will not be a

complacent woman, but Coriolis persists in his artistic fervor. Between the rejected letter and the

eventual posing scene, the authors include a lengthy description of a Purim celebration in the

Jewish quarter of Paris, where the men hope to find Manette. When they locate her, Manette

insists that the artists show her all the respect due to a lady of Paris before she will deign to even

consider posing (268-9). The men discover she was offended because the letter they sent her was

written on reused paper and unsigned, scrawled on the back of a note from Anatole’s friend

(268). She maintains her own power by forcing the men to come to her and expecting them to

earn the right to see her body, judging their quality for herself and choosing on her own terms

whether or not she will pose: “[..] elle le toisa du bout des bottes jusqu’à la racine des cheveux,

détourna la tête, et, après un silence, elle se décida à lui dire qu’elle voulait bien, et qu’elle
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viendrait ‘prendre la pose’ le lundi suivant” (269). Manette’s look, considering Coriolis’ body

from his boots to his hair, is reversed when, in his studio, he studies her from head to toe. The

authors acknowledge a gaze and a point of view that is Manette’s own while simultaneously

leading the reader to a feeling of heightened expectation before Manette eventually disrobes.

Manette’s first modeling scene is structured in a very visual, almost cinematic way that

focuses all attention on her body, slowing the pace of the narration and inscribing erotic desire in

the repetition and expansion of details. The authors first create the overall ambience. They then

show Manette in a full body pose, which is described in three increasingly detailed sets. The final

descriptive set follows the gaze of the artist as he studies her body in micro segments, carefully

and deliberately moving from head to toe, naming each body part and describing its shapes and

colors.

The authors begin with a brief establishing sequence where Manette undresses. Yet the

lack of description of the process of removing each item of clothing in turn, as well as the

absence of commentary on her body, minimizes elements that could turn her preparation for

modeling into a striptease. Instead, the authors emphasize her deliberate movements and

purposeful, modest demeanor: “[…] elle commença à se déshabiller lentement, rangeant avec

ordre sur le divan les vêtements qu’elle quittait” (270). She does not remove her chemise, her

upper undergarment, until she is on the modeling stand and ready to strike a pose. Her

undressing is not completely devoid of erotic suggestion, however, because, “elle tenait entre ses

dents le festonnage d’en haut” (271). Manette holds her chemise in her teeth as she moves to the

stand, which associates this action with orality and biting or chewing and adds a note of

sensuality to her movements.

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After Manette’s meticulous process of undressing, the narrative then transitions to an

intervention describing, in general terms, the behavior of professional female models. The

Goncourts thought the ritual of disrobing transformed a modest woman into a model, an object of

art.208 Although they indicate that the model is transformed from woman into art at the moment

she mounts the modeling stand and lets fall her chemise, underlining that she then becomes “une

statue de nature, immobile et froide, dont le sexe n’est plus rien qu’une forme” (270), the

Goncourts do not stop their description there, which would have been sufficient to communicate

the professionalism of a live modeling session. Instead, they shift the focus to the model’s point

of view, her experience of sensuality in the process of undressing, “le glissement de ses

vêtements sur elle” (the feeling of fabric sliding across skin), the anticipation of each bit of flesh

as it appears and the knowledge of “la curiosité de ces yeux d’hommes qui l’attendent” (curious

male eyes that are waiting for her) (270). She delights, too, in knowing her nudity is “pour l’art”

and thus “presque sacrée” (270). The authors propose that sexuality disappears when a woman

poses for art: “C’est dans la pose seulement que la femme n’est plus femme, et que pour elle les

hommes ne sont plus des hommes” (270). Yet, they also emphasize a simultaneous feeling of

attraction and repulsion to “les yeux d’artistes” that study “les plus intimes secrets de sa chair”

(270). The description of the model’s feelings and her viewpoint throughout this narrative

intervention ascribes most of the vacillating eroticism to the model herself, her nervousness, her

awareness of the eyes studying her, and her ambivalent pleasure.

The authors attribute curiosity and a professional gaze of “la sévérité de l’étude” to the

young male art students. They describe the look of the artist as “la contemplation sereine et

désintéressée” and “l’attention passionnée et absorbée” (270). However, these are paradoxical

208
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 175.
 94

and ambivalent descriptions: the emotional interest implied in the word “passionnée” entails the

opposite of disinterest, or “désintéressée.” Even if we accept that the painter’s gaze is not a

sexual one, the masculine reader, an outsider to the text and therefore to the studio scene being

described, can find a doppelgänger in the spectator present within the anecdote the Goncourts’

offer as part of this scene: A female model is posing in Ingres’ studio before thirty students. She

suddenly becomes embarrassed and runs for her clothing when she notices a roofer staring at her

through the overhead bay window (271). The authors thus suggest that one difference between

lascivious viewing and artistic viewing is the idea of having the right to look at the woman’s

body, being invited to look and having a professional purpose for doing so. During Manette’s

modeling session the reader is placed in a dual position where on the one hand he is standing

outside the narrative, like the roofer, watching the naked woman pose. Yet on the other hand, he

is also guided through the process of looking at Manette’s body with the eyes of a painter. The

look of the artist and the look of the observer conflate to communicate a multifaceted desire to

possess Manette’s body.

The three sets of descriptions of Manette’s body begin with an account of her behavior

once she is on the modeling stand and then an explanation of the pose she assumes. The mixture

of titillation and detachment continues through the entire section as the authors depict the

position of her body and compare her perfection to the masses of imperfect humanity.

When Manette poses for Coriolis, her pose is reminiscent of a well-known sculpture in

the Louvre. The authors evoke Greek sculpture and mythology in describing Manette’s stance as

“la pose de ce marbre du Louvre qu’on appelle le Génie du repos éternel” (272). The narrative

emphasizes Manette’s self-assurance, her admiration of her own beauty, and her deliberate

construction of the image she presents to others. She becomes an artist of her self-presentation,
 95

designing the dramatic unveiling of her body and choosing for herself—without waiting for

direction from the painter—how to position it.

Soudain, elle laissa tomber de ses dents desserrées la fine toile qui glissa le long
de son corps, fila de ses reins, s’affaissa d’un seul coup au bas d’elle, tomba sur
ses pieds comme une écume. Elle repoussa cela d’un petit coup de pied, le chassa
par derrière ainsi qu’une queue de robe; puis, après avoir abaissé sur elle-même
un regard d’un moment, un regard où il y avait de l’amour, de la caresse, de la
victoire, nouant ses deux bras au-dessus de sa tête, portant son corps sur une
hanche, elle apparut à Coriolis dans la pose de ce marbre du Louvre qu’on appelle
le Génie du repos éternel. (271-2)

In pushing her fallen chemise behind her “ainsi qu’une queue de robe,” Manette assumes a

different type of dress even as she poses nude: her skin becomes a costume of art. Again, the

narration concentrates briefly on the model’s point of view, although voiced externally and in the

third person. Before striking the pose, she looks down at her naked body with a loving, caressing,

victorious look: “un regard où il y avait de l’amour, de la caresse, de la victoire.” This brief

description of Manette’s self-appraisal credits her with her own point of view, her own thoughts

and emotions, and an evident awareness of her sexuality and power.

Most of the paragraph leans towards the erotically provocative. First, the authors indicate

that the “honte de femme” is brief for Manette (271). This serves two purposes. Along with the

images evoked in the rest of the paragraph, it alerts us to Manette’s comfort in posing, which

implies accompanying satisfaction with her own body and her sexuality. Manette’s use of her

teeth to hold her chemise and the sudden opening of them theatrically unveils her body while

also communicating an animal, physical nature. The authors’ juxtaposition of this image of

orality with the description of “la fine toile qui glissa le long de son corps” focuses attention on

the sensory experience, both tactile and visual, of cloth against skin, and repeats the same image

evoked earlier during the narrative description of nude modeling sessions in general. The word

“soudain” and the statement that “elle apparut à Coriolis” suggest a dramatic moment of
 96

unveiling Manette’s naked body, the very moment the text has been building towards for so

many previous chapters.

The statue whose position Manette copies, also known as “Narcisse, dit Hermaphrodite

Mazarin,” is of a male body with a feminine face and pronounced breasts, implying a sexlessness

in Manette’s classical pose and hinting at her role as one outside the expected standards for a

woman in nineteenth-century patriarchal Parisian society. 209 Indeed, the myths of Narcissus and

Hermaphroditus connected to the mentioned sculpture both contain elements that illuminate

transgressive aspects of Manette’s character and introduce themes of alternative sexualities and

gender identities that lie outside the heteronormative studio fantasy.

The myth of Narcissus tells of an attractive young man who rejects all suitors, both male

and female. Instead, he falls in love with his own reflection in a forest pool. He is so captivated

that he pines away. After his death he is transformed into a white flower with an orange

center.210 Ovid’s tale emphasizes Narcissus’ self-absorption and his admiration of his own

beauty: “Everything attracts him/that makes him so attractive. Foolish boy,/He wants himself.”211

Although the Goncourts’ 1867 novel predates Freudian theory, their portrayal of Manette’s

obsessive self-adoration aligns with Freud’s description of a narcissistic personality. 212

Narcissism, defined in the most simplistic terms, is an overinvestment in the self and in one’s

209
The Louvre’s website identifies two different types of marble with varying crystalline structures for
the upper and lower halves of this statue, suggesting it may be a composite of parts of two different
sculptures.
210
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 68-73.
211
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 70.
212
In 1910, Freud used the image of Narcissus to explain object choice among homosexuals. His study
Zur Einführung des Narzissmus was published in 1914. (Jean Laplanche. Vocabulaire de La
Psychanalyse. [Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1973], 261).
 97

own body as love object.213 Manette demonstrates Narcissus-like autoerotic qualities as she looks

down at her body triumphantly before assuming her pose. As Ricatte explains: “Une seule

passion [...] anime [...]: l’admiration d’elle-même, ou mieux de cette partie d’elle-même qu’elle

donne à voir, tous vêtements tombés.”214 The water where Narcissus finds his reflection is a

natural mirror. Manette enjoys gazing at herself, and the Goncourts devote an entire chapter—

which we will discuss in more detail later—to Manette’s self-admiration before the studio

mirror. Ovid also includes the theme of homosexual love in his tale, introducing Narcissus as a

youth so attractive both boys and girls sought his love, and his cursed pining for his own image

is the goddess Nemesis’ response to the ardently vengeful prayer of one of his rejected male

suitors.215 Narcissus’ love for his reflection is also same-sex love, and Ovid names it overtly:

Narcissus laments his own death as that also of the boy he loves.216 While Manette does not

express homoerotic attraction, the introduction of this theme creates an opening in the text, a

liminal space where it can exist.

The story of Hermaphroditus is one of powerful feminine desire, desire so powerful that

it attacks, overcomes, and weakens the male whom it targets. Hermaphroditus is the son of

Hermes and Aphrodite. He bears both parents’ names blended to form his own, foreshadowing of

his bi-gendered fate.217 A vain and covetous water-nymph, Salmacis, takes a fancy to the young

man. When he refuses her, she pretends to leave, but instead watches from the foliage as he strips

213
Laplanche, Vocabulaire, 261.
214
Ricatte, Création, 317.
215
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 68 and 70.
216
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 72.
217
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 90-93.
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to bathe in an inviting forest pool: “Desire of the naked body/Held her spell-bound.”218 As soon

as he enters the water, she plunges in after him and wraps herself around him. Ovid’s account of

the assault emphasizes Salmacis’ violent, animalistic desire and Hermaphroditus’ fruitless efforts

to escape:

“I win, I have him,” she cried, stripped herself naked,

Dove, swam to him, and held him fast, resisting,
Sought his reluctant kisses, touched his body,
Stroked his unwilling breast, embraced and held him
Whatever way she could. He fought and struggled,
But she wrapped herself around him, as a serpent
Caught by an eagle, borne aloft, entangles
Coils around head and talons …
[…]
Body to body: he would not escape her,
Fight as he may, “O grant me this,” she cried
In prayer to the gods, “May no day ever come
To separate us!” and they heard her prayer,
And the two bodies seemed to merge together
[…]
So these two joined in close embrace, no longer
Two beings, and no longer man and woman,
But neither, and yet both.219

Seeing that he has lost his masculine power and become soft like a woman, Hermaphroditus

curses the waters of his transformation, asking the gods to cause all men who enter the pool to

experience the same fate.220 With her emasculating manipulation of Coriolis, Manette is less like

the resulting blended Hermaphrodite and much more like the passionate, determined Salmacis,

infiltrating Coriolis’ life and ultimately rendering him artistically impotent. The Goncourts

portray Manette’s sexual power as dangerous and devouring, a destructive force in the life of the

painter. She knows how to use her body to her advantage, a fact reinforced by her choice to

218
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 91.
219
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 93.
220
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 93.
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assume the position of the “Génie du repos éternel” (262). This stance, with her arms above her

head is clearly meant to display her body to its fullest potential. As in her careful, precise

procedure of undressing, Manette’s actions are deliberate and calculated.

The narration then pauses once more, as if to let the reader take in the fullness of

Manette’s nude body on display. After cataloging masses of imperfect human bodies, the

narrative voice tells the reader that Manette is one of Nature’s own artistic triumphs, polished

with love and pride to show the divine example of Beauty:

[...] De la pâte humaine, on dirait [que la Nature] tire, comme un ouvrier écrasé de
travail, des peuples de laideur, des multitudes de vivants ébauchés, manqués, des
espèces d’images à la grosse de l’homme et de la femme. Puis de temps en temps,
au milieu de toute cette pacotille d’humanité, elle choisit un être au hasard,
comme pour empêcher de mourir l’exemple du Beau. Elle prend un corps qu’elle
polit et finit avec amour, avec orgueil. Et c’est alors un véritable et divin être d’art
qui sort des mains de la Nature.
Le corps de Manette était un de ces corps-là: dans l’atelier, sa nudité avait
mis tout à coup le rayonnement d’un chef-d’œuvre. (272)

Manette’s body is exceptional because it is already a masterpiece: “son corps, loin de reproduire

un style, l’invente, et [...] propose à l’art non un modèle dont celui-ci puisse s’inspirer, mais,

comme réalisé par avance, un chef-d’œuvre.”221 From this moment when he first sees Manette

nude, the artist in Coriolis wants to keep “cette oeuvre vivante” to himself, so he alone can create

the masterpieces Manette’s body inspires, and also so he can maintain exclusive rights to his

mistress’s body.222 Coriolis, “habitué à garder ses pensées, à refouler ses émotions, à se

renfoncer le coeur dans la poitrine,” sublimates his erotic desires into painting (28). He loves her

for how he feels about himself in her presence. His artistic talent becomes visible to him when he

Anne-Marie Christin. “Matière et idéal dans Manette Salomon.” Revue d’histoire littéraire de la
221

France 80e année, no. 6, Littérature et peinture en France (1830-1900), (Dec. 1980): 932.
222
Crouzet, “Préface,” 17.
 100

looks at her: “Il aimait cette femme pour son corps, pour les lignes qu’elle faisait, pour un ton

qu’elle avait à la place de la peau. [...] Il l’aimait pour sentir devant elle une inspiration et une

révélation de son talent” (285). Nature created Manette’s body, Manette herself composes the

living sculpture, and Coriolis falls in love with his own fantasized aesthetic ideal projected onto

Manette’s body. Yet, Coriolis confuses aesthetic desire with erotic desire.223 He soon takes

Manette to bed, and his physical attraction to her only increases: “Ce caprice, qu’il croyait user

en le satisfaisant, s’était enflammé, une fois satisfait. Il s’était changé en une sorte d’appétit

ardent, irrité, passionné, de cette femme; et dès le lendemain, Coriolis se sentait devenir jaloux

de ce modèle [...]” (282). It is not Manette herself that Coriolis loves, it is her body and the

artistic talent her physical beauty unleashes in him.

The second descriptive set, elaborating upon Manette’s physical features, focuses

primarily on the details of her pose (272-3). Still in the third person with Coriolis as implied

focalizer, the description moves slowly from her head, where her hands are crossed above her, to

her feet. The first part remains anatomical and impersonal, mentioning merely the position of

each body part without elaboration. For example, the paragraph begins: “Sa main droite, posée

sur sa tête à demi tournée et un peu penchée, retombait en grappe sur ses cheveux” (272).

However, the text then evokes Manette as representative of ideal feminine beauty, as if her body

radiated “tout le dessin de la femme,” a template of womanly physical perfection. While the

artist himself—at this point—does not touch Manette, his gaze substitutes for physical contact

and the reader follows each step as Coriolis studies his model’s body. The desire for physical

contact becomes instead the movement of the light, caressing Manette’s perfect form: “Et l’on

eût cru voir de la lumière la caresser de la tête aux pieds” (272). The artist may be required by

223
Crouzet, “Préface,” 16.
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his professional code to remain dispassionate (although, as we have seen, in this case he

definitely does not), but readers are under no obligation to do so, and the text offers these

visually enticing details that seduce them, just as Coriolis himself is seduced.

The third and final description of Manette’s body is lengthy and highly detailed. The

narrative action slows even more to follow the artist’s eye as he studies her, moving from head to

toe, lingering on each tiny feature, focusing on the colors and textures, the shapes and curves, the

lines and planes, the highlights and shadows (273-4). The variety of descriptors that appeal to

visual imagination indicate that the authors are, as stated before, guiding the reader’s eyes

through the process of studying human forms as a painter would. In particular, an artist would

appreciate the rich, poetic description of the subtle colors in Manette’s skin:

ces imperceptibles apparences d’un bleu, d’un vert presque insensible, ombrant
d’une adorable pâleur les diaphanéités laiteuses de la chair, tout ce délicieux je ne
sais quoi de l’épiderme de la femme, qu’on dirait fait avec le dessous de l’aile des
colombes, l’intérieur des roses blanches, la glauque transparence de l’eau
baignant un corps. (273)

Yet, even in this “artistic” description, there are words that evoke the erotic, such as “adorable”

and “délicieux.” Special attention is given to her breasts and nipples: “le bout du sein [qui] était

de la nuance naissante de l’hortensia” and on the way the light makes her underarm hair glow

golden, details which focus particularly on intimate body parts (273).224 The narration also

emphasizes the youth and innocence of Manette’s body, creating an elision of mature female

sexuality and an impression of childlike purity. Manette’s joints have “la fragilité et la minceur

des attaches de l’enfant” (273). Her ankle bones stick out like a little girl’s and her torso is like a

budding flower: “encore contenu et comprimé dans sa grâce, à demi mûr, serré dans sa jeunesse

224
Women’s body hair is rarely portrayed in traditional western art (Anne Hollander. Seeing through
Clothes. [New York: Viking Press, 1978], 136-7). The Goncourt’s choice to describe it adds a titillating
element of the forbidden.
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comme dans l’enveloppe d’un bouton” (273). Finally, her belly is simultaneously voluptuous and

virtuous: “la douce et voluptueuse ondulation d’un ventre de vierge, d’un ventre innocent,

presque enfantin” (273). Furthermore, Coriolis’ lengthy process of looking, the dwelling and

lingering on each detail is, in itself, erotically charged. The snail’s pace of the narration as

Coriolis so carefully studies each micro section of Manette’s body indicates an overwhelming

investment in this moment.

The aesthetic gaze and the erotic one merge for Coriolis. The Goncourts show this

change through their characters’ behavior.225 Coriolis loses himself in the leisurely study of

Manette’s body: “Un moment, il s’oublia à s’éblouir de cette femme” (273). Manette becomes

uncomfortable because she can sense a change in Coriolis’ gaze: “Sous cette attention qui

semblait ne pas travailler, Manette à la fin éprouva une sorte d’embarras” (274). The

combination of artistic rapture and physical desire present in this scene signals the motives for

Coriolis’ efforts to control access to Manette’s body. While his focus on colors and shapes

indicates his painter’s gaze, phrases highlighting his emotional reaction demonstrate his

fascination and bedazzlement. Coriolis’ look is clearly at least as sexually motivated as it is

artistically focused.

B: Manette’s Mirror: “un musée de sa nudité”

Manette, whom the Goncourts portray as increasingly manipulative, superficially

complies with the model’s stereotypical studio romance role of voluntary self-sacrifice to the

great artist’s career. However, even after she begins living with Coriolis, she resists his efforts to

225
Crouzet, “Préface,” 17.
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control her body, to possess her, to keep her from posing for other artists, and she refuses to give

up her apartment: “En tout, elle avait l’idée de s’appartenir, de garder son coin de liberté” (283).

She attempts to deceive him, continuing to pose secretly for other painters and for photographers.

Coriolis is fiercely jealous and, little by little, convinces her to pose only for him. It is at this

point that the authors focus an entire chapter on the model’s perspective, recounting a personal

ritual that Manette uses to maintain her individual identity and her control over her body.

Manette waits until Coriolis leaves and she is certain he will be gone for several hours. She then

strips and poses nude before the mirror, replicating the familiar studio modeling activities for her

own satisfaction. The scene is recounted using the same third person voice as the overall text, but

it is focused on Manette’s experience. Additionally, the authors use the French imperfect past for

the entire sequence, which indicates a habitual, repeated action, giving Manette’s solo posing

sessions the ambiance of a personal ritual.

Manette’s mirror is a complex symbol: the meanings shift depending on one’s

perspective, moving as one changes position like reflections on its glass surface. It alternately

stands in for the gaze of the various players in the studio fantasy, creating three different

interpretations for Manette’s private mirror-gazing. Although these readings may initially seem

to be contradictory, they are, in fact, interdependent and exist simultaneously. The key to all

three readings is the multifaceted symbolic role of the studio mirror. 226 First, the mirror replaces

226
The trope of a woman gazing into a mirror has been a frequent and changing symbol in Western art
(See Martha Lucy, “Impressionism and the Mirror Image,” in A Companion to Nineteenth-Century Art,
edited by Michelle Facos, [New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2019], 263-79; and Guy Michaud. “Le
thème du miroir dans le symbolisme français,” Cahiers de l'Association internationale des études
françaises 11, [1959]: 199-216.) For examples of the mirror associated with Venus and the concept of
beauty see: Titian, Venus with a Mirror (c.1555, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.); Diego
Velázquez, The Toilet of Venus (The Rokeby Venus, c.1647-51, National Gallery of Art, Washington
D.C.); and Peter Paul Rubens, Venus in Front of the Mirror (c.1614-15, National Gallery of Art,
Washington D.C.). The mirror can also symbolize vanity and deception because its surface can distort
vision. Impressionist artists took up the theme of women and mirror, using it as one metaphor for the
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the eyes of the male artists whose attention Manette craves. Second, it is her own gaze as she

takes sensual pleasure in her body and constructs her self-image. Finally, the mirror provides the

reader with a window into the model’s private space. “[Manette] se sculpte elle-même, devenant

devant cette glace qui est seule à la voir à la fois le modèle, l’artiste, et l’amant.”227 Manette,

looking at herself, temporarily assumes all three roles in the studio romance. The variety of

meanings for Manette’s mirror allows a variety of viewers to gaze through that metaphorical

window, opening the role of external observer beyond the presumed masculine perspective.

Manette uses the studio mirror to adopt the visual role of the male artist, providing herself

with an audience and deriving pleasure from the exhibition of her body. She has finally promised

to stop posing for other artists, as the introduction to her solo nude scene indicates: “Fidèle à la

promesse qu’elle avait fait à Coriolis, Manette ne posait plus pour les autres” (303). Yet, she

cannot tolerate not being seen, so she creates a ritual where she poses for herself and imagines

posing for others:

Quand Coriolis sortait, et elle le savait parti pour plusieurs heures, elle restait
immobile à regarder la pendule, attendant pendant un certain temps qu’elle
comptait. Puis, se levant, elle allait à la porte de l’atelier dont elle ôtait la clef,
retirait d’un coffre des petits fagots de bois de genévrier, qu’elle jetait sur le feu
du poêle, en regardant autour d’elle comme une petite fille qui est seule et qui fait
une chose défendue. (304)

Manette is not precisely breaking her promise to Coriolis, but the text signals the defiance of her

act: the rebellion is part of the pleasure. She waits for him to leave before locking the door and

watches the clock to make sure he is truly gone. This elaborate private nude scene is a climatic

subjective, shifting nature of visual perception (Lucy, “Impressionism,” 276). Examples include: Edgar
Degas, Madame Jeantaud in the Mirror (c. 1875, Musée d’Orsay, Paris); Edouard Manet A Bar at the
Folies-Bergère (1882, The Courtauld Gallery, London); and Mary Cassatt, Woman with a Pearl Necklace
in a Loge (1879, Philadelphia Museum of Art, PA).
227
Crouzet, “Préface,” 8.
 105

demonstration of Manette’s need to be seen, especially unclothed and particularly by artists. In

early chapters, as Coriolis seeks to persuade Manette to pose only for him, he has great difficulty

convincing her, partially because he can offer her nothing to compete with her craving for the

artistic masculine gaze. She seems to have no other vices, neither drink, nor food, nor craving for

rich gifts and jewels (283). She knows only “la coquetterie de son corps” (283). Manette even

refuses to allow Coriolis to cover her body in drapery or clothing, telling him: “Pour qui me

prenez-vous? Est-ce que je suis un mannequin, moi? Vous n’avez droit qu’à ma nudité pour vos

cinq francs…” (277). Manette not only enjoys the gaze of the artist, but she is completely aware

that when her body has become part of a work of art, it will be seen by many others beyond the

studio walls and perhaps long after her death. Coriolis tells Anatole that for Manette, posing is

her creative expression, her bid at immortality:

Elle est persuadée que c’est son corps qui fait les tableaux… Il y a des femmes
qui se voient une immortalité n’importe où, dans le ciel, dans le paradis, dans des
enfants, dans le souvenir de quelqu’un …. elle, c’est sur la toile! (277)

She looks at Coriolis’ painting after each session, not necessarily to evaluate the quality of his

work, but to look at herself, to see the contribution she has made to the progress of the canvas.

Coriolis tells Anatole: “Elle venait regarder avec une petite moue, en se penchant … Elle ne

disait rien…elle se regarde … une femme qui se voit dans une glace, absolument” (276).

Manette’s desire to be seen is a display of erotic exhibitionism. Beyond the pleasure she derives

while posing, she thrives on her contribution to works of art, believing herself to be an artistic

co-creator.

However, the Goncourts portray Manette’s active sexual desire as disturbing and

destructive—although also attractive, intoxicating, and inspiring. Manette’s practiced posing

allows her to construct the image she wishes to present. She becomes a seductive serpent
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hypnotizing her victims—and herself via the studio mirror—with her gaze: “[Manette] montrait

des coquetteries de chèvre et de serpent, comme les autres femmes montrent des coquetteries de

chatte et de colombe” (298). The authors associate Manette with goats and serpents, evoking the

Biblical traditions assigning evil attributes to these animals. Snake imagery also connects this

moment to the myths of threatening feminine power, Medusa and Salmacis. Medusa was the

Gorgon with serpents for hair and whose paralyzing gaze turned men to stone.228 Salmacis,

whose story is cited above, wrapped herself serpent-like around Hermaphroditus and merged

with him, thus stealing his male virility229 Coriolis is spellbound, wanting to capture in paint

Manette’s sensual, animal-like body and mannerisms: “Coriolis voulait peindre cette tête, cette

physionomie, avec ce qu’il y voyait d’un autre pays, d’une autre nature, le charme paresseux,

bizarre, et fascinant de cette sensualité animale que le baptême semble tuer chez la femme”

(298). The authors juxtapose Manette’s nude body with furs spread across the divan. Coriolis’

studio is filled with exotic objects, offering a rich backdrop for Manette’s flesh. “Le divan était

recouvert de peaux de panthères et de tigres, aux têtes desséchées” (220). While she poses alone,

Manette lounges on the furs and luxuriates in their rough surface:

Elle allait se glisser sur les peaux fauves garnissant le divan, s’étendait en se
frottant sur leur rudesse un peu râpeuse, et là couchée, elle se caressait d’un
regard jusqu’à l'extrémité des pieds, et se poursuivant encore au-delà, dans la
psyché au bout du divan, qui lui renvoyait en plein la répétition de son
allongement radieux. (304)

Contrasting Manette’s smooth flesh with the skins of wild animals creates a powerful visual

metaphor of her untamed sexuality.

228
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 106.
229
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 96.
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As she examines herself before the mirror, Manette becomes an artist, mimicking not

only the actions of posing for painters but their focused visual study of the shapes and lines

created as she moves her body:

Manette recommençait cette patiente création d’une attitude, cette lente et

graduelle réalisation des lignes qu’elle ébauchait, remaniait, corrigeait, conquérait
avec le tâtonnement d’un peintre qui cherche l’ensemble, l’accord et l’eurythmie
d’une figure. (305)

She thus composes and creates the image of herself she wants to project. The Goncourts suggest

more than simple exhibitionistic pleasure, underlining the performative aspect of her modeling.

Coriolis is deeply attracted to Manette precisely because of her creative and deliberate use of her

physical attractions, which is, perhaps, why he does nothing to suppress it when he returns home

to discover her engaged in her private ritual.

Enacting her personal ceremony before the studio mirror, Manette claims her own body,

her sensuality, and her erotic power. Significantly, she locks out the physical male presence

before beginning, creating an enclosed feminine space. The repeated nature of her actions, the

burning of incense, and the other-worldly “enchantement” evoke a sense of ceremony and

religious experience: the object of worship is her own body for “rien ne pouvait l’arracher à

l’adoration de ce spectacle d’elle-même” (305). The sentence “Elle était nue, n’était plus qu’elle”

is a paragraph unto itself, underlining Manette’s solitary strength and self-possession (304). The

narrative emphasizes her cultivation of sensory experience, the sensations of being in her body,

feeling it, seeing it, experiencing its beauty and power.

The same sensory details that mark Manette’s autoerotic enjoyment of her body also

serve to enhance the text’s sexual appeal to the external reader. The inherently forbidden nature

of Manette’s actions, signaled when Manette locks the door and behaves like a disobedient child,

creates an erotically charged scene. Details appealing to all the senses increase the physicality of
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the text: for example, the odor of burning juniper wood; the sound of her silk stockings on

Manette’s skin as she removes them; the tactile caress of her bared feet as she holds each of them

between her hands; and the visual description of how the tips of her toenails turn a little white

when she stands. Furthermore, her leisurely, deliberate actions—the care and length of time she

spends on each step of the process—slows the narrative flow to focus it on each moment and

increases the reader’s feeling of participation in Manette’s enjoyment of her body.

She first removes her shoes, slowly and gently: “Elle commençait à se déchausser, mais tout

doucement, peu à peu, avec une lenteur où elle mettait comme une paresseuse et longue

coquetterie” (305). Manette then caresses each of her feet and stands looking down at her legs

appreciatively. She takes down her hair and luxuriates in the sensations of her skin.

Each detail mentioned as she consciously engages all her senses adds to the scene’s erotic

appeal.

In effect, her prolonged appreciation of her own body provides the reader with increased

voyeuristic pleasure. Additionally, the visual description of Manette’s body recalls some of the

vocabulary and images the authors used during her first modeling scene. As she reclines or

stands before the mirror, the various shapes and movements of her muscles, the curves and

inflexions of her skin are “[p]resque invisible[s],” “à peine perceptibles,” or “insensibles,” all

similar adjectives to those used to describe the nuances of shape and color that Coriolis

contemplated in the earlier sequence (304-5). The near invisibility of these traces of “les beautés,

les voluptés, la grâce nue de la femme” that Manette finds and relishes as she studies her

reflection require careful, extensive, and sensitive observation (304). Manette’s own gaze

becomes the final powerful image, cycling self-adoration from her body to her own eyes: “deux

pupilles pareilles à deux petits points noirs dans le bleu aigu de ses yeux” (308).
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In this reading of Manette’s personal ritual, the mirror becomes a symbol for the

mythological figure of Narcissus, recalling the initial pose she took for Coriolis as the sculpture

called Génie du repos éternel or Narcisse, dit Hermaphrodite Mazarin. Manette adores her own

reflection, inviting feminine self-love and same-sex attraction. If the male artist’s point of view

can create a surrogate for a masculine reader’s vicarious participation in a text or painting, then

the same can be true of Manette’s perspective creating a surrogate for a feminine gaze. Manette’s

experience of her body invites a feminine reader to similarly claim and appreciate her own

physical being and erotic potential. Likewise, particularly with the male presence excluded from

the room, potential female homoeroticism becomes more visible.

The Goncourts’ acknowledgement of Manette’s perspective goes beyond the mere

suggestion of individuality that is present for the women in Courbet’s Atelier and Balzac’s “Le

Chef d’œuvre inconnu.” Although the authors’ own biases against women and Jews influence

their portrayal of Manette, they create her to be a woman with a mind of her own. She acts to

fulfill her own desires. Her point of view is essential to the construction of the novel, and her

choices affect the course of the plot. The authors evoke the stereotypical fantasy of the studio

romance when, in the early stages of her relationship with Coriolis, Manette seems to embody

the beautiful young model, prepared to sacrifice herself for the male painter’s career. When she

receives pleasure from posing, her desires align with the artist’s goals. Coriolis sees her as an

inspiring “belle Juive,” a muse whose body inspires masterpieces. Conversely, when she pursues

the goal of financial gain, she pushes Coriolis’ day-to-day life away from risky creativity and

towards comfortable stagnation. Manette’s transformation into the manipulative maternal figure

destroys the studio romance, yet maintains biased racial and heteronormative binaries. Likewise,

the brothers’ prejudiced view of Créoles colors their portrait of Coriolis. They design him to be
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passionate and sensitive, feminine traits that increase his artistic talent but weaken his resistance

to Manette. The Goncourts therefore reverse gender opposites in their novel, Manette Salomon,

superficially disturbing the atelier fantasy schema, while simultaneously reinforcing the

underlying patriarchal binary-based power structure. However, the novel’s fragmentary narrative

structure and mobile focalization resists reductive categorization and using Manette’s point of

view creates openings for alternative readings that trouble biased assumptions.
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Chapter Three: The Model’s Subjectivity in Zola’s L’Œuvre

Mais je suis vivante, moi! et elles sont mortes, les femmes que tu aimes…
Oh! ne dis pas non, je sais bien que ce sont tes maîtresses, toutes ces femmes
peintes. Avant d’être la tienne, je m’en étais aperçu déjà, il n’y a qu’à voir de
quelle main tu caressais leur nudité, de quels yeux tu les contemplais ensuite,
pendant des heures.230

In the scene cited above, Christine names the primary conflict in her marriage to Claude,

her husband and the painter-protagonist of Émile Zola’s novel L’Œuvre (1886). Christine’s

emotional response to Claude’s obsession with his art constitutes a major element of Zola’s text.

Zola gives Christine not only her own point of view throughout the novel, but complex

motivations and a richly developed psychology. Zola constructs the novel around a series of

contrasting characters, scenes, and themes that reinforce binary thinking and patriarchal power

structures while also undermining gendered stereotypes about the male painter, his female

model, and the process of artistic creation. The novel recounts the story of Claude Lantier’s

efforts to become a successful painter, his continual failures, and his dramatic suicide when he

hangs himself before his final unfinished canvas. Like Balzac’s Poussin and the Goncourts’

Coriolis, Claude is a young and ambitious painter who dreams of creating masterworks that will

revolutionize visual art. Claude, akin to the previous painter-protagonists, depends upon the

presence of a model who willingly sacrifices herself for his career, giving her body as well as her

time and energy to support him. However, L’Œuvre also subverts the atelier fantasy because

Zola deliberately assigns a central role in the narrative to Christine, Claude’s model and eventual

230
Émile Zola, L’Œuvre, in Les Rougon-Macquart: Histoire naturelle et sociale d’une famille sous le
Second Empire, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, vol 4, edited by Armand Lanoux, études, notes, et variantes
by Henri Mitterand. (Paris: Gallimard, 1960), 346. All page numbers refer to this edition.
 112

wife. Zola establishes a constantly shifting perspective between Claude and Christine beginning

immediately in the first few paragraphs of the novel. The exchange in focalization between the

artist and his future model creates two co-existing, interdependent, and competing narrative

threads. Claude and Christine respond to shared events differently: he filters every experience

through the lens of its effect on his art, while she consistently evaluates her relationship with

Claude through the lens of love. This strategy allows the author to communicate a destabilizing

sense of tension that is never fully resolved. Furthermore, similar to the way Manette’s nude

scenes occur at pivotal moments and affect the direction of the plot, Christine’s nudity drives the

narrative action and influences Claude’s career. When Christine is posing, the narrative

frequently pauses to allow “moments of erotic contemplation.”231 Zola also creates a build-up of

tension to the moments when Christine reveals her body. Thus, the author moves the model from

a position of voiceless passivity to an active and essential role within the novel.

From the earliest stages of his design, Zola planned for Christine to have strong physical

desires: “La sensualité de Christine est indiquée tout au début.”232 As we will see, Christine’s

sensual nature frequently motivates her choices throughout the novel, particularly those that

transgress social expectations. Thus, Christine is not merely a passive object of the gaze. Her

perspective, her desires, her choices, and her voice are essential at every level of the novel. Close

reading of four pivotal scenes when Christine poses nude for Claude in his studio will reveal

Zola’s deliberate use of literary devices that focus on Christine’s individual perspective and the

psychology behind it. These moments when Christine’s point of view dominates the narration

231
Mulvey, Pleasures, 19.

Patrick Brady, L’Œuvre d’Émile Zola: Roman Sur Les Arts, (Geneva, Switzerland: Librairie Droz,
232

1967), 370.
 113

move beyond the patriarchal masculine-centered binary because they acknowledge and validate

feminine subjectivity within the narrative. Yet, Christine ultimately fails in her attempt to win

Claude away from his art, and her role as self-sacrificing muse maintains the stereotypes of the

studio romance. Zola’s decision to assign Christine a more palpable personhood than Balzac and

the Goncourts gave to their female models creates a persistent tension between the complexity of

Christine’s character and the constraints of the gendered atelier fantasy.

This chapter will analyze four important nude scenes when Christine poses for Claude in

his studio. First, during the morning after the couple’s first meeting (“le lendemain”). Claude

sketches Christine’s head and upper torso as she sleeps. The second scene occurs when Christine

poses fully nude for the first time, lying lost “dans son néant” while Claude paints for hours

(114). The third pivotal segment occurs when Claude is working on his final canvas. He

compares Christine’s aging, maternal body to the figure she posed for “dans son néant,” treating

her with disgust, as if her body were responsible for his artistic impotence. In posing for the

painted figure that is Claude’s obsession, Christine has helped him create her own competition,

“sa propre rivale” (254). Finally, the night before Claude’s suicide, Christine bares herself to

stand before Claude’s final portrait of her, provoking “une scène de bataille” between the forces

of love and art.233 Although Christine poses for Claude numerous times throughout the novel,

these four scenes interconnect, each simultaneously foreshadowing those to come and/or and

referring to the previous ones in both imagery and language. Zola’s use of repetition marks these

four sequences as key moments in the text and positions Christine as a central figure. Zola

credits her with subjectivity and agency, moving beyond the merely passive role stereotypically

233
Zola, cited in Henri Mitterand, “Étude Sur L’Œuvre, Notes et Variantes,” in Les Rougon-Marcquart:
Histoire Naturelle et Sociale d’une Famille Sous Le Second Empire, vol. 4, (Paris: Gallimard,
Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 1960), 1363.
 114

assigned to the female model, and inviting readership outside the heteronormative masculine-

centered paradigm.

I. Zola’s L’Œuvre: “a poignant study of the artistic temperament”

L’Œuvre appeared first as a serial in Le Gil Blas from December 23, 1885 to March 27,

1886, and the first complete edition was published by Charpentier in April of 1886.234 It is the

fourteenth in Zola’s twenty-novel cycle entitled Les Rougon-Maquart: histoire naturelle et

sociale d’une famille sous le Second Empire. Published between 1871 and 1893, each novel in

the Rougon-Macquart series focuses on a different descendant of the two families named in the

title. Drawing on the ideas of Hippolyte Taine and Claude Bernard, Zola created a hybrid process

of literary creation and scientific study called “naturalism” to explore the history of the fictional

Rougon-Maquart family in France during the Second Empire (1851-70).235 Taine’s preface to

Essais de critique et d’histoire (1866) “develops a parallel between the naturalist and the

historian, the essential task of both being to examine man as but one member of the animal

kingdom and just as subject as its other members to the shaping influences of heredity and

environment.”236 Taine believed that individual humans are inevitably a product of three

combined influences: heredity, history, and environment, or “race, moment, and milieu.” 237 Zola

234
Robert J. Niess, Zola, Cézanne, and Manet: A Study of L’Œuvre, (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan
Press, 1968), 2.

For more about Zola’s theories and working methods, see William J. Berg and Laurie Martin-Berg,
235

Emile Zola Revisited, (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1992), 10-11.

236
Roger Pearson, “Introduction,” in The Masterpiece, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), xiii.

Cited in Berg and Martin-Berg, Zola Revisited, 10. “Race” in this context means ancestry, according to
237

Berg and Martin-Berg (note #3, 167).

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describes his adaptation of Claude Bernard’s experimental method in his essay “Le Roman

expérimental” (1880), titled in homage to Bernard’s Introduction à l’étude de la médecine

expérimentale.238 Bernard advocates the use of objective scientific study based upon direct

observation to develop effective medical treatments. Zola believed he could adapt the process of

scientific research to writing novels by making direct observation of details in his environment

and taking careful notes.239 He argues: “... si la méthode expérimentale conduit à la connaissance

de la vie physique, elle doit conduire aussi à la connaissance de la vie passionnelle et

intellectuelle.”240 Therefore, Zola observed the world around him very closely, and he believed it

was part of the novelist’s job to portray the world as it was, not as an imaginary ideal.241 To

construct his literary experiment, Zola created the Rougon-Macquart family and traced the

effects of the inherited traits of addiction and impulsivity upon each member of the family,

adding variations of gender, class, and location.

Zola’s working documents for L’Œuvre, including meticulous notes taken from daily

observations and his careful planning, are preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale. 242 L’Œuvre is

the most autobiographical work of the Rougon-Maquart cycle and the author was intimately

familiar with its milieu.243 Zola was well-known in the Paris art world and wrote in defense of

Émile Zola, “Le Roman expérimental,” in Œuvres Complètes (Paris: Cercle du livre précieux, 1966),
238

1175–205.
239
Berg and Martin-Berg, Zola Revisited, 10-11.
240
Émile Zola, “Le Roman expérimental,” 1175.
241
Pearson, “Introduction,” x.

See Henri Mitterand’s “Études, Notes, et Variantes” on L’Œuvre in the Pléiade edition (pages 1338-
242

1405) for a thorough discussion of Zola’s use of notes and an analysis of his working documents.
243
Mitterand, “Études,” 1341.
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Édouard Manet (1832-1883) and the Impressionists. Manet even painted a portrait of Zola

(1868). Zola and the painter Paul Cézanne (1839-1906) were childhood friends. Zola used his

and Cézanne’s personality and life experiences as inspiration for many details in L’Œuvre. For

example, Claude has similar physical characteristics and temperament to Cézanne. 244 Similarly,

in many respects, Pierre Sandoz, a writer and childhood friend of Claude, shares many traits with

Zola himself. Zola even used the pronouns “I” and “me” to refer to Sandoz in his notes. 245

According to Robert Niess, the consensus of critical opinion among Zola scholars is that Sandoz

is a “direct and exact self-portrait of Zola himself.”246 Many of L’Œuvre’s other characters are

also partially based on well-known individuals of Zola’s time. For example, Paul Jory is

probably based on Paul Alexis, a journalist whom Zola knew well, and Fagerolles resembles the

painter Henri Gervex.247 The author was included in group studio portraits by Frédéric Bazille

(1841-1870) and Fantin Latour (1836-1904) alongside Édouard Manet, Claude Monet (1840-

1926), Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), Alfred Sisley (1839-1899), and others.248 Zola's

notes on L’Œuvre and the Rougon-Macquart series show that from the beginning he envisioned

one of the novels as being devoted to art. 249

The artist in question would exemplify a “singular effect of heredity” whereby his
“genius” would be inherited from illiterate working-class parents. Where other
offspring of the illegitimate Macquart branch of the family would suffer for the
intemperance and insanity of their forebears through being ruled by insatiable

244
See Mitterand, “Études,” 1372 and Niess, Zola, 78-86.
245
See Niess, Zola, 62-4; Mitterand, “Études,” 1364-6; and Brady, Zola, 155.
246
Niess, Zola, 62.
247
Mitterand, “Études,” 1366.
248
See Mitterand, “Études,” 1341-7; Brady, Zola, 197-204; and William J. Berg, The Visual Novel: Emile
Zola and the Art of His Times, (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1992), 1-13.
249
Mitterand, “Études,” 1374.
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physical appetites and the need for alcohol, this one would have unbridled
“intellectual” appetites of such a violent kind that ultimately they render him
powerless to create. [...] In short, the work would present a “poignant study of the
artistic temperament in a contemporary context” and “the terrible drama of a mind
devouring itself.”250

Claude also appears as a child in L'Assommoir (1877) and as an adult in Le Ventre de Paris

(1873). In Le Ventre de Paris he is working on a painting depicting the life of the great Paris

market of Les Halles. L’Assommoir is focused on his mother, Gervaise, who exhausts herself

working as a laundress to support abusive and alcoholic men. Nana (1880) tells the story of

Claude’s half-sister who becomes a prostitute and eventually a high-class courtesan before dying

of smallpox. His brothers are Jacques Lantier, who is a violent murderer in La Bête humaine

(1890), and Étienne Lantier, a miner and revolutionary in Germinal, (1885). At the same time,

Zola emphasized the singularity of artistic representation. He famously said “une oeuvre d'art est

un coin de la création vu à travers un tempérament," acknowledging the effect of the creator’s

individual experience upon the formation of a work of art.251

L’Œuvre opens on a dark and rainy night in Paris. It is two in the morning and Claude

Lantier, painter, is returning to his Paris studio after spending the evening “en artiste flâneur”

(11). He encounters a young woman, soaked from the rain and trembling with fear, who has

sheltered in the alcove of his building’s entry. This is Christine, although we do not learn her

name until the next morning. Between sobs, she explains that she has just arrived in Paris to

begin a job. She had taken a cab from the train station, but the driver attacked and abandoned

her. Claude takes pity on her, although he usually avoids entanglements with women, and

conducts her to his one-room studio to wait out the storm. The next morning, he discovers her

250
Pearson, “Introduction,” viii. Remarks in quotations are translations of Zola’s preparatory notes.
251
Émile Zola, Mes Haines: Causeries littéraires et artistiques, (Paris: 1866). Gallica; gallica.bnf.fr;
https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k9603604x. 250.
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asleep, lying with her breasts exposed and one arm behind her head. Her pose is perfect for his

current Salon painting, so he sketches her while she sleeps.252 As the novel progresses, she

returns frequently to his studio and the couple begins a chaste courtship. She eventually agrees to

pose nude for the full body of the figure in his Salon painting, although they do not consummate

their relationship until after the canvas appears in the Salon des Refusés. They move to the

countryside where they enjoy a brief idyllic time together before returning to Paris. They

conceive a son, Jacques, whose life is pathetically short. The couple marries several years after

Jacques’ birth. Claude’s art career has some successful moments, but the fatal flaw he inherited

from his Rougon-Macquart ancestors causes him to continuously strive for his imagined ideal. 253

He obsessively overworks his canvases, destroying their initial charm and beauty. He never

achieves the artistic success he so desires. The novel ends with Claude’s burial after his suicide:

he has hanged himself from the studio scaffolding in front of his last painting.254 Christine is left

destitute.

252
Zola describes the composition of Claude’s Salon painting, entitled Plein air, as a forest glade where a
nude woman lies on the grass with one arm behind her head. There are also two smaller nude women, a
blonde and a brunette, laughing and tumbling together on the grass in the background. In the foreground
is a male figure leaning on his left arm with his back to the viewer (33). This fictional work of art
resembles Manet’s Déjeuner sur l’herbe, which scandalized the public at the Salon des Refusés in 1863
(Brady, Zola, 228-9 and Niess, Zola, 116-7). Both paintings contain a nude female figure accompanied by
fully dressed men in an outdoor setting.
253
Claude’s parents are Gervaise Macquart and Auguste Lantier in L'Assommoir (1877).
254
Claude’s final painting is never titled within the novel. It depicts a view of the Île de la Cité seen from
a bridge overlooking the Seine. The background shows both branches of the river embankments and the
skyline of the Cité. In the left foreground are workers unloading a barge (“Paris qui travaille,” 216), while
bathers enjoy the water on the right bank (“Paris qui s’amuse,” 216). Claude adds a boat and with three
female figures to the center of the composition, each woman in a different state of undress. One has on
her bathing costume and is rowing, another is half-undressed and sits with her feet in the water, and the
third is standing naked at the prow of the boat (234). He becomes obsessed with perfecting the nude
central figure.
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II. The Studio Romance in L’Œuvre: “le récit du deux”

L’Œuvre maintains the binary gender roles of the atelier fantasy in many ways. Although

Zola clearly conceived of Christine as an active, central character attributed with rich psychology

and even active sexual desire (which we will discuss in more detail below), his choice of

metaphors for her role are heteronormative and polarized. Zola’s use of human reproductive

biology as the guiding metaphor for artistic creation imbues the entire text with patriarchal

binaries and gendered power structures. Preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale among Zola’s

working documents for L’Œuvre is a list of possible titles written in the author’s hand. 255 This

list includes the word “œuvre” repeated several times and in a variety of phrases such as

“l’œuvre d’art” (the work of art) and “l’œuvre vivante” (the living work). It shows the author’s

thinking process, connecting associative definitions and metaphors to the title word.256 Zola

weaves these possible title words and related tropes throughout the novel. Among the included

metaphors are several references to sexuality, reproduction, childbirth, and creation: “Création,

créer, procréer,” (creation, to create, to procreate); “Engrosser la nature,” (to impregnate nature);

“enfantement,” (childbirth); “accouchement,” (childbirth). Another important term on the list,

“l’œuvre de la chair,” is a euphemism for sexual intercourse. Littré defines it as “la conjonction

charnelle de l'homme et de la femme.”257 Zola also lists “être Dieu” (to be God) among the

255
For a complete list, see Mitterand, “Études,” 1338; and Phillip Walker, “An Attempt by Zola to Define
Artistic Creation: The List of Possible Titles for L’Œuvre,” in Émile Zola and the Arts: Centennial of the
Publication of L’Œuvre, edited by Jean-Max Guieu and Allison Hilton, (Washington DC: Georgetown
University Press, 1988), 121-2. Walker’s text includes a photograph of the original document.
256
Walker, “An Attempt,” 121–34.
257
Émile Littré, Dictionnaire Littré - Dictionnaire de La Langue Française, (Paris: L. Hachette, 1873-
74), electronic version created by François Gannaz, https://www.littre.org/, Entry “œuvre.”
 120

associated phrases. Thus, from the early stages of the novel’s conception, Zola connects artistic

creation to human reproduction and demiurgic creative powers. Male and female reproductive

roles merge, and the painter becomes god-like in shaping the world through his art.258 Comparing

the male painter’s artistic creation to human procreation can be understood as a form of

masculine womb-envy: in a painted, sculpted or written representation of a human female body

made by a male artist, woman is symbolically born of man.259 Zola further emphasizes the

difficult process of creating art, comparing the male painter’s aesthetic struggle to the painful

process of childbirth: “le travail,” (work, labor) “l'angoisse de créer, d’enfanter” (the anguish of

creating, of giving birth).

While the narrative describes Christine’s labor at Jacques’ birth with a scant few words

(“tout marcha très bien” [152]), Claude’s endless endeavors to perfect his paintings are extended

labors, “[des] enfantements continus” (236). The narrative voice describes each step in Claude’s

interminable aesthetic efforts, emphasizing their endless difficulty:

Ah! cet effort de création dans l'œuvre d’art, cet effort de sang et de larmes dont il
agonisait, pour créer de la chair, souffler de la vie! [...] Il se brisait à cette besogne
impossible de faire toute la nature sur une toile, épuisé à la longue dans les
perpétuelles douleurs qui tendaient ses muscles, sans qu’il pût jamais accoucher
de son génie. (245)

Zola references bodily signs of the effort of childbirth: blood and tears (“sang” and “larmes”),

suffering (“il agonisait”), pains (“douleurs”), and strained muscles (“qui tendaient ses muscles”).

Conversely, the author also uses references to the children in the novel as metaphors for

failed artistic creation. None of the artists in the novel has any viable children. For example, one

of Claude’s childhood friends, Louis Dubuche is an unsuccessful architect who fathers two

258
Walker, “An Attempt,” 131.
259
Brady, Interdisciplinary, 56-9.
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disabled children. Claude and Christine both neglect their son, Jacques, in favor of Claude’s art.

Just as Claude expects long hours of posing from Christine, he wants Jacques to be still so he can

paint. When the baby plays and laughs happily instead of posing, Claude is angry: “[Il] jurait

contre ce sacré mioche qui ne pouvait pas être sérieux une minute. Est-ce qu’on plaisantait avec

la peinture?” (154). Claude sees Christine primarily through the lens of his art, and similarly, he

can look at Jacques solely with painter’s eyes: “il ne le couvait plus que de ses yeux d’artiste”

(154). Additionally, Jacques’ daily needs, his normal childhood noises, and his demands for

attention irritate his father. When the child knocks at the locked studio door while his mother is

posing nude, Claude expresses his frustration “grondant qu’on n’avait pas une minute de repos”

(242). As the boy lies dying, his father keeps a late-night vigil with his unfinished canvas instead

of staying near his child (260-5). It is only when Jacques dies that he is finally still and quiet

enough for his father to paint his portrait. 260 The boy’s warm, active body becomes cold and

immobile: “Le père le toucha, le trouva d’un froid de glace” (266). Christine tells Claude “Ah! tu

peux le peindre, il ne bougera plus!” (267). As if the birth of a work of art requires the death of

its model, Claude’s grief transforms as he paints:

Pendant les premières minutes, ses larmes l'empêchaient de voir (...). Puis
le travail sécha ses paupières, assura sa main; et, bientôt, il n’y eut plus là
son fils glacé, il n’y eut qu’un modèle, un sujet dont l’étrange intérêt la
passionna. (267)

The canvas Claude creates at Jacques’ deathbed is “un chef-d’oeuvre de clarté et de puissance”

(267). Claude calls the work Enfant mort, and it is his only painting to be accepted into the

Salon. The living child that the couple could have cherished and nurtured was an obstacle to

260
The subject of Claude’s deathbed portrait is reminiscent of Claude Monet’s postmortem portrait of his
wife, Camille, Camille Monet sur son lit de mort (1879, Musée d’Orsay, Paris).
 122

Claude’s creative production; but once dead, he inspires a work of art. Instead of bringing life,

Claude’s labors bring death.

In Zola’s L’Œuvre, Christine’s role vacillates between extreme, polarized variations

which acts to maintain a binary framework. Christine embodies conflicting impulses: “Zola

insiste toutefois sur le caractère composite de Christine: tendresse et passion, pureté et sensualité,

vierge sage et vierge folle.”261 Christine is sometimes an ideal, beloved, and inspiring muse, but

at other times she is a jealous, demanding lover. When she is the muse, she infuses the painter’s

work with her beauty, as when he makes the first sketches of her asleep. She supports his

artwork with her time and energy, although initially she finds his brutal style disturbing (23). She

learns to appreciate his work as she spends more time with him (110). However, at times she

also seduces Claude away from his creative efforts, her body providing an object of desire

outside his art.262 He paints very little while the couple lives happily in the countryside at

Bennecourt because his energy is focused on Christine: “Désormais, toute sa tendresse de la

chair de la femme, cette tendresse dont il épuisait autrefois le désir dans ses œuvres, ne le brûlait

plus que pour ce corps vivant, souple et tiède, qui était son bien” (148). As an ideal partner,

Christine sacrifices herself for his career, supporting and adoring him. In fact, she turns all of her

energies towards Claude, neglecting even their son: “C’était l’homme adoré, désiré, qui devenait

son enfant; et l’autre, le pauvre être demeurait un simple témoignage de leur grande passion

d’autrefois” (209). On the other hand, as Claude’s lover, she becomes possessive and resentful

when he devotes the majority of his time and energy to painting. Christine particularly resents

Claude’s investment in the painted version of her nude body, seeing his image of her as the

261
Mitterand, “Études,” 1371.
262
Brady, Zola, 393.
 123

supreme rival. He even refuses to make love with her when he is actively working on his canvas

because he believes he needs to direct all his energies towards his art: “[C’était la] volontaire

abstinence, chasteté théorique, où il devait aboutir pour donner à la peinture toute sa virilité”

(541). Her sacrifice has the primary goal of recapturing his attention, time, and love. When

Claude is working on his final painting, Christine poses for long hours whenever he wishes and

assists him with studio maintenance, but she does it for her own purposes:

Ah ! Comme elle aurait voulu le reprendre à cette peinture qui le lui avait pris !
C’était pour cela qu’elle se faisait sa servante, heureuse de se rabaisser à des
travaux de manœuvre. Depuis qu’elle rentrait dans son travail, côte à côte ainsi
tous les trois, lui, elle et cette toile, un espoir la ranimait […] peut-être allait-elle
le reconquérir, maintenant qu’elle était là, elle aussi avec sa passion. (238)

She is thus also a source of destructive influences in Claude’s career. Therefore, in L’Œuvre, the

female model serves as a conflicted and unsettled intercessor between the ideal (Claude’s vision

of creating a new kind of art) and the real (the demands of daily life, his inability to achieve his

dreams). These simultaneous but contradictory roles assigned to Christine maintain the binaries

of the studio romance paradigm.

III. Beyond the Binaries: The Model’s Subjectivity

A study of Zola’s preparatory notes for L’Œuvre demonstrates that he designed

Christine’s role to be an indispensable element in the text. Zola’s initial plan to link Claude with

a worldly Parisienne changed early in the process, but from the beginning he wanted his model

to be attracted to Claude and fall deeply in love with him. 263 Even before the mistress acquired a

263
Zola’s first idea for “la maîtresse” was not the virginal Christine: “Pas une vierge, bien sûr, une fille de
Paris, qui a roulé très jeune, très amoureuse surtout” (Notes for L’Œuvre, F08 279-284, cited in
Mitterand, “Étude,” 1357).
 124

name, Zola planned for her perspective to be included. He also intended to describe both the

painter’s and the model’s point of view, “le récit du deux,” during their first morning in the

studio:

Elle couche dans le lit, lui sur un canapé, et c’est ainsi qu’elle le trouve le
lendemain en train de dessiner. Sa rougeur, elle veut se cacher. L’inconnu entre
eux, le récit du deux, et à la fin le regret de la fille qui part. Pour cela, lui donner
de la passion, une âme et une chair ardentes. L’inconnu de la chair qui la tente. Et
aussi le regret qu’elle peut avoir d’avoir été respectée.264

Even more significantly, the author also planned to give the model strong emotional and physical

impulses: “lui donner de la passion, une âme et une chair ardentes.” “Ardent” is used to describe

strong responses: “flamboyant” or “violent” (Littré). Additionally, throughout the novel, the

author deliberately portrays Christine as having active erotic desire. For example, after her initial

accidental visit to Claude’s studio, Christine chooses to return repeatedly, although she could

have never seen him again and enjoyed a placid, bourgeois life working for her respectable

employer, Madame Vanzade. Instead, she is beset by a “désir ignoré d’elle-même,” thoughts of

Claude have become “l’obsession de toutes ses heures,” and her only appeasement is to visit him

(91). While it may not be unusual to encounter a woman in literature who has strong sexual

desire, she is frequently a femme fatale whose pursuit of physical pleasure is destructive to all

around her—like Manette Salomon. Zola’s decision to make Christine simultaneously chaste and

passionate creates a female character who does not fit nineteenth-century stereotypes about either

the studio romance specifically or women in general.

In fact, Edmond de Goncourt criticized Zola’s design of Christine’s character precisely

because, in his opinion, it was not realistic enough. In other words, it did not fit his expectations

for a modest woman’s behavior:

264
Zola, Notes for L’Œuvre, F08 305-308, cited in Mitterand, “Étude,” 1361.
 125

Voici ma critique à vol d’oiseau sur L’Œuvre. [...]

L’amour de Christine joliment et délicatement posé dans cette succession de
chastes visites faites au peintre, mais un amour commençant et finissant par deux
situations non vraies et qu’a seul pu trouver vraisemblables un ignorant de la
pudeur de la femme comme Zola. Une femme pudique, dans certaines
circonstances, acceptera peut-être l’hospitalité de nuit d’un homme, mais jamais,
au grand jamais, ne se dévêtira, ne se mettra en chemise et j’ai la persuasion
qu’une femme vraiment pudique est plus disposée à se laisser déshonorer par un
régiment qu’à se montrer nue à un homme avec lequel elle n’a pas encore
couché!265

Zola seems to have anticipated these criticisms in his construction of Christine’s psychology.

Christine’s decision to undress although she is alone with an unknown man is a logical one under

the circumstances the author created: she was soaked to the skin in the violent downpour that led

to her meeting Claude, who would not have taken her in otherwise. Additionally, it is Christine’s

attraction to Claude—although she may not understand it initially—that explains her choice to

return frequently to his studio. Goncourt’s statement that a modest woman would find group rape

less dishonorable than posing nude for a painter is wildly exaggerated and does not take into

account Christine’s experience with Claude: because he did not touch her when she was

vulnerable after the rainstorm, she knows she can trust him. Christine also does not embrace

other aspects of feminine gendered stereotypes and frequently chooses transgressive behavior, as

she does when she deceives her employer so she can continue her visits with Claude. She

displays very little love towards their son, Jacques (“La maternité ne poussait pas en elle,” 153)

and she has neither interest in the traditional tasks of a housewife and mother, nor the necessary

skills to perform the work effectively: “Son ancien malaise à coudre, son inaptitude aux travaux

de son sexe, reparaissait dans les soins que réclamait l’enfant” (153). Thus, neither Claude nor

Christine fit gendered stereotypes: he is more interested in creating art than in making love to a

265
E. de Goncourt, Journal, cited in Mitterand, “Étude,” 1384. Italics included in Mitterand.
 126

vulnerable woman, and she is more attracted to him than to the calm and respectable life she

might have had.266 Including Christine’s viewpoint in the novel from the very beginning

introduces the couple as partners in the creative process and creates dramatic tension. It also

infuses Christine with a subtle and nuanced sexuality.267 Her passionate, sensual nature creates a

deliberate counterpoint with Claude’s habitual sublimation of his sexual desires into the act of

painting.

A. “Le Lendemain:” The First Nude Scene

The first few pages of the opening chapter demonstrate Zola’s use of free indirect style

narration to express an alternating perspective between Claude and Christine. As the point of

view shifts, narrative tension increases. The anxiety and discomfort created during the opening

sequence alerts the reader to Christine’s innocence and Claude’s distrust of her while

foreshadowing both her inevitable seduction and his equally inevitable artistic failure. Both

characters express uneasiness in the opening scenes, although Christine is truly fearful while

Claude is merely distrustful. Christine’s first words to Claude are “Oh! monsieur, ne me faites

pas du mal,” clearly indicating her distress (12). Her vulnerability is a reality for a young woman

alone at night in Paris, emphasized with her account of being attacked by the cab driver who then

abandoned her, leaving her to seek shelter from the raging storm as best she can. Claude,

however, believes she is “une farceuse […] quelque gueuse flanquée à la rue et qui cherche un

266
Mitterand, “Étude,” 1361.
267
Mitterand, “Étude,” 1361.
 127

homme” (12).268 Zola’s vivid visual description of the environment heightens the emotional

intensity of the scene. The reader’s first view of Paris is infused with Christine’s fear.269 The free

indirect style of narration allows the author to use a combination of objective information—such

as the names of specific Paris landmarks—with vocabulary indicating his character’s emotional

state. For example, the description cited below occurs immediately following Christine’s account

of how she came to be sheltering in the alcove of Claude’s building:

Un éclair éblouissant lui coupa la parole; et ses yeux dilatés parcoururent

avec effarement ce coin de ville inconnue, l’apparition violâtre d’une cité
fantastique. La pluie avait cessé. De l’autre côté de la Seine, le quai des Ormes
alignait ses petites maisons grises, bariolées en bas par les boiseries des boutiques,
découpant en haut leurs toitures inégales; tandis que l’horizon élargi s’éclairait, à
gauche jusqu’aux ardoises bleues des combles de l’Hôtel de Ville, à droite jusqu’à
la coupole plombée de Saint-Paul. Mais ce qui la suffoquait surtout, c’était
l’encaissement de la rivière, la fosse profonde où la Seine coulait à cet endroit,
noirâtre, des lourdes piles du pont Marie aux arches légères du nouveau pont
Louis-Philippe. (12)

The first sentence marks Christine as the focalizer for the description, seen through her “yeux

dilatés,” while the sudden blast of lightning emphasizes a violent sense of disorientation. The

phrase “l’apparition violâtre d’une cité fantastique” evokes nightmarish hallucinations.

“Apparition” is not only a sudden appearance but also carries the connotations of phantoms and

ghosts, and “fantastique” implies unnatural, imaginary visions. The features of the buildings with

their confusion of colors and lines, the threatening “encaissement” (encasement) and steep sides

of the river are described with words evoking Christine’s sense of disorientation, enclosure and

suffocation. However, her feelings are not the only information the author provides. The

268
See Dictionnaire Littré: “Gueuse” is a familiar term meaning prostitute when used in the feminine
form, but its association with the idea of begging seems to imply lack of means as the motive for the
prostitution. It also implies trickery and dishonesty. Christine will later use this word repeatedly to refer
to her rival, the painted representation of herself in Claude’s last painting. See Section D “une scène de
bataille,” page 157, below.
269
Brady, Zola, 371.
 128

landmarks of the Seine, the quai des Ormes, l’Hôtel de Ville, Saint Paul’s dome and the two

bridges, Pont Marie and Pont Saint-Louis, locate the scene in a very specific part of Paris.270 The

narrative here cannot be purely focused on Christine’s point of view because as a newcomer she

would not be able to name these sites, but Claude knows this part of Paris intimately. Therefore,

although the narrative voice provides the information, the description can be read as a

combination of his knowledge and her emotions. Their lives merge at this moment like the path

of the Seine, flowing swiftly through its deep, black gap and moving towards unknowable

darkness. The frightening storm and the movement of the Seine through the dark city foreshadow

the couple’s ultimate destruction. 271 Additionally, their respective viewpoints will shift, merge,

and diverge throughout the novel like the river’s flow.

The following morning when Claude sketches Christine’s semi-nude body as she sleeps,

the focalization continues to shift between their two perspectives, creating a tense emotional

environment that symbolizes sexual tension between the couple. The visuality of the

descriptions, the primary focus on the painter’s viewpoint, and the slowed pace of the narrative

appeal primarily to stereotypically masculine scopophilic sexual desire. However, Christine has

her own visual perspective and an individual psychological response. From the first word of the

novel to this dramatic moment, the story is fast-paced, with the rapidly shifting perspectives

enhancing the swift progression. However, as Claude gazes at Christine’s exposed flesh, the

narrative slows to linger on a detailed description of her physique and his reaction to it. The

270
Claude’s apartment is on the banks of the Seine, located on the Île Saint-Louis at the north end of the
Rue le Regrattier (formerly known as la rue de La Femme-sans-Tête). See Mitterand, “Étude,” note #2,
1405. The name of the street, which translates to “the headless woman,” also subtly inverts and
foreshadows Claude’s obsession with his drawings of Christine’s head.
271
The Seine becomes an important recurring trope throughout the novel: the couple court along its banks
and Claude becomes morbidly fascinated with the river. The prominent role of the river in Claude’s final
painting is an additional dramatic testament to the Seine’s hold on his imagination.
 129

narrative voice signals a suspension of action when Claude moves aside the screen surrounding

the bed. As soon as he sees Christine, he freezes to contemplate her: “Mais ce qu’il aperçut

l’immobilisa, grave, extasié” (19). Then, the description that follows blends visual ecstasy and

physical defenselessness, simultaneously communicating Claude’s rapture and Christine’s

vulnerability.

La jeune fille, dans la chaleur de serre qui tombait des vitres, venait de
rejeter le drap; et, anéantie sous l’accablement des nuits sans sommeil, elle
dormait, baignée de lumière, si inconsciente, que pas une onde ne passait sur sa
nudité pure. Pendant sa fièvre d’insomnie, les boutons des épaulettes de sa
chemise avaient dû se détacher, toute la manche gauche glissait, découvrant la
gorge. C’était une chair dorée, d’une finesse de soie, le printemps de la chair,
deux petits seins rigides, gonflés de sève, où pointaient deux roses pâles. Elle
avait passé le bras droit sous sa nuque, sa tête ensommeillée se renversait, sa
poitrine confiante s’offrait, dans une adorable ligne d’abandon; tandis que ses
cheveux noirs, dénoués, la vêtaient encore d’un manteau sombre. (19)

The author’s visual description of Christine’s semi-nude body communicates her innocence, her

purity, and the inadvertent exposure of her chest. Had she sought the male gaze, she would not

be the sweet young girl of this atelier seduction fantasy, the virginal ingénue: she would be the

wanton woman, the “gueuse” that Claude suspects her of being. Instead, the narrative describes

the accidental unfastening of her chemise, celebrating “sa nudité pure” and the natural beauty of

her pose. Claude’s perspective provides the painterly details: she is bathed in golden light

(“baignée de lumière” and “dorée”), her nipples are “deux roses pâles,” her body creates “une

adorable ligne d’abandon,” and her dark hair contrasts with the colors of her flesh. The phrases

“la manche gauche glissait” and “une chair dorée, d’une finesse de soie,” contain an abundance

of “s” and “sh” phonèmes. Thus, the words themselves poetically evoke the texture of

Christine’s smooth flesh. The eroticism of the scene is heightened by the contrast between her

youth and the maturity of her body. Claude’s sunlit studio has become a metaphorical

greenhouse where Christine’s beauty blooms. Her “poitrine confiante” offers itself readily, her
 130

breasts become vegetable material, “gonflés,” bursting with sap and “déjà mûrs,” already ripe,

although she is still in the springtime of innocent youth (“le printemps de la chair”). The

description evokes a contrast between the innocence of youth and virginity with the maturity of a

body ready for sexual activity.

The sensory image of the stifling heat of Claude’s studio that “falls” upon Christine (“la

chaleur de serre qui tombait”) juxtaposed with a lexicon of defeat, oppression and

unconsciousness communicates her absolute defenselessness in this moment. The phrase

“anéantie sous l’accablement des nuits sans sommeil” could mean simple exhaustion from lack

of sleep, yet “anéantie” and “l’accablement” carry much stronger meanings: from Littré’s entry

for the verb “anéantir,” we learn that this word means to “devenir à rien” as in the synonyms to

annihilate, to destroy or to ruin, and to “plonger dans un abattement total,” to beat down or to

extinguish. “L’accablement,” related to the verb “accabler,” is to “vaincre, ruiner, faire

succomber,” meaning to vanquish, to ruin, or to oppress. Christine is completely powerless to

prevent the voyeuristic gaze of the artist, which is shared by the reader.

As Claude begins to draw, the narrative proposes his purity of motive, positing a merely

artistic gaze that justifies viewing Christine’s body and sketching without her consent:

Légèrement, Claude courut prendre sa boîte de pastel et une grande feuille de

papier. Puis, accroupi au bord d’une chaise basse, il posa sur ses genoux un
carton, il se mit à dessiner, d’un air profondément heureux. Tout son trouble, sa
curiosité charnelle, son désir combattu, aboutissaient à cet émerveillement
d’artiste, à cet enthousiasme pour les beaux tons et les muscles bien emmanchés.
Déjà, il avait oublié la jeune fille, il était dans le ravissement de la neige des seins,
éclairant l’ambre délicat des épaules. Une modestie inquiète le rapetissait devant
la nature, il serrait les coudes, il redevenait un petit garçon, très sage, attentif et
respectueux. (19)

Here, however, there is a recognition that Claude’s sexual desire (“sa curiosité charnelle”) has

not been eliminated, but instead it is beaten down (“combattu”), suppressed and redirected to
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worshipful contemplation of the model. This interaction between Claude and Christine as he

sketches her demonstrates his primary focus on painting. As Patrick Brady notes, Claude’s art is

more successful when he focuses his sexual energy towards his canvases: “l’on voit aussi que

son art profite de la sublimation de ses désirs.”272 The words “émerveillement,” “enthousiasme,”

and “ravissement” carry connotations of religious adoration, affirming the acceptability of

Claude’s actions. It can even be read as not merely acceptable but admirable: he is fulfilling the

sacred calling of artistic creation. Comparing the artist to “un petit garçon, très sage, attentif et

respectueux” further underlines the purity of his professional intentions. Conversely, in the

descriptions of Christine, her innocence is intended to increase the eroticism of the scene, while

his is used to stress the redirection of his sexual interest. The narrative voice frequently compares

Claude to a child in his relationship to Christine. For example, when Plein Air fails, he cries in

Christine’s lap, feeling “plus débile qu’un enfant” (140). Additionally, Christine will develop

maternal feelings for “son grand enfant d’artiste” (247) that will overshadow her feelings for

their son. The text announces several times in the opening chapters that Claude’s primary

creative and erotic desire is painting, not women, for he mistrusts women: “Ces filles qu’il

chassait de son atelier, il les adorait dans ses tableaux, il les caressait et les violentait, désespéré

jusqu’aux larmes de ne pouvoir les faire assez belles, assez vivantes” (51). For Claude, art is an

act of erotic desire. Therefore, whether or not the character himself is aware of it, his motivations

are simultaneously erotic and artistic as is the language Zola uses to describe them.

During the morning sketching scene, the author creates tension between the stated

dispassionate aims of Claude’s gaze and the visual descriptions within the text. The paragraph

announcing Claude’s chaste intentions is framed on the one side by the visually titillating

272
Brady, Zola, 393.
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description of Christine’s body and on the other by his imagining detailed explanations—all of

them involving a sexual fall from grace—for Christine’s life circumstances. Ironically, it is

Christine’s air of innocence that fuels Claude’s fantasies of her supposed debauchery as he

envisions elaborate scenarios of “des perversions ingénues et extraordinaires” (20). Claude

decides she is too fresh and youthful-looking to be the “gueuse” he originally suspected her to

be. He does not believe her story of the train crash and the rapacious cab driver, so he tries to

guess what the truth might be: “Et il imaginait d’autres histoires: une débutante tombée à Paris

avec un amant, qui l’avait lâchée; ou bien une petite bourgeoise débauchée par une amie, n’osant

rentrer chez ses parents; ou encore un drame plus compliqué [...]” (20). To support the belief that

Claude’s gaze is dispassionate, the narrative offers the following sentence: “Déjà, il avait oublié

la jeune fille, il était dans le ravissement de la neige des seins, éclairant l’ambre délicat des

épaules” (19). Forgetting the individuality of the young woman before him seems to suggest that

he is not invested in her personally and is instead entirely focused on the shapes and colors of her

body. Yet, from this moment forward, he never forgets about her. The action of the narrative

recycles back to this scene through repeated references to the sketches from the “lendemain,” the

figure in Plein Air that is based on them, and future posing sessions for the same painting—all of

them based on Claude’s brief matinal viewing of Christine’s exposed chest.

The focalization continues to move between Claude and Christine until she agrees to

resume the pose. While he sketches, she looks at him and studies his studio space. The model

therefore returns the artist’s gaze and evaluates his appearance and behavior. The alternating

focalization in the narrative voice during the “lendemain” demonstrates significant differences

between Claude’s and Christine’s experiences of the event. Each character’s personality and

emotions infuse the narrative voice as the point of view shifts. Thus, Zola establishes
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complementary narratives which will interweave throughout the text. When Claude sketches

Christine’s semi-nude body as she sleeps, he assumes he has the right to look at her. His artistic

curiosity is paramount. Therefore, he does not hesitate to study her exposed body at length and

does not consider how she might feel about the situation. From his perspective, he rescued her,

he is not touching or hurting her, he is being generous, and she owes him this favor of helping

him with his art. He becomes angry when she cries and covers herself upon awakening,

demanding she allow him to continue. He is frustrated that her modesty impedes his gaze: “la

pruderie de cette fille l'empêcherait d’avoir une bonne étude pour son tableau” (21). As he tells

her: “[…] écoutez, ce n’est pas très gentil de me refuser ce service, car enfin, je vous ai

ramassée, vous avez couché dans mon lit” (21). Although as she continues crying, he eventually

stops scolding her and instead begins to plead, he demonstrates that he does not see her as an

individual, only as inspiration for his painting. He will remain true to this characteristic

throughout the novel.

Christine, on the other hand, initially experiences Claude’s gaze as a violation.

Upon awakening in a strange place and seeing an unknown man “la mangeant des yeux,”

like Claude who froze when he first looked past the screen to see her lying in bed,

Christine is similarly paralyzed with emotion:

Et une stupeur la paralysa, ce lieu inconnu, ce garçon en manches de chemise,

accroupi devant elle, la mangeant des yeux. Puis, dans un élan éperdu, elle
ramena la couverture, elle l’écrasa de ses deux bras sur sa gorge, le sang fouetté
d’une telle angoisse pudique, que la rougeur ardente de ses joues coula jusqu’à la
pointe de ses seins, en un flot rose. (20)

The narrative voice emphasizes Christine’s “angoisse pudique,” the anguish of a modest woman

who has neither chosen to expose her body nor consented to the masculine gaze. The sudden

blush of “rougeur ardente” that flows from her cheeks to the tips of her breasts indicates her
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innocence and inexperience, especially when contrasted with the images of sexual debauchery

and perversion Claude entertains while she sleeps. Claude’s anger understandably increases

Christine’s initial fear as she sobs uncontrollably. However, establishing a pattern of overlooking

his violent outbursts that will persist throughout their relationship, Christine accepts Claude’s

unspoken apology when he pleads with her, begging her to let him draw “La tête, rien que la

tête” (21). Seeing that he has not moved and that he has no intention of physically assaulting her,

she relaxes and resumes her original pose.

At this point, the narrative shifts to Christine’s perspective while she looks at Claude.

Having calmed her initial shock upon finding herself exposed to his gaze, she decides to trust

him and is beginning to find him attractive: “Il n’était pas laid pourtant, elle découvrait au fond

de ses yeux bruns une grande tendresse” (22). Yet, her fear has not disappeared but is instead

projected onto the studio space and the objects within it. The narrative marks the shift to her

point of view, referring directly to her eyes and her surreptitious gaze between half-closed

eyelids: “Et, entre ses paupières demi-closes, elle l’étudiait à son tour” (22). Zola’s description of

Christine’s view of the studio is filled with words from a lexicon of violence, fear, disorder and

discomfort (emphasized in bold print below):

L’atelier, il est vrai, continuait à l’effarer un peu. Elle y jetait des regards
prudents, stupéfaite d’un tel désordre et d’un tel abandon. Devant le poêle, les
cendres du dernier hiver s’amoncelaient encore. Outre le lit, la petite table de
toilette et le divan, il n’y avait d’autres meubles qu’une vieille armoire de chêne
disloquée, et qu’une grande table de sapin, encombrée de pinceaux, de couleurs,
d’assiettes sales, d’une lampe à esprit-de-vin, sur laquelle était restée une
casserole, barbouillée de vermicelle. Des chaises dépaillées se débandaient,
parmi des chevalets boiteux. Près du divan, la bougie de la veille traînait par
terre, dans un coin du parquet, qu’on devait balayer tous les mois […]. Mais ce
dont elle s’effrayait surtout, c’était des esquisses pendues aux murs, sans cadres,
un flot épais d’esquisses qui descendait jusqu’au sol, où il s’amassait en un
éboulement de toiles jetées pêle-mêle. Jamais elle n’avait vu une si terrible
peinture, rugueuse, éclatante, d’une violence de tons qui la blessait comme un
juron de charretier, entendu sur la porte d’une auberge. Elle baissait les yeux,
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attirée pourtant par un tableau retourné, le grand tableau auquel travaillait le

peintre, et qu’il poussait chaque soir vers la muraille, afin de le mieux juger le
lendemain, dans la fraîcheur du premier coup d’œil. Que pouvait-il cacher, celui-
là, pour qu’on n’osât même pas le montrer ? Et, au travers de la vaste pièce, la
nappe de brûlant soleil, tombée des vitres, voyageait, sans être tempérée par le
moindre store, coulant ainsi qu’un or liquide sur tous ces débris de meuble, dont
elle accentuait l’insoucieuse misère. (22-3, italics and bold print added)

The verb “effarer,” meaning to alarm or to frighten, sets the tone for the description that follows.

Just as the room itself is piled with objects, the paragraph uses a multitude of adjectives

describing the “désordre” and the items that are strewn about (“débandaient,” “traînait,”

“s’amoncelaient”), broken (“disloquée,” “dépaillées,” “boiteux”), dirty (“sales,” “barbouillée de

vermicelle”), piled up (“s’amoncelaient,” “encombrée”), and generally tossed haphazardly

around the studio (“jetées pêle-mêle”). The word “abandon” used previously to describe

Christine’s relaxed pose now carries the connotation of slovenly indifference and the same

unfiltered sunlight that enhanced her beauty accentuates the filth in the studio. Additionally, the

description of Claude’s atelier fits the myth of the bohemian artist, living on the verge of

starvation and obsessed with his work to the point of forgetting his environment. As Jacques

Lethève explains, the nineteenth-century Parisian bourgeois idea of the typical artist’s studio

included the belief that "in such a diabolically wicked place [one] could catch a whiff of

adventure, of unbridled freedom, even debauchery” (56). Or even perhaps that one could enter

the studio and “[…] surprise that mysterious process of transmutation which transformed base

matter, be it clay or pigment, into a work of art" (56). Zola’s portrait of Claude’s studio, tinted

with Christine’s displaced trepidation as she poses semi-nude, effectively communicates the

sense of freedom seasoned with a soupçon of decadence that readers expected.

A final element of Christine’s experience is her emotional reaction to Claude’s artwork.

In the phrase “Mais ce dont elle s’effrayait surtout,” the author uses the verb “effrayait,” which is
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related to “effarer” used previously in the same paragraph. They are similar not only phonetically

but, in their meanings, both related also to the nouns “frayeur” and “effroi.” Here, the verb

includes the reflexive “se” emphasizing the internal reaction of suddenly becoming frightened or

terrified. Zola used vocabulary from the same family in the description of Christine’s view of the

river as her eyes were dilated with “effarement.” Her view of the artwork shares other

similarities with her perception of the river. The overabundance of details assaults her senses.

The sketches and canvases flow down the walls and spread across the floor. Claude’s painting

style is “rugueu[x],” an adjective to describe a rough and irregular surface. To Christine’s eyes,

the canvases are explosive, violent, and offensive. The lightning that lit the river scene, the

“éclair,” is similar to the “éclatante” (shocking) colors and shapes in Claude’s paintings.

Discontinuity between her decision that she can trust Claude, her consent to allow him to paint

her, her growing attraction to him, and her uneasy feelings about the studio and artwork create

tension, evoking an erotically charged atmosphere.

The free indirect style of narration includes a phrase in this paragraph that is not

consistent with Christine as focalizer. The phrase is italicized in the paragraph above and cited

again here: “[…] le grand tableau auquel travaillait le peintre, et qu’il poussait chaque soir vers

la muraille, afin de le mieux juger le lendemain, dans la fraîcheur du premier coup d’œil.”

Similar to the author’s technique in the outdoor description of Paris, this information about

Claude’s purpose for keeping the canvas turned towards the wall is not something Christine

would know. The narration then moves directly, without marking the shift, to a citation of

Christine’s thoughts: “Que pouvait-il cacher, celui-là, pour qu’on n’osât même pas le montrer?”

The rapid shift in perspective increases the reader’s experience of instability and echoes

Christine’s sense of cautious curiosity. Her uneasy interest compels her further exploration of
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Claude and his atelier, engaging the reader and advancing the plot. Just as in the opening scene

the narrative reveals her emotions through the description of Paris, her feelings are displaced

onto Claude’s studio and her perspective infuses the text. The fragmented focalization Zola uses

to describe Christine’s first nude pose represents the individual subjectivity of both artist and

model, reconfiguring the erotic gaze to invite a multiplicity of readers.

B: Christine “dans son néant” (114): The Second Nude Scene

In the chapter leading to the first time Christine poses fully nude, Christine and Claude

spend more time together and their lives become intertwined. The narrative focalization reflects

the shift in their relationship and echoes the events of the plot. This strategy values the feminine

perspective and positions Christine as a partner in the creative process. The fourth chapter begins

with Christine’s first surprise visit to the atelier. As her visits become more regular, the couple’s

attachment increases. She agrees, mid-chapter, to pose again, but only for the head of the figure

in Claude’s large salon canvas. The suspense builds as Claude’s inability to complete the

painting without her creates a growing professional need for access to her body, while the

couple’s mutual attraction increases simultaneously. The chapter ends climatically when

Christine poses fully nude for the complete figure. Artistic and erotic desire blur for both Claude

and Christine: true to the studio romance, painting and sex are inextricably intertwined yet

inevitably incompatible. For Claude, he cares most about painting, but his attraction to Christine

invades the art: she is “la nouvelle passion qui l'envahissait” (109). He becomes obsessed,

thinking of nothing but his need for her body, linked erotically and artistically: “Au fond de lui,

maintenant, une pensée unique montait: obtenir d’elle qu’elle consentît à poser la figure entière”
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(112). For Christine, her opinion of Claude’s artwork softens as her affection for him blooms.

Initially, she continues to find his paintings offensive. Some of them bother her because of their

subject matter—the nudes from his student days, for example (“l’anatomie terriblement exacte

des études”) (92). More significantly, Claude’s painterly style both disturbs and attracts her. She

feels fearful looking at “la peinture féroce” and “les flamboyantes esquisses du Midi” (92).

However, over time Christine becomes accustomed to Claude’s canvases (109). She begins to

empathize with his stormy emotional response to his daily successes or failures at the easel, and

because she loves the man, she loves the paintings: “elle en venait à leur découvrir des qualités,

pour les aimer aussi un peu” (111). Thus, both painter and model project their emotions onto the

canvas: it is a product of their union.

As the couple’s connection grows and the story moves closer to the climatic moment

when Christine will choose to reveal her body, Zola constructs the text to communicate the

confluence of their desires with a confluence of grammatical structures and literary devices. The

scene in question merits citing at length here. Relevant pronouns are in bold print, with the plural

ones also italicized for emphasis:

Et, pourtant, un soir, comme il s’apprêtait à la reconduire et qu’elle remettait son

chapeau, les bras en l’air, ils restèrent deux seconds les yeux dans les yeux, lui
frémissant devant les pointes des seins relevés qui crevaient l’étoffe, elle si
brusquement sérieuse, si pâle, qu’il se sentit deviné. Le long des quais, ils
parlèrent à peine: cette chose demeura entre eux, pendant que le soleil se
couchait, dans un ciel couleur de vieux cuivre. À deux autres reprises, il lut, au
fond de son regard, qu’elle savait sa continuelle pensée. En effet, depuis qu’il y
songeait, elle s’était mise à y songer aussi, malgré elle, l’attention éveillée par des
allusions involontaires. La peur même qu’il osât le demander ne lui vint pas; elle
le connaissait bien à présent, elle l’aurait faire taire d’un souffle, avant qu’il eût
bégayé les premiers mots [...]
Des jours s’écoulèrent; et, entre eux, l’idée fixe grandissait. Dès qu’ils se
trouvaient ensemble, ils ne pouvaient plus ne pas y penser. [...] Bientôt, rien
d’autre ne resta dans leur vie de camarades. [...] Et ce qu’ils avaient évité jusque-
là, le trouble de leur liaison; l’éveil de l’homme et de la femme dans leur bonne
amitié, éclatait enfin, sous l’évocation constante de cette nudité vierge. Peu à peu,
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ils se découvraient une fièvre secrète, ignorée d’eux-mêmes. Des chaleurs leur
montaient aux joues, ils rougissaient pour s’être frôlés du doigt. C’était désormais
comme une excitation de chaque minute, fouettant leur sang ; tandis que, dans cet
envahissement de tout leur être, le tourment de ce qu’ils taisaient ainsi, sans
pouvoir se le cacher, s’exagérait au point qu’ils en étouffaient, la poitrine gonflée
de grands soupirs. (113)

In this sequence, which occurs right before the nude scene, the focalization of the narrative

initially shifts between Claude and Christine as they both think incessantly about his desire for

her to pose. In the first paragraph, Zola uses primarily third person singular pronouns, alternating

between the masculine and feminine as the perspectives change. Then, the plural pronouns begin

to appear. “Ils” and “eux” occur a few times at the beginning and by the second paragraph the

narrative has moved entirely to the third person plural. Additionally, the details Zola provides in

the first paragraph combine images and language of both art and love. In the second paragraph

the author emphasizes his characters’ physical responses, further emphasizing their growing

attraction, and adding to the building sexual tension. Details demonstrating Claude’s painterly

perspective include the shape of Christine’s breasts and the way her clothing stretches around

them (“les pointes des seins relevés qui crevaient l’étoffe”) and the sun setting in a copper sky

(“le soleil se couchait, dans un ciel couleur de vieux cuivre”). When the focus is Christine’s point

of view, the text emphasizes her emotional connection to Claude; her ability to guess his

thoughts and her confidence that she can read him well enough to prevent him from speaking his

request (“La peur même qu’il osât le demander ne lui vint pas; elle le connaissait bien à présent,

elle l’aurait faire taire d’un souffle, avant qu’il eût bégayé les premiers mots.”). Thus, Christine’s

subjectivity again affects the course of the novel.

The imperfect tense is prevalent in the second paragraph, communicating repetition and

the passage of time. Zola emphasizes bodily experiences, beginning with “l’évocation constante

de cette nudité vierge.” Images of blood and heat dominate, symbolic of erotic desire: “une
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fièvre,” “des chaleurs,” “ils rougissaient,” and “leur sang.” Zola mentions specific body parts and

physical responses. Recalling Christine’s initial “rougeur ardente” on the morning of the

“lendemain,” their cheeks blush at the brush of a finger (“Des chaleurs leur montaient aux joues,

ils rougissaient pour s’être frôlés du doigt.”); their blood is whipped up with excitement (“une

excitation de chaque minute, fouettant leur sang”); their chests heave with emotional sighs (la

poitrine gonflée de grands soupirs”); and their feelings invade their entire being (“cet

envahissement de tout leur être”). The couple’s thoughts and desires are merging, flowing

together inexorably like the waters of the Seine reuniting beyond the Île de la Cité. The text itself

thus enacts on the linguistic level the events of the plot. Christine’s perspective, her desires, and

her bodily responses are equally important to Claude’s, woven into the novel on every level. This

strategy represents Christine as far more than the stereotypical passive model.

The first time Christine poses fully nude for the female figure in Claude’s Salon painting,

Plein Air, Zola deploys a network of narrative and literary devices that communicate her

perspective and demonstrate her importance to the novel itself. The author constructs this posing

scene as a spiritual union of painter and model, casting Christine as a necessary partner in the

creative process. Yet, the shifting narrative focus between Christine’s perspective and Claude’s

creates an unsettling atmosphere of coexisting contrasts because each has his or her unique

response to this experience. For Claude, the moment is a spiritual merging of erotic and artistic

bliss. To communicate Claude’s perspective, Zola includes vocabulary of religious experience as

well as erotically charged details, such as the shape of Christine’s breasts (115). However, for

Christine, undressing her own body is not an inherently erotic experience, nor is she interested in

the artistic process for its own sake as is Claude. The reader sees Christine’s step-by-step

removal of her clothing through her perspective. This narrative strategy redirects the visual
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sexual energy that could otherwise create a strip scene. Zola invites the reader to imagine the

model’s body rather than describing it in detail, thus subtly increasing the eroticism of the text.

Using Christine’s perspective also allows Zola to describe her motives and her growing jealousy.

She poses to solidify her connection to Claude, to assert her role in the creation of the artwork,

and to reclaim Claude’s distorted representation of her body. In posing, Christine chooses to

become an object of spiritual, artistic, and erotic contemplation. Her choice advances both

Claude’s career and the plot of the novel. Claude completes Plein Air on time to submit it to the

Salon, although it is instead displayed later at the Salon des refusés. At this point they have not

yet consummated their relationship, but the emotional intensity of the experience increases the

couple’s intimacy, cementing their connection to one another through the creation of the canvas.

The male painter and the female model represent complementary sides of the human

reproductive binary that serves as the novel’s primary metaphor of the creative act. Thus, Plein

Air and the text itself are both products of their union.

Claude’s appeal to Christine becomes a prayer of supplication, and her choice to pose is

both an act of devotion and divine intervention. As the Salon nears and his painting is still

unfinished, Claude’s despair grows. He has worked and reworked the central female figure so

many times it has lost its resemblance to Christine, and attempting to paint the figure’s body

using another model has increased the distortions: “la tête, si fine, disait-il, ne s’emmanchait

point sur [des] épaules canailles” (112). Finally, it is clear he will fail without her, but Claude

does not have the courage to ask Christine to pose:

Les yeux brûlants dont il la regardait disaient clairement : « Ah ! il y a

vous, ah! ce serait le miracle attendu, le triomphe certain, si vous me faisiez ce
suprême sacrifice! Je vous implore, je vous le demande, comme à une amie
adorée, la plus belle, la plus chaste! »
Elle, toute droite, très blanche, entendait chaque mot; et ces yeux
d’ardente prière exerçaient sur elle une puissance. Sans hâte, elle ôta son chapeau
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et sa pelisse; puis, simplement, elle continua du même geste calme, dégrafa le

corsage, le retira ainsi que le corset, abattit les jupons, déboutonna les épaulettes
de la chemise, qui glissa sur les hanches. Elle n’avait pas prononcé une parole,
elle semblait autre part, comme les soirs, où, enfermée dans sa chambre, perdue
au fond de quelque rêve, elle se déshabillait machinalement, sans y prêter
attention. Pourquoi donc laisser une rivale donner son corps, quand elle avait déjà
donné sa face ? Elle voulait être là tout entière, chez elle, dans sa tendresse, en
comprenant enfin quel malaise jaloux ce monstre bâtard lui causait depuis
longtemps. Et, toujours muette, nue et vierge, elle se coucha sur le divan, prit la
pose, un bras sous la tête, les yeux fermés. (114-15)

The narrative voice speaks for Claude as if he says the words, yet it is the look of “ardente

prière” in his eyes that Christine reads. With the words “prière,” “miracle,” and “sacrifice,” Zola

introduces the language of religion, echoing the spiritual metaphors invoked when Claude first

sketched Christine. Christine therefore becomes simultaneously a sacrificial virgin and an adored

goddess.273

Zola creates an atmosphere of hushed calm to enhance the sense of sacred space. From

the moment Christine begins to undress, all sound is suspended and movement slowed, signaling

this experience as something extraordinary: “Elle n’avait pas prononcé une parole, elle semblait

autre part” (114). Mentioning her virginity as she lies upon the sofa and strikes the pose,

“toujours muette, nue et vierge,” compares her to a virgin sacrifice (114). Time expands, calm

and quiet prevail. Christine remains still while Claude works passionately for three hours.

Compared with her discomfort and shame during the “lendemain,” here, Christine is calm: “Il ne

remua pas, elle ne souffla pas, faisant le don de sa pudeur, sans un frisson, sans une gêne” (115).

Claude’s heart beats “comme devant une nudité religieuse,” and Christine passes the time

silently, seemingly lost in another world “dans son néant de beau marbre, avec le sourire

mystérieux et figé de la pose” (115). The silence between them remains unbroken, even as

Christine’s name may also evoke that of Jesus Christ, adding to the textual references to her symbolic
273

martyrdom.
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Claude kisses Christine on the forehead before she leaves (115). The act of undressing thus

metaphorically transports Christine “into the ethereal world of art” that the Goncourts sought to

evoke in Manette Salomon.274 Zola, unlike the Goncourts, creates a spiritual environment during

Christine’s second nude pose, neither eliminating nor overtly emphasizing “any notion of the

erotically voyeuristic.”275 Zola’s use of religious metaphors to describe Claude’s experience in

the second nude scene along with the prevailing sense of quiet stillness create an otherworldly

ambiance.

As she undresses, Christine is the focalizer for the narrative voice and Zola uses

ambivalent language and imagery to represent her multifaceted emotions, her deliberate actions,

and her motives for posing. He also uses plot events, language, and images to connect this scene

to le “lendemain,” creating an erotic undertone. The author could have simply written “Christine

undressed slowly and then lay on the divan.” Instead, he describes the step-by-step process as

she undresses. This strategy slows the narrative pace, focusing the reader’s attention on

Christine’s smallest action. For Christine, the removal of her garments is an everyday occurrence

and the body revealed is her own. Therefore, the narrative offers no detailed description of her

physique because the events are told from her perspective. However, the author names each item

of clothing in order as Christine removes it, from her outer wraps to her underskirts, and, finally,

her chemise. The text thus invites readers to imagine the unveiling of her body, adding an erotic

tone to the scene.276 Zola also infuses a note of otherworldly experience in her dissociated

274
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 175.
275
Dolan, “Musée Goncourt,” 175.
276
The concept of clothing inherently includes the body parts covered by that clothing and vice-versa:
“Since the erotic awareness of the body always contains an awareness of clothing, images of bodies that
aim to emphasize their sexual nature will make use of this link.” (A. Hollander, Seeing, 88.)
 144

automatized (“machinalement”) behavior. The ambiance seems almost supernatural, as if

Claude’s eyes have cast a spell upon her (“ces yeux d’ardente prière exerçaient sur elle une

puissance”) (114). Rather than being asleep, as she was when Claude first sketched her body, she

is awake but seems lost in a dream. Unlike the awkward removal of her rain-drenched clothing

during the first night in Claude’s atelier, here she is undressing purposefully. The quotidian, the

mystical, and the erotic blur as she removes her outer clothing “sans hâte,” undressing

“simplement,” and “du même geste calme,” taking off her dress, then her undergarments

“machinalement, sans y prêter attention,” as she would if she were “enfermée dans sa chambre”

(114). Each of these words emphasize her slow, deliberate actions and communicate purposeful

choice. Additionally, Zola repeats vocabulary and imagery from the “lendemain” scene,

activating a subtle erotic echo between these two parts of the novel. When Christine undoes her

shoulder straps and lets fall her last piece of clothing, the vocabulary and imagery recalls the

“lendemain” sequence when Christine’s chemise had accidently slipped from her body as she

slept. In the first nude scene, “le lendemain,” Zola writes: “les boutons des épaulettes de sa

chemise avaient dû se détacher, toute la manche gauche glissait, découvrant la gorge” (67,

emphasis added). The related sentence from the second nude scene, reads as follows: “[Elle]

déboutonna les épaulettes de la chemise, qui glissa sur les hanches” (114, emphasis added).”

However, in the second scene the unveiled body part, “les hanches” (hips), is even more

evocative than “la gorge” (chest/breasts) because it communicates her complete nakedness. The

narrative thus contains sexual and spiritual elements, but it emphasizes Christine’s choice to give

Claude the gift of her nudity.

Christine’s feelings about posing for Plein Air and about the figure within it are complex

and evolve throughout the story. Zola carefully constructs an opposition between Christine and
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Claude’s painted representation of her.277 Christine’s fascination with posing for Claude and her

simultaneous jealousy of his obsessive devotion to his art are therefore essential to the logical

development of the novel. Her discontent grows as the text progresses, culminating in the final

“scène de bataille” between Christine and the painting when she demands that Claude choose

between them. She dislikes the painted version of herself from the first time she sees it, during

her second visit to Claude’s atelier. He has used the sketches made of her asleep “le lendemain”

to inspire the figure’s face and body. Christine feels violated when she recognizes herself in the

painting, partially because she feels as if her own nudity is exposed, and partially because the

brutality of Claude’s colors and brushstrokes shocks her:

Christine, tout de suite, se reconnut. C’était elle, cette fille, vautrée dans l’herbe
[…]. Cette fille nue avait son visage, et une révolte la soulevait, comme si elle
avait eu son corps, comme si, brutalement, l’on eût déshabillé là toute sa nudité
vierge. Elle était surtout blessée par l’emportement de la peinture, si rude, qu’elle
s’en trouvait violentée, la chair meurtrie. (92-3)

Christine identifies with the figure, experiencing the painting as if the physical surface of the

paint and the exposed body were an extension of her own “comme si elle avait eu son corps,”

Yet, she also instinctively understands the woman on the canvas as her enemy (93). She feels

similarly when she sees Plein Air hanging at the Salon des Refusés while the Paris crowds laugh

and jeer: “C’était elle qu'on sifflait ainsi, c’était sur sa nudité que crachaient les gens (...)” (140).

During her next visit, two months later, the figure no longer looks like her and she feels

embarrassed at her initial response: “Non, ce n’était pas elle, cette fille n’avait ni son visage ni

son corps: comment avait-elle pu se reconnaître, dans cet épouvantable gâchis de couleurs?”

(94). The figure is disturbingly like her, but even more disturbingly unlike her. She is

increasingly unhappy the more her likeness disappears because she senses the distortions as an

277
Robert J. Niess, “Antithesis and ‘Reprise’ in Zola’s L’Œuvre,” L’Esprit Créateur 4, no. 2, (1964): 70.
 146

indication of distance between her and Claude: “Ne l’aimait-il pas, qu’il la laissait ainsi sortir de

son œuvre?” (110). Claude’s mention of trying another model again in the hopes that he can

finish Plein Air on time sparks Christine’s jealousy. The narration recounts her thoughts directly:

“Pourquoi donc laisser une rivale donner son corps, quand elle avait déjà donné sa face?” (114).

She therefore sees other models as potential rivals for Claude’s attention as well as competition

for her place in the painting. She wants to banish all other women from Claude’s studio and from

his canvases. However, she also understands the figure itself as a threat, particularly because its

unrecognizable features are so close to her own: “Elle voulait être là tout entière, chez elle, dans

sa tendresse, en comprenant enfin quel malaise jaloux ce monstre bâtard lui causait depuis

longtemps” (114). In her desire to be “chez elle,” she wishes to reclaim her body and Claude’s

representation of it, seeking to dispel a distorted, strange, and horrifying version of herself, “ce

monstre bâtard.” Thus, her motivations for posing are to establish her connection to Claude, to

validate her role as the model for his painting, and to repossess the image of her body.

The narrative tone changes when the focalization moves to Claude, likewise shifting the

reader’s perception of Christine. Zola infuses the paragraph with artistic, spiritual, and erotic

imagery to communicate Claude’s emotional state. From Claude’s point of view, Christine’s

identity as a human individual—the very thing she wishes to assert with her choice to pose—is

already entirely merged with the ideal image he wishes to create. The first few sentences

describe Claude’s response as he watches her undress. A slippage of pronoun referents occurs in

the following citation, which begins the paragraph: “Saisi, immobile de joie, lui la regarda se

dévêtir. Il la retrouvait. La vision rapide, tant de fois évoquée, redevenait vivante.” (115). The

first time the reader sees the pronoun “la,” it clearly refers to Christine as she undresses. In the

second sentence, the reader initially assumes “la” still refers to Christine, but discovers, upon
 147

reading the third sentence, that it might refer instead to “la vision rapide.” Claude’s recalled

image of Christine based on his sketches from the “lendemain” is “la vision rapide.” The word

“vision” activates a chain of meanings that refer to sight, the prophecies of spiritual seers, and

supernatural or imaginary projections. Claude’s “vision” of Christine is clouded by his artistic

ambition; he sees his image of her, not her as herself. This time, unlike the first night when

Christine undressed uncomfortably behind a screen, Claude can see her as she slowly and

deliberately disrobes. However, like the painters in Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” who

could not truly see Gilette, Claude is blind to the woman before him.

Christine’s transformation into an object of art, spiritual though it may be from Claude’s

perspective, is tinged with eroticism that obscures her identity. The narrative voice recalls the

“lendemain” scene again, blurring artistic and sexual imagery to demonstrate Claude’s

redirection of his erotic desires into painting. The description of Christine's young body repeats

Claude’s words in both scenes. On the first morning, Claude’s thoughts become part of the free

indirect narrative as he gazes at Christine asleep: “Un peu mince, un peu grêle d’enfance, mais

si souple, d’une jeunesse si fraîche ! Et, avec ça, des seins déjà mûrs. Où diable la cachait-elle,

la veille, cette gorge-là, qu’il ne l’avait pas devinée?” (19). Zola reprises the same ideas and

some of the same phrasing when Claude again sees Christine’s body as he watches her undress:

“C’était cette enfance, grêle encore, mais si souple, d’une jeunesse si fraîche; et il s’étonnait

de nouveau: où cachait-elle cette gorge épanouie, qu’on ne soupçonnait point sous la robe?”

(115). Claude’s surprise at her ample breasts when her body is thin (“grêle,” “mince”)

symbolizes Christine’s double role of self-sacrificing partner and passionate lover. 278 Her face is

278
Zola frequently used physiognomy, or the idea that physical qualities can reveal the personalities of his
characters. He emphasizes Christine’s lips, chin and jaw when her sensual side is most dominant. Her
generous breasts likewise symbolize her sensuality. (Brady, Zola, 381-3.)
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also dual, both sensual and tender: “dont les mâchoires un peu massives et sensuelles s’étaient

noyées sous l’apaisement tendre du front et des joues” (115).279 The author again contrasts

Christine’s youth and virginal innocence with her fully mature body, symbolically inviting the

reader to visually deflower her. Claude’s artistic ability becomes sexual prowess: he is inspired,

working frantically for three hours in a burst of “effort si viril” that he is able to paint the full

figure in this one session (115). However, Christine is so still she barely seems to breathe (“elle

ne souffla pas”) seeming to be made of marble, opening her eyes only briefly:

Seulement, de temps à autre, elle ouvrait ses yeux clairs, les fixait sur un point
vague de l’espace, restait ainsi un instant sans qu’il pût rien y lire de ses pensées,
puis le refermait, retombait dans son néant de beau marbre, avec le sourire
mystérieux et figé de la pose. (115)

Comparing Christine to a sculpture (“beau marbre”) as she poses is similar to the Goncourts’

description of Manette standing in “la pose de ce marbre du Louvre qu’on appelle le Génie du

repos éternel” (262). Furthermore, the evocation of a living female sculpture recalls the

Pygmalion myth. Ovid’s Pygmalion, like Claude, is fearful and distrustful of women yet

passionately desires them; he falls in love with his own ideal creation as a way of managing

those two conflicting urges.280 While Christine is lying quietly on the divan, her body naked and

exposed, her voice is silent and her thoughts are hidden. Although she opens her eyes, the

narrative does not move to her perspective. Instead, the reader remains in Claude’s emotional

world, where the ideal woman is present merely as an image for him to paint, “une nudité

religieuse” (115). She has no needs, makes no demands, merely gives herself to him “faisant le

don de sa pudeur” (115). Like Pygmalion and Balzac’s Frenhofer, Claude desires to create art so

279
Claude’s face also reflects duality because his childlike eyes contradict his heavy beard and strong
eyebrows. (Niess, Zola, 220).
280
Niess, Zola, 219.
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realistic that it seems alive; yet, to create the artificial representation on canvas, he needs the

living, breathing woman to become still and mute--metaphorically lifeless. Her briefly open eyes

indicate her consciousness, yet as soon as she closes them again, she returns “dans son néant de

beau marbre” (115). The word “néant” denotes an empty state of nothingness (“le non-être,”

“l'état d'une âme vide de sentiments et d'affections,” and “nullité, obscurité d'une personne.”281 It

is also the root of the word “anéantie,” which the author used to describe Christine on the first

morning when she was sleeping “anéantie sous l’accablement des nuits sans sommeil” (19).

Thus, in another callback to “le lendemain,” Zola skillfully communicates Claude’s emotional

state and foreshadows the couple’s fate, their eventual destruction. For, in this moment, Christine

fulfills the stereotypical role of the model in the studio romance, giving of herself willingly to the

point of allowing her own identity, thoughts, and desires to be nullified.

While Claude is working, Christine is simply a beautiful model posing, and her nudity is

a sacred sacrifice to art. But as soon as he is done painting, she is merely naked, and they both

suddenly become awkward. Although he watched Christine as she undressed carefully, and he

studied her body as she lay on the divan for three hours, Claude hurries to turn his face to the

wall while she dresses rapidly. The narrative voice refers again to the “lendemain” when

Christine blushed upon awakening “jusqu’à la pointe de ses seins” (20), noting that Christine is

“très rouge” as she dresses, pulling her sleeves down and raising her collar “pour ne plus laisser

un seul coin de sa peau nue” (115). Christine’s suddenly reawakened modesty recalls the

behavior of the model in Ingres’ studio who ran for her clothing when a workman was gaping at

her through the window (261). The reason for her nakedness changes as soon as Claude puts

down his brushes. While she was posing “Tous deux sentaient que, s’ils disaient une seule

281
Littré, entry “néant.”
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phrase, une grande honte leur viendrait” (115). The narrative voice explains that Claude and

Christine maintain their silence even after she has dressed because their throats are closed with

“une émotion qui les empêcha encore de parler,” and they are both overcome with “une tristesse

infinie […] comme s’ils venaient de gâter leur existence, de toucher le fond de la misère

humaine” (115). This mysterious sadness can be understood as “une grande honte,” a resurgence

of “pudeur,” meaning modesty, or chastity—when referring to a woman.282 Littré’s definition of

“honte” (shame) includes “pudeur” as a near synonym and offers this succinct definition of both:

“Les reproches de la conscience causent de la honte. Les sentiments de modestie produisent la

pudeur.”283 The feeling of “honte” is therefore a natural consequence of sacrificing one’s

“pudeur,” as Christine does. However, both Christine and Claude experience this metaphorical

post-coital tristesse after their artistic union. Perhaps Claude feels such deep shame knowing that

he has “already betrayed Christine, using the beauty of her body for another purpose than for the

act of love, the only legitimate one.”284 He has also ascended the heights of aesthetic bliss while

she posed, blending his sexual and artistic urges for a brief time to create “une ébauche superbe,”

thus the return to ordinary life is disorienting. Claude’s limited experience with women also

means his “pudeur” and shyness are part of his response. Significantly, the narrative voice uses

neither character’s names during the posing scene, talking about the couple using only pronouns.

However, as soon as Claude is done painting, both names appear in the text. 285 This suggests that

282
Littré, entry “pudeur.”
283
Littré, entry “pudeur.”
284
M. Hemmings, cited in Brady, Zola, 381
285
“Claude, d’un geste, dit qu’il avait fini; et, redevenu gauche, il bouscula une chaise pour tourner le dos
plus vite; tandis que, très rouge, Christine quittait le divan” (115).
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both their identities are temporarily submerged and resurface as soon as the posing session is

over. Claude, as mentioned above, prefers to interact with women only in his paintings, never

inviting them into his studio except to paint them and then immediately banishing them. 286

However, when he allows Christine to enter, to remain, and then to return to his atelier, he

symbolically opens himself to relating to her as a subject—a person whose inner being he cannot

fully know or understand—rather than merely as an object for him to study and paint.287 Her

modeling is not a professional interaction, which would allow him to keep her at a distance: it is

a gift made to him as a result of her very subjectivity—her desire and her conscious choice.

When her subjectivity returns as the posing session ends, his discomfort with women reappears

as well. Furthermore, the couple’s sense of having tapped into “le fond de la misère humaine''

foreshadows their tragic destruction, just as their eyelids swollen with tears (“leurs paupières se

gonflèrent de larmes”) predict the years of weeping Christine will endure (“En dix ans, je ne me

souviens pas d’avoir vécu une journée sans larmes'' [344]) and presage the macabre image of

Claude’s grossly protruding and bleeding eyes staring at his final canvas as his body hangs

before it (352). Claude’s and Christine’s overwhelming sadness when the painting session is over

is another indication of their sexual investment in the painting’s creation: they both respond

emotionally as if they have had intercourse.

The narrative suspense builds towards the moment of Christine’s posing as if the couple

were going to consummate their relationship, leading the reader to expect a potentially spicy

scene. Instead, the energy of their sexual union is diverted to the creation of the canvas and the

286
“(…) jamais il n’introduisait de fille chez lui, il les traitait toutes en garçon qui les ignorait, d’une
timidité souffrante qu’il cachait sous une fanfaronnade de brutalité (...)” (13).
287
Dorothy Kelly, Telling Glances: Voyeurism in the French Novel, (New Brunswick NJ: Rutgers
University Press, 1992), 127.
 152

couple does not yet make love. However, Zola’s interweaving of the aesthetic and the erotic

make the “dans [le] néant” sequence far more suggestive than his description of the moment

when Claude and Christine enjoin at last. When Plein Air hangs at the Salon des Refusés, the

crowds mock its unfamiliar colors and jarring style. One salon visitor comments, for example:

“un savonnage: les chairs sont bleues, les arbres sont bleus, pour sûr qu’il l’a passé au bleu, son

tableau!” (128). Christine rushes to Claude’s atelier after her visit to the gallery, herself upset by

the crowd’s cruelty. As noted above, she feels their laughter as if it were directed at her own

body. But it is her awareness of Claude’s feelings, the tender and empathetic side of her nature,

that sends her to his side: “Mais elle s’oubliait maintenant, elle ne songeait qu’à lui, bouleversée

par l’idée du chagrin qu’il devait avoir (...)” (140). Stereotypical gender roles become troubled,

as Claude loses emotional control, collapses into tears—weak and childlike—with his head on

Christine’s lap, and it is Christine who pulls him into a passionate kiss:

Toute son excitation de l’après-midi, sa bravoure d’artiste sifflé, sa gaieté et sa

violence, crevaient là, en une crise de sanglots qui le suffoquait. [...] Sa force
entière s’en était allée, il se sentait plus débile qu’un enfant [...] Alors, elle, des
deux poings, le remonta jusqu’à sa bouche dans un emportement de passion. Elle
le baisa, elle lui souffla jusqu’au cœur, d’une haleine chaude:
“Tais-toi, tais-toi, je t’aime!” Ils s’adorent, leur camaraderie devait aboutir
à ces noces, sur ce divan, dans l’aventure de ce tableau qui peu à peu les avait
unis. (140)

Thus, again, Christine’s active sexual desires and the choices she makes as a result are essential

to the progression and tone of the novel. Christine metaphorically breathes life into his heart. In

the ongoing battle between art and love, love seems to win temporarily. The description of the

couple’s physical union is merely a few sentences that emphasize the hand of fate. Their

friendship was destined to become a sexual union because the painting itself united them. The

narrative moves quickly and offers no description of Christine’s body. The chapter closes with

an image that symbolizes Claude’s broken dreams: flakes of gold leaf from Plein Air’s frame
 153

sparkle on the floor of the studio “pareilles à un fourmillement d’étoiles” (140). When compared

to the erotically charged ambiance of Christine’s second pose, the description of the couple’s

sexual union seems anticlimactic. The narrative itself therefore places more emphasis on the

idealized merging of aesthetics and erotics than on the physical act of making love, thereby

mirroring within the text Claude’s sexualization of artistic creation.

C: “Sa propre rivale:” The Third Nude Scene

As the novel progresses, Christine’s body becomes a source of disgust for both Claude

and Christine. When Christine’s nude pose allows Claude to access spiritual aesthetic bliss, he

paints successfully and his desire is fulfilled. Conversely, Claude feels revulsion towards his

wife when he cannot paint well. For Christine, her body allows her to capture Claude’s attention

and experience sensual pleasures. However, Claude’s disturbing representation of her and his

negative responses to the changes of age and maternity cause her to experience a sense of

revulsion towards her own body.

According to Julia Kristeva in Pouvoirs de l'horreur: essai sur l'abjection (1980),

abjection is the feeling of fear and disgust that occurs when there is a perceived threat to the

distinction between self and Other. 288 Anything that threatens the boundary between self/Other

pulls individuals towards a loss of subjectivity, thus towards meaninglessness. Disgust as defined

by Winfried Menninghaus is “(...) the experience of a nearness that is not wanted.”289 It is also

288
Julia Kristeva, Pouvoirs de l’horreur: Essai Sur l’abjection, (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1980).
289
Winfried Menninghaus, Disgust: The Theory and History of a Strong Sensation, translated by Howard
Eiland and Joel Golb, (New York: State University of New York Press, 2003), 1.
 154

the instinct of revulsion towards something that reminds human beings of their mortality or of

the uncanny alliance between life and death: for example, seeing a corpse or maggot-covered

decaying flesh.290 Disgust is inherently an ambivalent response because it is the converse of

desire, where desire is a nearness that is wanted.291 Thus, the strong reaction of disgust is

connected to sexuality and mortality.292 Human beings are simultaneously drawn towards and

repulsed by the abject, giving the repulsive object a “macabre attraction.”293 In that regard, desire

and disgust are two complementary, often simultaneous, manifestations of abjection, just as the

lifeforms feeding on decaying flesh create an unsettling combination of life and death. If disgust

is triggered by a threatened boundary of self/Other, as the ultimate “Other” to the human male,

women stand along that precarious boundary, evoking simultaneous attraction and repulsion. The

earliest in-depth theory on the human response of disgust, Aurel Kolnai’s Der Ekel (1929),

misogynistically associated the female body and its reproductive fecundity with revulsion.294

Within the novel, Christine’s nudity, as a source of desire and a trigger of disgust, becomes a

metaphor for the conflicting forces of life (artistic creativity) and death (artistic impotence).

As Claude labors on his final canvas, a seemingly never-ending process that begins

several years before his death, the movement of narrative voice between Claude’s and

Christine’s perspective creates a growing tension between desire and disgust that mirrors the

fluctuations in Claude’s ability to paint. Chistine offers to pose hoping that the more time she

290
Menninghaus, Disgust, 1-3.
291
Menninghaus, Disgust, 1.

Florence Vatan, “The Lure of Disgust: Musil and Kolnai,” The Germanic Review: Literature, Culture,
292

Theory 88, no. 1, (2013): 28.

293
Aurel Kolnai (1929) cited in Menninghaus, Disgust, 27.
294
Cited in Menninghaus, Disgust, 18.
 155

spends “nue sous ses regards” will bring him back to her arms (240). Claude, however, does not

see Christine herself, but only looks at her body as an object to paint. At one point in the early

stages of his final canvas, he descends the scaffolding to touch each part of her body: “il

s’approcha d’elle, il la détailla avec une passion croissante, en touchant du bout de son doigt

chacune des parties qu’il voulait désigner" (241). The narration uses Claude’s own speech in this

segment, his direct discourse. Claude focuses on the erogenous zones of Christine’s body: her

breasts, hips, inner thighs, and belly. Yet, he is more interested in their artistic than their erotic

potential. His passion increases (“une passion croissante”) as he describes each detail :

– Tiens! là, sous le sein gauche, eh bien! c’est joli comme tout. Il y a des petites
veines qui bleuissent, qui donnent à la peau une délicatesse de ton exquise… Et
là, au renflement de la hanche, cette fossette où l’ombre se dore, un régal!... Et là,
sous le modelé si gras du ventre, ce trait pur des aines, une pointe à peine de
carmin dans de l’or pâle... Le ventre, moi, ça m’a toujours exalté. Je ne puis en
voir un, sans vouloir manger le monde. C’est si beau à peindre, un vrai soleil de
chair! (241)

Claude notices the shapes, colors, and tones of her body. He is particularly enamored of her

“ventre,” a word that means both belly and womb. His desire to create life on canvas is a desire

to appropriate Christine’s “ventre” for artistic production. Christine, however, feels dehumanized

by Claude’s gaze, his touch, and his words:

Immobile, sous la brutalité des choses, elle sentait le malaise de sa nudité. À

chaque place où le doigt de Claude l’avait touchée, il lui était resté une impression
de glace, comme si le froid dont elle frissonnait, entrait par là maintenant. […] Ce
corps, couvert partout de ses baisers d’amant, il ne le regardait plus, il ne l’adorait
plus qu’en artiste. (242)

She thus experiences a surge of disgust at her own body because of his disregard of her

humanity. When Claude forgets to kiss her at the end of the session, this sense of shame

solidifies: “Et c’était un mépris d’elle-même, un dégoût d’en être descendue à ce moyen de fille,

dont elle sentait la bassesse charnelle […]” (243). His aesthetic desire inspires his creative
 156

achievement while simultaneously erasing her selfhood. While modeling, Christine finds that

Claude looks at her but does not see her. She is simply an object. Posing for Claude is torturous:

“c’était un métier où il la ravalait, un emploi de mannequin vivant qu’il plantait là et qu’il

copiait, comme il aurait copié la cruche ou le chaudron d’une nature morte” (240). He demands

endless posing sessions of her, seeing artistic access to her body as a marital right: “plus exigeant

que s’il l’eût payée, sans jamais craindre d’abuser de son corps, puisqu’elle était sa femme”

(240). She is reduced in her own eyes to the degraded status of model rather than feeling like the

beloved wife she wishes to be: “Il la tuait à la pose pour embellir l’autre” (244). Thus, in posing

she becomes her own rival and participates in her own self-negation.

When Claude finds the figure from Plein Air, the original nude for which Christine posed

“dans son néant,” he hangs it on the wall next to his unfinished final canvas, and as Christine

poses, he compares her aging, post-maternal body to his representation of her virginal one.

Again, using the same words seen earlier in the novel, Claude recalls his thoughts the morning of

the “lendemain” and reprises the image of Christine’s surprisingly full breasts that seem hidden

under her clothing:

Je me souviens de ma surprise, quand je t’ai vue avec une gorge de vraie femme,
tandis que le reste gardait la finesse grêle de l’enfance... Et si souple, et si frais,
une éclosion de bouton, un charme de printemps... Certes, oui, tu peux t’en
flatter, ton corps a été bigrement bien ! (254)

Then, he details her now sagging chest, enumerating all the pouches and wrinkles in her body’s

formerly smooth places: “il y a là, près des aisselles, des poches qui se gonflent et ça n’a rien de

beau” (254). He blames her imperfect physique for his artistic impotence: “Non, décidément, je

ne puis rien faire avec ça. Ah! vois-tu, quand on veut poser, il ne faut pas avoir d’enfant!” (254).

According to classical aesthetics, the ideally beautiful female body is youthful and smooth, does

not have visible body hair, has no unsightly marks or irregular areas (such as scars, folds,
 157

wrinkles, or warts), and does not display open orifices.295 Maternity has emphasized the

imperfections in Christine’s body, eliciting Claude’s repulsion and making motherhood

incompatible with the role of inspiring model. Additionally, Claude’s use of the neutral pronoun

“ça” dehumanizes and depersonalizes Christine; he talks about her body as if it were a useless

thing. For Christine, the resurrection of the Plein Air figure is an uncanny reminder of the painful

course of her relationship with Claude, her sacrifices for him and his failure to recognize them:

Voilà qu’elle devenait sa propre rivale, qu’elle ne pouvait plus regarder son
ancienne image, sans être mordue au cœur d’une envie mauvaise ! Ah ! que cette
image, cette étude faite d’après elle, avait pesé sur son existence ! Tout son
malheur était là: sa gorge montrée d’abord dans son sommeil; puis, son corps
vierge dévêtu librement, en une minute de tendresse charitable ; puis, ce don
d’elle-même, après les rires de la foule, huant sa nudité; puis, sa vie entière, son
abaissement à ce métier de modèle, où elle avait perdu jusqu’à l’amour de son
mari. (254)

Like Claude, she recalls the “lendemain” and the gift of her modesty “dans son néant,” but she

uses them to measure her connection to Claude and his love for her. When Claude blames her

maternity for his failure to paint, Christine turns her negative feelings towards Jacques because

her changed body diminishes her power to attract her husband’s love: “elle haïssait [l’enfant]

maintenant, à cette idée qu’il avait pu, en elle, détruire l’amante” (255).

D: “Une scène de bataille:” The Final Nude Scene

Christine poses nude one last time during the final hours of Claude’s life. She stands

before Claude’s portraits of her and calls him to turn away from the copies of herself, towards

love and life: “(...) elles sont affreuses, elles sont raides et froides comme des cadavres [...] je

295
Menninghaus, Disgust, 51-54.
 158

suis en vie, moi!” (348). Zola planned for the conflict between Christine and the artificial images

of herself to be a central theme in L’Œuvre, calling their final confrontation “une scène de

bataille.”296 Readers experience the events framed primarily through Christine’s viewpoint, and

her voice dominates the final chapter because much of the text is her direct discourse. The

themes and events of the novel all meet in this dramatic scene, and Christine’s qualities are

essential to Zola’s construction of the text.

The “scène de bataille,” which comprises the majority of chapter twelve, begins in the

hours immediately preceding Claude’s suicide, includes a passionate scene where Christine

dramatically reverses gender roles and seduces Claude, and ends with Christine’s collapse

beneath her husband’s hanging corpse. Frantic and fast-paced in tone, this section is markedly

different from rest of the novel. The sequence “mounts steadily in passion and frenzy, rising to a

peak of lust not equaled in any other of Zola’s novels.”297 It is a grand crescendo of emotional

intensity after several chapters of progressive defeat and growing despair. Claude’s annual

income of a thousand francs, interest on the capital he inherited from his childhood benefactor, is

insufficient to support his family and his professional expenses, even with occasional sales of

small canvases. The family moves to progressively smaller and more poorly equipped lodgings

before finally moving into his large studio space to save the double rent. Between the couple’s

return to Paris after their idyllic time together in Bennecourt and this climactic battle before

296
Cited in Mitterand, “Étude,” 1363.
297
Niess, Zola, 221. Contemporary critics found this scene unbelievable and morally outrageous. Armand
de Pontmartin, who habitually criticized Zola’s work on moral grounds, wrote: “Ce qu’il y a peut-être de
plus révoltant dans L’Œuvre, c’est le rôle que M. Zola a imposé à Christine.” The most appalling,
Pontmartin says, is the lustful scene just before Claude’s death “[cela] dépassse, en fait, de lubricité, tout
ce que nous inflige, depuis dix ans, l’école naturaliste” (cited in Mitterand, “Étude, ” 1390). The scene
therefore seems to have been morally offensive largely due to the frank portrayal of feminine erotic
desire. See also the relevant Edmond de Goncourt journal entry above, cited on page 125.
 159

Claude’s death, the narrative recounts Christine’s constant love for “son grand fou d’artiste”

(343) in spite of his continual failure and their increasing poverty. Claude ignores and mistreats

her, blind to everything but his dream of creating life with canvas, paint and brushes “[Il] la

traitait parfois en servante à qui l’on donne ses huit jours” (219). He becomes steadily more and

more obsessed with the painted representations of his ideal woman. Like the mythical Pygmalion

and Balzac’s Frenhofer, “il voulait souffler la vie à son oeuvre” (342). Christine tragically clings

to the hope that she will be able to use the delights of her body to lure Claude away from his

obsessive connection to his canvases, her only rivals:

Jalouse! oui, elle l’était, et à en agoniser de souffrance. Mais elle se moquait bien
des autres femmes, tous les modèles de Paris pouvaient retirer là leurs jupons!
Elle n’avait qu’une rivale, cette peinture préférée qui lui volait son amant (239).

Claude is also like Frenhofer in the redirection of his sexual energies into painting.

Frenhofer calls his mastepiece “mon épouse,” explaining “Voilà dix ans que je vis avec

cette femme, elle est à moi, à moi seul, elle m’aime” (431). Claude, too, spends ten years

loving his artwork more than his wife. Christine excoriates Claude’s erotic attachment to

his paintings:

Dix années d’abandon, d’écrasement quotidien; ne plus rien être pour toi, se sentir
de plus en plus jetée à l’écart, en arriver à un rôle de servante; et l’autre, la
voleuse, la voir s’installer entre toi et moi [...]. Enfin, elle est ta femme, n’est-ce
pas? Ce n’est plus moi, c’est elle qui couche avec toi... (344).

Where Claude shares qualities with Frenhofer, Christine is similar to Gillette in a more

limited fashion. Like her, Christine shows that she is poignantly aware of what the artist

himself is unable to see. Yet, unlike Gillette, who stands forgotten and “oubliée dans un

coin” (438) at the end of Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu,” Christine voices her

experience. Even when Claude has a brief encounter with Irma Bécot, a former model

turned high-end prostitute, Christine almost finds it a relief that he turned to a woman
 160

because she has more of a chance of winning him back from a living rival than from his

art: “elle l’aurait plutôt jeté à une femme” (252). 298

Zola establishes Claude’s characteristic mistrust of women and his redirection of

his sexual urges into art within the first few pages, and Claude remains true to these

qualities throughout the novel.299 Other than the brief period at Bennecourt when Claude

loses himself in his love for Christine after the crushing defeat of Plein Air, he always

chooses painting first, above all things. Claude even refuses to make love with her while

working on his final canvas because he believes he needs to reserve his virility for his

artwork: “Au fond, elle retrouvait la théorie répétée cent fois devant elle: le génie devait

être chaste, il fallait ne coucher qu’avec son œuvre” (347). However, Claude never again

achieves the ecstatic, spiritual union of artistic and erotic bliss that existed briefly the

evening of Christine’s first fully nude pose. Once Claude sleeps with Christine, her body

no longer gives him the same access to transcendent fusion of his competing sexual and

aesthetic urges. She becomes a real person to him, a subject, and cannot continue to be

merely an object of contemplation.300 Likewise, Christine achieves her dream only

fleetingly because she has Claude to herself for a short time at the beginning of their

relationship while the couple resides in Bennecourt; as soon as they return to Paris,

Claude returns to his easel. The text allows neither Christine’s nor Claude’s ultimate

desires to be fulfilled. True to the studio romance framework, for this couple, art and love

are intertwined but cannot coexist. Like Claude’s urge for artistic perfection becomes a

298
This event, too, was part of Zola’s plans. “Ne pas faire [la maîtresse de Claude] jalouse d’une femme,
elle n’est que jalouse de la peinture.” Cited in Mitterand, “Étude,” 1362.
299
Niess, Zola, 219.
300
Kelly, Telling Glances, 126.
 161

fatal flaw, Christine’s overinvestment in him means she shares his fate. She wants to see

Claude succeed, sacrificing everything she has to support him, even while she is jealous

of the time and energy he spends on his paintings. Christine’s perspective, her desires,

and her actions weave throughout the narrative. Her presence provides both a

counterpoint and a catalyst to the events of Claude’s life as his artistic dreams remain out

of reach and he descends slowly into madness.

Christine bears witness to Claude’s unraveling and the reader understands the painter’s

mental state through Christine’s external observations. For example, she wakes in the middle of a

freezing November night to find Claude dressed only in slippers and trousers, working by

candlelight on the nude female figure at the center of his unfinished painting: “C’était à la

Femme nue qu’il travaillait” (343). He is grinning madly and oblivious to everything around

him: “(...) il avait un rire immobile aux lèvres, et il ne sentait pas la cire brûlante de la bougie qui

lui coulait sur les doigts (...)” (343). She sees that the painting has grown more bizarre the more

he works on it: “Plus il s’y acharnait, plus l’incohérence augmentait” (342). She knows that he

has been contemplating suicide and waits until he is asleep each night before allowing herself to

sleep (341). Christine also feels betrayed, “trompée pendant son sommeil, dans la pièce voisine”

(343). Claude’s obsession is a physical betrayal as much as an emotional one because of his

refusal to make love with her: “la virilité qu’il lui refusait, il la réservait et la donnait à la rivale

préférée” (346). For Christine, “la sensuelle pudique,” whose sensual nature gives her strong

sexual desires, while her modesty leads her to focus those desires within her committed

relationship with Claude, his rejection of marital relations is an insult (“c’était un outrage que

cette abstinence”) (346). At last, “elle éclata,” her emotional explosion is a metaphorical

orgasmic release as she relieves her pent-up frustrations (344).

 162

The passionate and powerful emotional atmosphere that Zola creates during the “scène de

bataille” is a result of Christine’s love and her determined commitment to Claude in spite of his

ongoing abuse and neglect. She uses her body, which has been her greatest and most reliable

means of getting his attention since the morning of “le lendemain,” aggressively and seductively,

wielding her sexuality like a weapon in the battle for her lover’s life. The author’s chosen

metaphor of human reproduction to communicate the complexities of creative production relies

on the simultaneous use of stereotypical gender roles and the reversal or transgression of these

same roles. As Christine battles to reclaim Claude from his hallucinogenic obsession with his

painting, she becomes aggressive and domineering, which are traditionally masculine traits.

When she temporarily succeeds in reigniting their mutual passion, she laughs with pride at her

triumph “avec un rire d'orgueil sensuel” (350). Additionally, stereotypically it is the male who

conquers the female, yet in this scene—in an echo of her initiating the passionate kiss that began

their first lovemaking—Christine overpowers Claude: “c’était elle qui le possédait” (351).

Claude responds the same way in both instances: he turned to Christine for comfort after Plein

Air’s failure at the Salon des refusés; he seeks refuge in her once again when he recognizes that

instead of the reality he sought to create on canvas, he has painted a strange, otherworldly figure

“[une] idole d’une religion inconnue” (347). Claude thus exhibits stereotypically feminine sexual

passivity throughout the novel. Instead of mastering Christine with his strength and virility,

Claude responds most ardently to her advances when he is in a position of weakness and

vulnerability: “(...) il fut vaincu, il brûla avec elle, se réfugia en elle (...)” (350). With these

reversals of expected gender roles, however, the couple reaches the heights of sexual bliss: “Ce

fut une rage, jamais il n’avait connu un emportement pareil, même aux premiers jours de leur

liaison” (350). Although her triumph is short lived, Christine’s desire and the choices she makes
 163

to satisfy them drives the progression of the narrative. In creating a scene so infused with

powerful female sexuality, Zola offers an opportunity for alternative interpretive possibilities

outside the patriarchal studio romance framework.

Christine’s sensual side takes over as she attempts to reclaim her lover. Just as Claude

becomes almost a different person when his madness is upon him, Christine’s emotions overtake

her and she becomes overtly passionate, sexual, and seductive.301 Throughout the scene, she

continually appeals to life and love, begging Claude to come back to her. She repeats the

invitation “reviens” six times throughout the sequence, and her words are peppered with

variations of “la vie” (life) or “vivre” (to live). She calls him to choose life and warmth instead

of death in the freezing studio: “Voyons, il y a la vie... Chasse ton cauchemar, et vivons, vivons

ensemble... (...) La terre nous prendra assez tôt, va ! tâchons d’avoir un peu chaud, de vivre (...)”

(345). When her passionate pleas are not enough to coax Claude away from his painting, she

engages her body directly. Whereas Christine undressed uncomfortably behind a screen her first

night in the studio, and when she posed for Plein Air she disrobed calmly, in the final scene she

casts aside her chemise suddenly, “d’un grand geste” (348). Christine herself refers to the

“lendemain,” comparing her naked body after pregnancy and ten years of stressful living to the

nude figure in Claude’s last large painting. She stands naked before the canvas, asking him to

compare her living, loving body with the artificial garishly-colored one in the picture: “Va, tu

peux comparer, je suis plus jeune qu’elle… Tu as eu beau lui mettre des bijoux dans la peau, elle

est fanée comme une feuille sèche... Moi, j’ai toujours dix-huit ans, parce que je t’aime” (348).

She thus invokes her youthful self—the one he sketched their first morning together—as the true

version, preserved through love rather than through art. Then, much like Ovid’s Salamacis who

301
Niess, Zola, 221.
 164

wrapped her limbs around Hermaphroditus so he could not escape, Christine, too, holds to

Claude with every inch of her body: “Éperdument, elle le liait de ses membres, de ses bras nus,

de ses jambes nues. (...) elle voulait entrer en lui, dans cette dernière bataille de sa passion”

(348). In her desire to “entrer en lui,” she is again like Salamacis, who pleads “‘O grant me this,’

she cried / In prayer to the gods, / ‘May no day ever come / To separate us!’” 302 Christine

represents the life-force, calling Claude to set aside the fantastic vision on his canvas.

Zola creates a chain of references that connect this ultimate climactic scene to earlier

parts of the novel and to the two previous important nude scenes. Not only do the characters

speak directly of previous events, but also the same vocabulary and imagery reappear. For

example, similar to the moment when Claude first saw Christine asleep on the morning of “le

lendemain,” during this final scene, her chemise slips off to reveal her breasts while she pleads

with him to leave the freezing studio and join her in bed: “Sa chemise, à moitié arrachée, avait

laissé jaillir sa gorge (...)” (348). The repetition of the same theme also allows Zola to create

contrasts that underscore the change in the couple’s situation. One notable contrast is between

the stifling heat present when Claude first sketched Christine and the freezing November night of

the final scene. Claude’s attic studio had an overhead bay window that overheated the room: “La

jeune fille, dans la chaleur de serre qui tombait des vitre, venait de rejeter le drap (...)” (19). In

contrast, the final scene takes place in the early hours of a freezing autumn night, chilled “par

cette brise aigre de novembre qui soufflait au travers de leur chambre et du vaste atelier” (341).

The alteration in temperature metaphorically communicates the couple’s sexual separation:

“Leur couche, depuis de longs mois, se glaçait” (341). Furthermore, in contrast with the

“lendemain” when the studio was merely disorderly and communicated bohemian freedom, now

302
Ovid, Metamorphoses, 93.
 165

the couple is living in true poverty: their home is freezing because they cannot afford to heat it.

Other words and images from earlier scenes reappear as well. Christine calls the woman in the

painting a “gueuse,” a term meaning prostitute. Claude used the same word to refer to Christine

when he first saw her sheltering in his doorway (See note 268 above, page 127). Thus, Claude’s

own representation of womanhood becomes the betraying trickster he feared he would find in

Christine. In fact, “gueuse” is the last word Christine utters, hurling a curse at the painting before

she falls to the floor “pareille à une loque blanche” (353). The word “loque” means “rag,” with

the same connotations of emptiness and uselessness that it carries in English. Christine’s body,

which had breasts “gonflés de sève” (19) when Claude first saw her is now empty, and her heart

which was full of love for him has been drained: “L’excès de la souffrance avait retiré tout le

sang de son coeur (...)” (353). Additionally, she has been cast off like the clothes she removed so

many times to nurture Claude’s art with her nudity, linking this scene to her role throughout the

novel. In another connection to earlier scenes, Christine refers to the fear she felt when she

initially saw her own figure in Claude’s artwork: She exclaims: “(...) ta peinture, c’est elle,

l’assassine, qui a empoisonné ma vie. Je l’avais pressenti, le premier jour; j’en avais eu peur

comme d’un monstre, je la trouvais abominable, exécrable (...)” (344). Bringing together all

these elements in this final scene underscores Christine’s importance to the structure of the

novel.

“La scène de bataille” and Claude’s suicide reinforce the myth that love and aesthetic

creation cannot coexist in a painter’s life. Claude’s persistent sexualization of his creative

practice destroys his artistic talent and his relationship with Christine. When Claude gives in to

Christine’s seduction, he accepts love but dies as an artist, so he can no longer tolerate life. When

Christine believes she has finally won Claude away from the vampiristic figure in his paintings,
 166

she loses him forever. The complexities and nuances of their relationship thus ultimately

reiterate the underlying atelier fantasy.

On the one hand, L’Œuvre maintains the patriarchal heteronormative stereotypes of the

studio romance schema because Christine is a sacrificial secondary partner to the male artist.

Yet, on the other hand, Zola imbues her with subjectivity and credits her with erotic desire. The

author assigns her a central role in the narrative and frequently uses her point of view to create

the emotional ambiance in important scenes. Although Zola may not have been deliberately

deconstructing gender binaries, with Christine he created a nuanced character whose qualities do

not always conform to the stereotypical profile of a female model. Incorporating the female

model’s gaze in the organization and structure of the novel undermines the myth that she is

merely a passive object and invites a multiplicity of readers into the space of the text. Her point

of view is not merely decorative enhancement to the novel but an essential part of the text and of

Zola’s design. Yet, in L’Œuvre, the gendered power structures and the atelier fantasy persist, to

the mutual destruction of the painter and the model.

 167

Chapter Four
The Model Speaks: Gustave Courbet’s L’Origine du monde and Christine Orban’s
J’étais l’Origine du monde.

A nude female torso, shown with open legs and visible genitals, dominates the

composition of Gustave Courbet’s L’Origine du Monde (1866).303 Courbet confronts the viewer

with frank sexuality, activating all the concomitant cultural concepts of gender and power. He

then seduces the observer with flowing shapes, subtle coloration and soft tones. Partially covered

with a froth of white fabric and framed to focus on her sexual organs, the model’s body is the

only subject of the painting. The horizontal orientation implicitly compares her body to a

landscape, one so intimate and rendered with such sensitivity that it can only have been painted

from life. The viewer’s position is that of a lover approaching the beloved. Yet, Courbet’s

composition also creates a sense of violence, with the figure’s head and limbs so brutally absent,

her most sensitive, vulnerable parts displayed so openly and in such detail. We cannot see her

face, so we do not know her identity, and yet we perceive her as if we were her most intimate

partner. For Courbet to have painted this, the model must have posed for hours, perhaps days.

The canvas potentially invites viewers to imagine that event: his painting and her posing, an

erotic and artistic union of artist and model. Thus, L’Origine du monde’s subject matter and

artistic rendering invoke the studio romance fantasy and its associated gender binaries. Its

inherently complex composition, its appeal to deep human emotions, and its evocative title call

viewers to a profound relationship with this painting.

Like the work that inspired it, Christine Orban’s novel J’étais l’origine du monde (2000)

also evokes gender binaries and incorporates socio-cultural myths about the artist, the model, and

303
Oil on Canvas. 46.3 x 55.4 cm. Musée d’Orsay, Paris.
 168

the studio romance. Yet, within these dichotomous structures and with all the stereotypes intact,

Orban uses Courbet’s painting as a starting point for a literary portrayal of a female model whose

perspective dominates the text. Orban’s protagonist is Joanna Hiffernan (Jo), the supposed model

for Courbet’s L’Origine du monde.304 The novel details Jo’s account of her experience posing,

describing her multifaceted motivations and complex emotions. Orban’s narrative also often

includes Jo’s recollections of her lover’s words and actions. Orban creates a literary portrait of

Gustave Courbet as a combustive mix of sensitive poet, passionate lover, creative genius, and

manipulative misogynist. With these two characters and Jo’s first-person narrative voice, the

author constructs a text framed by heteronormativity and traditional gender roles while also

including a wide range of ambivalences, possibilities, and fragmentations that challenge the

fixity of gender and sexual norms. Courbet’s painting and Orban’s novel both powerfully evoke

binary gender structures while simultaneously questioning them.

I. L’Origine du monde: “le dernier mot du réalisme”

L’Origine du monde was a commission for Khalil Bey, a Turkish ambassador and art

collector who also owned Courbet’s Le Sommeil (1866) and Ingres’ 1862 painting Le Bain

Turc.305 It remained obscure for a long time, with only rumors and occasional written references

to suggest its existence. An oft-cited mention in Maxime Du Camp’s 1878 Les Convulsions de

Paris is the first known description and commentary on L’Origine du monde. Les Convulsions de

304
The spelling of Joanna’s last name is different across various sources. I will use “Hiffernan,” which is
the most common variation. However, the name is spelled “Heffernan” in James Rubin’s text (Courbet,
207), while Christine Orban, Bernard Teyssèdre, and Thierry Savatier use “Hifferman.”
305
Rubin, Courbet, 201-12; Teyssèdre, Roman, 27-39.
 169

Paris was Du Camp’s denunciation of the Paris Commune, published less than a year after

Courbet’s death.306 Courbet had been imprisoned for his participation in the Commune and fined

for the destruction of the Vendôme column.307 Du Camp saw Courbet and his works—L’Origine

in particular—as representative of the excesses of the Commune.308 Although the quote might

seem humorous in its tone, it is meant as a condemnation:

Pour plaire à un très riche musulman [...] Courbet [...] fit un portrait de
femme bien difficile à décrire.
Dans le cabinet de toilette du personnage étranger auquel j’ai fait allusion,
on voyait un petit tableau caché sous un voile vert. Lorsqu’on écartait le voile on
demeurait stupéfait d’apercevoir une femme de grandeur naturelle, vue de face,
extraordinairement émue et convulsée, remarquablement peinte, reproduite con
amore, ainsi que disent les Italiens, et donnant le dernier mot du réalisme. Mais
par un inconcevable oubli, l’artisan, qui avait copié son modèle sur nature, avait
négligé de représenter les pieds, les jambes, les cuisses, le ventre, les hanches, la
poitrine, les mains, les bras, les épaules, le cou et la tête. 309

A second commentary on Courbet’s painting is a journal entry by Edmond de Goncourt in June

of 1889, wherein Goncourt praises the work, comparing it to works of the Italian Renaissance:

Aujourd’hui, un marchand m’écrit qu’il avait reçu des livres et des objets
japonais, et, comme je regarde, de deux yeux ennuyés, le très médiocre envoi de
l’Empire du Lever du Soleil, le marchand me dit: “Connaissez-vous ça?” Et il
ouvre avec une clef un tableau, dont le panneau extérieur montre une église de
village dans la neige, et dont le panneau secret, peint par Courbet pour Khalil-
Bey, représente un ventre et un bas-ventre de femme. Devant cette toile que je
n’avais jamais vue, je dois faire amende honorable à Courbet: ce ventre est beau
comme la chair d’un Corrège.310

306
Courbet died December 31, 1877.
307
See Rubin, Courbet, 269-304.
308
Teyssèdre, Roman, 109.
309
Cited in Teyssèdre, Roman, 108.
310
Journal of Edmond de Goncourt, 29 June 1889, cited in Teyssèdre, Roman, 137.
 170

Beyond these two nineteenth-century commentaries, there is little information about what

happened to the painting after Bey’s bankruptcy in 1867. According to Bernard Teyssèdre’s

thoroughly sourced historical account, it was first sold to Jean-Baptiste Faure, then eventually to

François de Hatvany, a Hungarian painter and collector.311 The painting’s whereabouts were

unknown through most of the early twentieth century until 1955, when Jacques Lacan purchased

L’Origine for his wife, Sylvia. It hung in their home or Lacan’s office until the mid 1970s.312 The

Lacans hid L’Origine behind a cleverly designed frame containing a wooden panel painted by

André Masson.313

Masson avait peint un paysage “surréaliste” sur un fond brun; un paysage étrange
dont les lignes principales reprenaient les contours de L’Origine du monde. Un
observateur qui n’aurait pas connu ce tableau pouvait y voir des collines
innocentes là, où se dressaient les seins, de la végétation là où le jupon (ou le
drap) avait laissé des plis ainsi qu'à l’emplacement de la toison [...].314

The composition of Masson’s screen therefore closely matches the shapes of L’Origine and

visually compares it to a landscape. Masson’s design hints at what it hides, extending the sense

of veiling/revealing that Courbet’s painting so powerfully evokes.

L’Origine du monde is still surrounded with a certain amount of mystery. The identity of

the model has been a topic of discussion since Courbet painted it. Until recently, scholars

thought the model was Joanna Hiffernan (1839-1886), who also posed for Courbet’s La Belle

311
Teyssèdre, Roman,185. Jean-Baptiste Faure (1830-1914) was a baritone with the Paris Opera and art
collector, particularly of Impressionist works.
312
Teyssèdre, Roman, 249.
313
Masson was Sylvia’s brother-in-law, married to her sister, Rose (Teyssèdre, Roman, 236).
314
Savatier, L’Origine, 186.
 171

Irlandaise (1866).315 She may have been the lighter-haired model in Le Sommeil.316 She was

James McNeill Whistler’s (1834-1903) model and lover, posing also for his 1864 Symphony in

White No. 1, The Little White Girl.317 Orban supposes Hiffernan was the model and chooses her

as the inspiration for her protagonist, “Jo,” in J’étais l’origine du monde. However, in 2018,

Claude Schopp located compelling evidence to suggest the model was actually Constance

Quéniaux, one of Khalil Bey’s mistresses.318 Another development is the discovery of a painting

proposed to be the figure’s missing head, which suggested L’Origine may have been cropped

down from a much larger original painting.319 However, in December of 2013 preservation

specialists at the Musée d’Orsay examined L’Origine carefully and proved that the canvas is in

315
Teyssèdre, Roman, 331-41.
316
Rubin, Courbet, 207.
317
Rubin, Courbet, 206; Teyssèdre, Roman, 333-4.
318
Claude Schopp recounts the details of his discovery in L’Origine du monde: vie du modèle, (Paris:
Phébus, 2018). He was editing the correspondence between George Sand and Alexandre Dumas fils when
he discovered a confusing word in one of Dumas’ letters referring to Courbet. The letter is dated June 17,
1871, and the lines in the previously edited volume he was consulting read:
Courbet est sans excuse [...]. Quand on a son talent, qui, sans être exceptionnel, est
remarquable et intéressant, on n’a pas le droit d’être aussi orgueilleux, aussi insolent et
aussi lâche – sans compter qu’on ne peint pas de son pinceau le plus délicat et le plus
sonore l’interview de Mlle Queniault de l’Opéra, pour le Turc qui s’y hébergeait de tems en
tems, le tout de grandeur naturelle et de grandeur naturelle aussi deux femmes se passant
d’hommes. (Cited in Schopp, Vie du modèle, 13)
Schopp thought the second painting “de grandeur naturelle” of “deux femmes se passant d’hommes” was
probably Courbet’s Le Sommeil, a painting of two nude lesbians lying intertwined, and the “Turc”
mentioned was probably Bey, who owned Le Sommeil and L’Origine du monde (Schopp, Vie du modèle,
14). This suggested that the word “interview” might be mistranscribed (Schopp, Vie du modèle, 14). He
returned to the original letter in the Bibliothèque Nationale and confirmed that Dumas had instead written
“l’intérieur de Mlle Queniault” (Schopp, Vie du modèle, 15). Schopp believes the juxtaposition of
references to Bey and Le Sommeil suggest that “cet ‘intérieur de Mlle Queniault’ ne pouvait être que
L’Origine du monde, tableau provocateur que le Turc Khalil Bey avait également commandé à Gustave
Courbet" (Schopp, Vie du modèle, 15).
319
Anne-Cécile Beaudoin, et al. Gustave Courbet le visage de L’Origine du monde. (New York:
Filipacchi, 2013, Kindle), XX.
 172

its original format.320 Thus, the framing and composition of Courbet’s masterpiece is an essential

and deliberately planned part of its meaning, as is the obscuring of the model’s identity. The fact

that L’Origine has inspired viewers to conduct extensive research and to create works of art

themselves demonstrates the powerful effect of this painting: it demands a response from its

viewer.

L’Origine calls the observer to more than passive spectatorship of the woman’s body.

Although the image seems to be displaying everything openly, the truncated torso emphasizes

what the viewer cannot see, cannot know. The face of the model, normally the most public part

of her, becomes a secret between her and the artist, a transgressive move that enhances the erotic

appeal of the image. These choices reverse the expected order: what is usually most private is

now overtly displayed, and what is usually most visible is now kept private. Furthermore, the

intimacy of the pose, the close-up detail—including a glimpse of the interior, with a bit of inner

labia visible—are all indicators of the artist’s personal knowledge of his model. Because of this

sense of intimacy, the viewer can see the model’s body and can even imagine having access to it,

but the ultimate access is blocked.

Courbet accomplishes this tension between the seen and the unseen with his careful

arrangement of compositional elements. L’Origine contains an abundance of triangles, beginning

with the pubic triangle, which immediately draws the viewer’s attention. The dark color of the

negative space in the top left corner is an inversion of the pubic triangle. The overall pyramid

shape of the torso, the space below the buttocks pointing upwards and the small triangles on

either side all work to frame the image. These triangular shapes spiral and swirl around the

vagina, pointing all attention there. Yet, there is nowhere for the viewer’s gaze to go when it gets

320
Bruno Mottin, “L’Origine du monde: une approche technique,” in Cet obscur objet de désirs: Autour
de l’Origine du monde, (Paris: Lienart, Musée départemental Gustave Courbet [Ornans], 2014) 33.
 173

there. The vaginal opening itself is not visible: if one cannot see it, then metaphorically one also

cannot enter. Viewers also cannot simply escape its pull because the composition of the painting

clearly makes it the focal point. Then, the swirling triangles draw the viewer’s gaze outwards

again to rejoin the spinning visual dance. The movement of the observer’s eye around, towards

the vagina, then outward and back again metaphorically reenacts sexual touch, inviting viewers

to a visual ménage à trois. The spectator becomes more than simply a voyeur of the model’s

body, but is instead invited to participate in the visual exchange between artist and model.

A. Reading L’Origine du monde: Binary Interpretations

Two opposing interpretations of L’Origine du monde immediately present themselves,

both either supporting or resisting traditional heterosexual gender roles and the studio fantasy

story line.321 The first is the most evident, focusing on the overt sexuality, the fact that it is

essentially a crotch-shot, beautifully painted and clearly meant for masculine viewing pleasure.

Conceived as Khalil Bey’s commission and born of Courbet’s creation, the ultimate origin of

L’Origine du monde, as Linda Nochlin argues, is masculine desire, which Courbet’s painting

casts as likewise the origin of art itself, thus displaying his sexual and artistic prowess

simultaneously.322 In this variation of the studio romance, the artist is a god-like creator and

321
Scholars have proposed a variety of interpretations for L’Origine du monde, including seeing the
painting as a form of religious iconography—perhaps representing the Virgin Mary—and understanding it
as a representation of the cosmic Big Bang (See Teyssèdre, Roman, 331-478). However, these readings
remain within the gender binary, assigning the female figure an allegorical role. They are also externally
imposed, an understanding accounting for the viewer’s perspective, not questioning the point of view or
the experience of the model herself.
322
Linda Nochlin, “Courbet’s ‘L’Origine du monde:’ The Origin without an Original.” October 37,
(Summer, 1986), 76.
 174

master of his domain. As for his patron, the spectator, his possession of the painting grants him

vicarious ownership of the artist’s powers and the woman’s body.323

The second reading is a feminist one wherein the female model is a victim, nameless,

faceless, passive, reduced to nothing but her sexual parts, laid out on display, subject to countless

desiring and dissecting gazes, with no voice or identity of her own. In fact, L’Origine du monde

is similar to anatomical illustrations and medical imagery.324 One powerful example of a

potential source for Courbet’s composition is a wax figure depicting female genitals within a

white cloth frame, Sexe féminin après défloration.325 In this formula, the woman is powerless.

Her inferior position within patriarchy defines everything about her. Her body is merely the stage

upon which men act out their fantasies and achieve their professional objectives, while

simultaneously fulfilling a deep psychological need to control and contain the potentially

contaminating influences of the female body. 326 These opposing interpretations are

complementary because they are both based on an either/or binary framework. However, in the

case of Courbet's work, including but not limited to L’Origine du monde, such a binary reading

proves reductive as it ignores interpretations that fall outside the gender binary.

323
Susan Waller describes this triangulated relationship and argues that although the stereotype of the
artist’s sexual relationship with his model was common during the nineteenth century, the actual implied
erotic connection was between the viewer and the model (Invention, 58-9).
324
Jérémie Koering, “Le tableau à venir,” in Cet obscur objet de désirs: Autour de L’Origine du monde.
(Paris: Lienart, 2014), 41–57.
325
Koering, “Le tableau à venir,” 46. This figure was part of Dr. Pierre Spitzner’s “Athaeneum, Muséum
anatomique et ethnologique,” a collection of medically-themed wax moulages that was displayed in Paris
beginning in 1865 (Koering, “Le tableau à venir,” 46 and 56). Therefore, it is possible Courbet may have
seen the moulage in question before composing L’Origine du monde in 1866.
326
For more, see Lynda Nead, The Female Nude, especially Part 1 “Theorizing the female nude” (6-33).
 175

There is simply no denying the eroticism of the L’Origine du monde, so much so that one

could argue that this painting is merely pornography. In fact, there is compelling evidence that

Courbet’s composition was influenced by contemporary pornographic photography, especially

hand-tinted stereographic photo cards.327 Courbet deliberately sought to surpass photography as a

visual medium, demonstrating his superior ability to depict life with L’Origine du monde.328

Certainly, even today, displaying the image outside the museum might still provoke calls for

censorship.329 This frank sexuality of L’Origine is an important source of the work’s power. The

painting was purposefully transgressive, shocking enough to be kept behind a green curtain in

Khalil Bey’s dressing room, and shocking enough that a century later even Jacques Lacan kept it

covered with Masson’s screen. 330

B. Courbet’s Artistic Transgressions

L’Origine du monde’s powerful effect aligns with Courbet’s intentional challenges to the

social and aesthetic boundaries of his time. 331 While a painting of a nude woman reclining on the

banks of a river might be acceptable to the Salon audience when she is cast as a nymph or

327
Linda Nochlin, Courbet, (New York: Thames and Hudson, 2007), 12-13.
328
Nochlin, Courbet, 12.
329
In 2011, Facebook censored Frédéric Durand-Baïssas’s post of a photo of L’Origine du monde,
resulting in an 8-year court battle. The case was well-covered in the press. See for example: Caitlin
Dewey. “Facebook censored a nude painting, and it could change the site forever.” The Washington Post,
9 March 2015.
330
Lacan reportedly enjoyed surprising dinner guests with a dramatic unveiling of “son Courbet.”
(Teyssèdre, Roman, 238-9).
331
See the monographs by Fried (1990), Herding (1991), Nochlin (2007), and Rubin (1997/2003) for
more detailed discussions about the interrelationship of Courbet’s art and politics.
 176

bacchante, a similar visual trope becomes a source of scandal once stripped from its

mythological background. Courbet was dedicated to rejecting idealization and anchored his work

in his personal sensory, physical experiences.332 Critics accused Courbet’s Realism of being

crude, uncouth, and devoted to the ugly, seamy side of life because of its rejection of “the poetic

aspiration to rise above nature.”333 In La femme aux bas blancs (1851), for example, Courbet

purposefully evokes the common theme of a female figure in a natural setting, but he

demythologizes it. He depicts the female body in realistic detail, defying convention and

heightening the eroticism.334 The young woman in La femme aux bas blancs is dressing after a

swim, putting on one stocking while her ankle rests on her other knee, evocatively displaying the

crevasse and cave between her legs.335 Her white stockings connect this image to contemporary

popular pornographic photos of prostitutes wearing only des bas blancs.336

Two further examples of Courbet’s crossing of artistic boundaries are paintings from the

same year as L’Origine’s creation, 1866: La Femme au perroquet and Le Sommeil.337 These two

paintings each disrupt the boundaries of artistic custom by combining traditional and

unconventional elements. Courbet created La Femme au perroquet for the Salon of May 1866,

declaring—probably sarcastically—that he would send the committee “des tableaux propres

332
Paul Galvez, “Courbet’s Touch,” in Soil and Stone: Impressionism, Urbanism, Environment,
(Edinburgh UK and Burlington VT: Visual Arts Research Institute, 2003), 20.
333
Rubin, Courbet, 161.
334
Rubin, Courbet, 184-5.
335
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 212.
336
Rubin, Courbet, 185.
337
Scholars thought Hiffernan modeled for both Le Sommeil and La Femme au perroquet (Rubin,
Courbet, 207). However, Margaret Macdonald’s research suggests that this is unlikely because Hiffernan
was in London during that time (Woman in White, 26).
 177

comme ils les aiment” and describing the large nude as “une académie.”338 The large canvas

depicts a naked young woman lying on a white cloth spread upon a bed. Her upper body is

turning away from the viewer while her lower body is oriented forward, her sex hidden by the

fabric. She holds one arm above her head, creating a perch for a brightly colored parrot. The

parrot’s wings are outspread and its beak is ready to pierce the skin of her outstretched finger.

She smiles up at the bird, her mouth slightly open as if laughing gleefully.

Courbet referred to this painting as “une académie,” a term used to describe the idealized

nudes that students learned to draw in their official training at the École des Beaux-Arts.339 In

some ways, La Femme au perroquet respects the nineteenth-century conventions of the nude

genre: the beautiful young woman’s body is displayed provocatively; the smooth rendering of

muscle and sinew demonstrate the artist’s skill; and the parrot points towards mythological

themes like Leda and the swan.340 However, there are no clear references to known myths,

neither through traditional attributes nor in the title of the work. Her discarded clothing, shown in

the bottom right corner, hints at her loose morals and suggests she is a prostitute.341 Although the

real scandal, according to Teyssèdre: “c’est que cette demoiselle ait l’air de se passer très bien

338
Cited in Daniel Arasse, Le Détail: Pour une histoire rapprochée de la peinture, (Paris: Flammarion,
2009), 444. The cited quote can be found in footnote #349 on page 444. “G. Courbet (propos rapporté par
le comte H. d’Ideville): ‘Ils auront des tableaux propres comme ils les aiment, un paysage et une
académie,’ cité dans Courbet raconté par lui-même et ses amis, Genève, P. Callier, 1948, I, 212.”
339
Waller, Invention, 4.
340
In Greek mythology, Zeus transforms himself into a swan to rape Leda. This story has inspired many
artists, including Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. Additionally, the parrot became a complex and
often eroticized symbol, appearing in many works, including Gustave Flaubert’s Un Coeur Simple
(1876). See: Le Juez, Brigitte. Le papegai et le papelard dans ‘Un coeur simple’ de Gustave Flaubert.
Amsterdam; Atlanta: Rodopi, 1999.
341
Arasse, Le Détail, 358.
 178

des mâles pour son orgasme.”342 Together, various elements of the painting create an enclosed

space that excludes the viewer: the unbalanced composition weighted heavily to the left; the

awkward twist of the woman’s body; her focus on the parrot; and her clear pleasure in the

depicted moment. This painting offers no easy entry into voyeurship and no proposed surrogate

for the observer to inhabit. The viewer is not invited into the private exchange between woman

and bird.343 This lack of clear access to metaphorically possess and control the woman’s body

breaks the convention in Western painting that displays the female nude to attract “a male viewer

located unproblematically at a distance from the painting that allows him easy command of the

pictorial field.”344 Further, Courbet complicates the roles and characteristics upheld by the

gender binary: Instead of being a passive recipient of the observer’s gaze, the female figure

clearly makes choices about her own sexual pleasure that do not account for male desire.

Teyssèdre proposes a new title for the work that would more clearly indicate its subject matter:

“une femme qui vient de se masturber s’amuse à se faire becqueter un doigt par son perroquet au

342
Teyssèdre, Roman, 52.
343
Edouard Manet created the similarly themed Woman with a Parrot in 1866, the same year as Courbet’s
Femme au perroquet. Mona Hadler notes a long literary tradition of women with parrots as companions–
and sometimes confidants, beginning from as far back as the sixteenth century to Flaubert’s Un Coeur
Simple (“Manet’s ‘Woman with a Parrot of 1866,’” Metropolitan Museum Journal 7, [Jan. 1973]: 118-9).
In Flaubert’s 1876 story, a servant woman develops a deep connection to her pet parrot. Therefore,
Courbet’s painting is not an isolated instance of this theme amongst his contemporaries. Hadler notes that
although Manet’s painting was shown at the Salon in 1868, it had already been completed when
Courbet’s painting was on display at the 1866 Salon (Hadler, “Manet’s ‘Woman,’” 120). It is possible
that Manet created his work in response to Courbet’s, but there is no clear order of events to support that
claim (Hadler, “Manet’s ‘Woman,’” 120). Therefore, without any further evidence, we can assume that
when they created parrot-themed works of art, both Courbet and Manet were responding to similar
cultural tropes but not necessarily directly to one another’s work.
344
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 204.
 179

moment où elle jouit.”345 Courbet’s La Femme au perroquet is an evocative image of solitary

feminine pleasure.

Another example of Courbet’s transgressive art is the painting Le Sommeil, sometimes

called Paresse et Luxure or Les deux amies. This large canvas is far more daring than La Femme

au perroquet, portraying two nude women wrapped in a post-coital embrace. Khalil Bey owned

Le Sommeil as well as L’Origine du monde. It was probably a commission, ordered when Bey

saw the similarly themed Venus et Psyché and requested a copy.346 Instead, Courbet said he

would paint the scene that followed, the “après.”347 Like L’Origine du monde, the sexually

explicit subject matter is the most noticeable aspect of this painting.

The female figures lie on a bed covered with white fabric, their discarded jewelry and

clothing strewn about them, a broken strand of pearls suggesting their fallen moral state.348 Their

entwined bodies glow against the white bedding and the dark background. The composition

focuses on their nakedness, emphasizing the similarities of their curves while also highlighting

differing flesh tones of the brunette model and the strawberry-blonde one. As Michael Fried

observes, the position of the figures presents observers with “complementary aspects” of the

female body, showing both front and rear, seen from above and below.349 The models’

interlocking limbs and awkwardly rotated torsos seem to merge into “virtually a single body,

345
Teyssèdre, Roman, 52.
346
Arasse, Le Détail, 357-8.
347
Arasse, Le Détail, 357-8.
348
Arasse, Le Détail, 357-8.
349
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 207.
 180

embraced by a single pair of arms.”350 The two women’s absorption in one another recalls the

enclosed erotic space of La Femme au perroquet. Viewers are invited into the intimate space of

the couple’s bedchamber, yet they are excluded from the women’s communion with one another.

Courbet’s pattern of transgressing artistic and social norms throughout his career

provides a context for the bold subject and composition of L’Origine du monde. Like so many of

his works, L’Origine breaks rules dramatically, frankly presenting details that social expectations

and visual tradition usually keep hidden. Portraying any woman’s body hair is in itself a defiance

of contemporary aesthetic conventions.351 Courbet rejects the idealized shorn and sanitized

female bodies normally gracing the walls of the Salon. Instead, he places the pubic triangle

centrally and uses contrasting colors to emphasize it, evoking the animal, purely sexual side of

humanity.352 Yet, Courbet maintains the white cloth, a visual trope that so often accompanies the

nude female figure in Western art. Traditionally, the drapery or cloth shown near a reclining

nude softens the impact of her nakedness, comfortingly reminding viewers of the bedroom or

bath.353 However, in L’Origine du monde, Courbet deploys the fabric to increase the viewer’s

discomfort with the image: while it would normally hide her genitals, here the cloth hides her

face instead. With L’Origine du monde, Courbet portrays the naked truth of art: “…le nu de

peinture devient comme la peinture mise à nu, une peinture où l’éros du peintre est autorisé à ne

plus prendre en compte les contraintes d’un raffinement social.”354 Although perhaps, as

350
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 207.
351
A. Hollander, Seeing, 136.
352
A. Hollander, Seeing, 137.
353
A. Hollander, Seeing, 157.
354
Arasse, Le Détail, 359.
 181

Teyssèdre suggests, Courbet simply wanted to paint “un ventre de femme.” 355 Sexual desire

becomes synonymous with artistic desire, both openly declaring their presence and their

purposeful rejection of social conventions.

The graphic representation of female genitals created by a male painter can be read as the

ultimate metaphor for the masculine domination of art itself. Theorists Susan Gubar and Barbara

Johnson suggest that the paintbrush/pen can be seen as a phallic symbol, while the canvas/page

represents the female body, blank until it is defined by the male’s chosen marks upon its

surface.356 Applying this idea to L’Origine, the image communicates directly what, according to

these critics, all art is—a representation of male desire, an enactment of the primal heterosexual

act, every painting a result of an ejaculation of color onto a virgin surface—and only Courbet

dared to show the truth.

These interpretations are all indeed present to an extent, and they exemplify polarized

understandings of Courbet’s painting. The subject of L’Origine undoubtedly activates these sorts

of comparisons: woman is portrayed as what her body is while also being defined as what she is

not. She is the ultimate Other to man. Yet, reading only these binary oppositions keeps the work

locked into traditional gender-dependent complementary meanings. The power and richness of

L’Origine can be read beyond these reductive points of view.

355
Teyssèdre, Roman, 397.
356
Susan Gubar, “‘The Blank Page’ and the Issues of Female Creativity,” in The New Feminist Criticism:
Essays on Women, Literature and Theory, (New York: Pantheon Books, 1985), 292–313; and Barbara
Johnson, “Is Female to Male as Ground Is to Figure?” in Feminism and Psychoanalysis, (Ithaca NY:
Cornell University Press, 1989), 255–68.
 182

C. L’Origine du monde: “Bigendered” Embodiment

Supporting this claim, Michael Fried identifies what he calls a “bigendered” pattern of

themes and compositional elements throughout much of Courbet’s oeuvre. Fried uses the term

“bigendered” to describe something that simultaneously displays qualities stereotypically

associated with both genders.357 Fried reinterprets the paintbrush and the canvas as bigendered

symbols in many of Courbet’s works. The paintbrush contains both masculine and feminine

elements, because while the wooden handle can be seen as phallic, primarily due to its shape, the

brush or hair end is associated with the long flowing hair Courbet gives many of his female

figures.358 For example, in La Belle Irlandaise Courbet represents Hiffernan fingering her

luxurious hair with her right hand. Because Courbet held his brush or palette knife in his right

hand when working, Fried identifies the right hand as metaphorically associated with the act of

painting. Thus, when Courbet unconsciously identifies with many of his figures and transposes

his own painting activity into visual metaphors within the work, the figures’ right hand is also

often the active hand, while the left hand more passively holds something or is shown in a

position akin to that used for holding the painter’s palette.359 Fried therefore reads Hiffernan’s

curling tresses as metaphor for the “business—(but also the pleasure—) end” of the painter’s

brush.360

357
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 191.
358
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 198.
359
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 191.
360
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 198-9.
 183

In Fried’s reading, the canvas itself is also a more nuanced metaphor, becoming an

extension of the artist’s own body, the figures and themes frequently exhibiting bigendered traits.

Courbet’s Realist project, as he described in his own Realist Manifesto, was to “puiser dans

l'entière connaissance de la tradition de sentiment raisonnée et indépendante de ma propre

individualité.”361 Courbet therefore deliberately tapped into his own lived experience when he

painted and, consciously or unconsciously, created compositional themes that invite viewers to

become similarly aware of their own embodied presence before the works of art.362 One way of

accomplishing this is to depict human figures cropped at the waist and foreshortened, thus the

bodies seem to project into the viewer’s space. Examples include some of Courbet’s early self-

portraits, like The Wounded Man (c. 1844-54, Musée d’Orsay, Paris) and, of course, other works

with dramatically cropped bodies, such as L’Origine du monde. In Courbet’s self-portrait from a

drawing known as Country Siesta (c.1840) the male figure’s pose is very similar to The Wounded

Man. Fried explains that with the composition, Courbet calls attention to the physical bulk of the

figure’s body, and furthermore:

[…] we are thus invited to become aware that the sitter’s view of his own body,
should he awaken and open his eyes, would itself be foreshortened—more
precisely, that he occupies towards his own body a fixed and unchanging point of
view, whereas his relation to all other objects is a function of his ability to
approach or withdraw from them, to survey them from different sides, in short to
adopt toward them a multiplicity of perspectives according to interest and desire,
limited only by contingent circumstances. The experience of that fixed point of
view, which entails the impossibility of surveying one’s body as a whole, belongs
to the body as actually lived […].363

361
Courbet, Exhibition et vente, 1.
362
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 53-84.
363
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 67.
 184

Thus, the viewer’s own living body is consciously or unconsciously engaged in the

response to L’Origine, which explains part of its powerful impact.

Christine Orban’s own response to L’Origine du monde inspired her novel. Orban builds

a narrative that relies on traditional gender roles within the painter/model relationship, while also

challenging the fixity of gender and sexual norms through shifting and multifaceted narrative

fragmentations. In a further challenge to the patriarchal power of the studio romance, Orban’s

protagonist moves beyond the model’s role, becoming an artist herself as she creates a literary

work of art with her memoirs.

II. Christine Orban’s J’étais l’origine du monde: the model’s account of the studio

romance

A. A Response to Courbet

Christine Orban’s novel J’étais l’origine du monde invites readers to witness the model’s

relationship with a fictionalized version of Gustave Courbet and to consider non-binary gender

role variations within the studio romance. 364 The author steps behind the canvas to give a body

and voice to the woman who posed for L’Origine du monde. Orban presumes the model is

364
To avoid confusion between the literary version of Courbet created by Orban and necessary references
to the historical person, I will refer to the fictional character as “Gustave.” This does not always follow
the conventions of the novel, wherein Jo occasionally distinguishes between “Gustave,” her lover, and
“Courbet,” the celebrated painter: “J’étais prête à offrir mes jambes ouvertes sur un sofa à Gustave, pas à
Courbet” (Christine Orban, J’étais l’origine du monde, [Paris: Albin Michel, 2000], 60). The same system
will apply to the artist “Whistler” and the fictional character “James.” I will also use either the full name
“Joanna Hiffernan” or the surname “Hiffernan” to refer to the historical person, while “Jo” indicates
Orban’s fictional creation. Whenever I am citing the novel directly, I will, of course, use the author’s
words and maintain Orban’s spelling of Hiffernan’s name (Hifferman).
 185

Joanna Hiffernan, called “Jo.” The author frames the narrative with letters addressed to an editor

with whom Jo shares her memories and confesses that she was the model for Courbet’s

masterpiece. In Orban’s tale, the traditional actors in the studio romance still play the same

gendered roles as in the nineteenth-century versions: the artist is a man and his desire drives the

painting’s creative process; the model is a beautiful woman, sacrificing herself for his art; and

the external observer is a man—in this case, the male editor to whom Jo addresses her memoir.

However, whereas within the nineteenth-century framework the model’s voice is absent or

serves to support the artist’s story, in Orban’s novel, Jo’s experience determines the direction of

the narration.

Christine Orban was born in Casablanca, Morocco in 1957. She has published more than

twenty novels, several of them based on historical figures: Virginia Woolf in Une Folie

amoureuse (1997), Joséphine and Napoléon in Quel effet bizarre faites-vous sur mon cœur

(2014), and Marie Antoinette in Charmer, s’égarer et mourir (2016). Orban’s novels are

generally well-received and discussed widely in the French press upon their release, but there is

almost no scholarship devoted to her work. Only three articles appeared in academic journals, all

of them about Orban’s novel based on the life of Virgina Woolf. 365 In his book about Courbet’s

masterpiece, Thierry Savatier refers to Orban’s novel, noting that she attributed the model’s role

to Joanna Hiffernan “dans un roman publié il y a quelques années et qui connut un certain succès

[...].”366 Teyssèdre, too, mentions Orban, adding a bit of implied literary commentary to his

365
Robert Dion, “Une année amoureuse de Virginia Woolf, ou la fiction biographique multipliée,”
Littérature 128, (2002), 26-45; Anne-Laure Rigeade, From the Author to the Icon: A Heritage of Virginia
Woolf in French Biographies and Biofictions, (Clemson, SC: Clemson University Press, 2017); and
Claudia Schmitt, “Ein Leben wie im Roman: Virginia Woolf als literarische Figur biographischer
Romane,” in Discourses on Nations and Identities, Edited by Daniel Syrovy, (Berlin, Germany: Walter de
De Gruyter, Inc. 2021), 167-182.
366
Savatier, L’Origine, 54.
 186

description of her novel: “Christine Orban s’est reconnue dans [le] pelage [de L’Origine du

monde] et a bâti autour de lui toute une ruche de souvenirs fantasmés.”367 Teyssèdre’s remark

categorizes Orban’s work as feminine autobiography (elle “s’est reconnue”), a buzzing,

disorganized “hive of fantasized memories” (“une ruche de souvenirs fantasmés”), and seems to

minimize its literary value. Christine Orban’s novel J’étais l’Origine du monde uses

heteronormative stereotypes liberally, and the text contains many contradictions and repetitions

that can become disorienting for the reader. However, Orban’s focus on the model’s perspective

and her use of narrative strategies that replicate the composition of Courbet’s painting merit

further scholarly attention.

Using a fragmentary, non-sequential first-person narrative, Orban’s protagonist, the aging

Jo, recounts her long-ago love affair with Gustave. Although Jo frequently cites her recollection

of Gustave’s words, the visual and psychological perspective is exclusively hers as she grapples

with what it means to look and be looked at as a body posing and as a body represented on

canvas. When the painting is finished, she finds it shocking and cannot abide its presence, so she

departs in the night, ending her relationship with Gustave. However, in writing her memoirs

years later, Orban’s Jo creates her own work of art and thereby attempts to construct a new

image of herself. Jo expresses a desire to control how others perceive her when, in the opening

letter, she asks the editor to publish her confession after her death, pleading “Ne me jugez pas”

(11). Therefore, Jo is simultaneously the artist writing her story, the model posing for Courbet’s

masterpiece, and the observer viewing the process of creation as well as the resulting painting.

Jo’s role as active creator of her own narrative moves the focus away from the painter’s

367
Teyssèdre, Roman, 331.
 187

perspective to the model’s, and thus inherently subverts the patriarchal fantasy of the studio

romance.

Orban assigns her protagonist a series of questions that serve as a nodal point for the

complexities and ambivalences that characterize both the text and the painting. About her

experience posing for L’Origine, Jo asks: “Que [Gustave] pouvait-il me demander de plus? […]

Comment a-t-il osé? […] Comment ai-je pu accepter?” (40). Jo tells of her hesitations, her

discomfort with Gustave’s requested pose, Gustave’s seductively pleading speeches, and her

eventual acquiescence to his wishes. Her recollections of the events surrounding the creation of

L’Origine du monde focus on her own preoccupations. She ruminates on her lost youth and

beauty. She also describes her physical and emotional sensations while posing, claims her

contribution to the masterpiece, and recalls her response when she finally sees the completed

painting. Jo deconstructs her complex, ambivalent motives for agreeing to pose: jealousy of

Gustave’s other women; making a bid for immortality through inclusion in the artist’s œuvre;

pleasing her lover; and finding pleasure in exhibitionism. Her past and present feelings about her

experience are multifaceted. She expresses both a sense of pride as well as deep shame about

having posed for L’Origine. Jo embraces all these emotions as her narrative follows her

fluctuating and frequently contradictory responses.

The author weaves known facts about Hiffernan, Courbet, and Whistler with imagined

events to construct the novel and its characters. Examples of historical events mentioned in the

text include Whistler’s and Hiffernan’s close friendship with Courbet while all three were

vacationing in Trouville during the summer of 1865 (when Hiffernan posed for Portrait de Jo,

and Jo, La Belle irlandaise), and Whistler’s departure for Chile in January of 1866.368 Other

368
Teyssèdre Roman, 332-3.
 188

facts, such as mentions of Gustave Courbet’s known works and references to other artists and

writers of the time are sprinkled throughout the text, although they are not always entirely

accurate.369 As Savatier says of J’étais l’Origine du monde: “Un écrivain, dans le cadre d’une

fiction, a la liberté, sur le base de faits réels, d’inventer ce qu’il veut.”370 Although Orban uses

real works of art, facts about actual people, and verifiable historical events to anchor her work,

her novel is an artistic creation, not a biography of Hiffernan and/or Courbet. The romantic

relationship Orban creates between her fictionalized versions of Joanna Hiffernan and Gustave

Courbet is her own construction.

Adding to the complex, multi-layered meanings within the novel, the author is a female

artist responding to her own initial shocking encounter with L’Origine du monde. When

Christine Orban saw Courbet’s painting for the first time, she noticed the powerful reactions of

others before seeing the canvas itself:

Après une journée d’écriture, j’aime me promener ... Ce jour-là, j’avais

choisi d’aller au musée d’Orsay. Je ne venais chercher aucun tableau en
particulier, lorsque j’aperçu un groupe de touristes aux visages embarrassés, des
mères cachant les yeux de leurs enfants. De là où j’étais placée je ne pouvais voir
L’Origine du monde. Je connaissais le tableau, mais je n’étais pas consciente de
l’effet puissant qu’il produisait. Alors, je me suis demandé comment une femme
avait pu poser ainsi.371

369
For example, Orban mentions Gustave Flaubert (63), Édouard Manet (59), Henri Fantin-Latour (23),
and Charles Baudelaire (23). An example of an inaccuracy occurs in Jo’s final letter to the editor, which
claims that the Goncourt brothers saw L'Origine du monde (137). However, as cited above, it was only
Edmond de Goncourt who saw the painting in 1889 at an antique dealer’s shop.
370
Savatier, L’Origine, 55.
371
I contacted Christine Orban via email in July of 2020. She graciously responded to questions about her
creative process when she was writing J’étais l’origine du monde. This quote is from our personal
correspondence, July 5, 2020.
 189

Orban embeds her initial question “comment une femme avait pu poser ainsi” and the

image of the shocked viewers into her novel. Jo’s opening letter to the editor is dated

1903 (the year of Whistler’s death), a time when L’Origine’s location was unknown.372

Jo then tells the editor she is sure the painting will resurface one day and people will

wonder who posed for it: “Je pense à ceux qui ne me connaissent pas, qui un jour

découvriront, impressionnés, choqués, émerveillés, L’Origine du monde et se

demanderont qui est la femme qui a osé poser dans cette honteuse insouciance” (15). The

expression “honteuse insouciance” (shameful carelessness) seems to conflate two

polarized points of view, blending Jo’s perception of the viewer’s moralizing gaze with

her own mindset. Jo’s emotional response fluctuates between these two extremes as she

remembers her time with Gustave, and the dramatic focus of Orban’s novel is Jo’s

embodied experience of modeling rather than the painter’s visual perspective while

looking and painting. Jo’s words furthermore signal the writer’s intention and invite

readers to adopt the female model’s perspective, thus undermining the male artist-

centered studio fantasy.

B. Spiraling Around the Void: The Narrative Structure and Lexical Features of
Orban’s novel

Christine Orban organizes the narrative of her novel J’étais l’Origine du monde in a

similar fashion to Courbet’s design of L’Origine du monde. As discussed above, Courbet’s use of

372
According to Margaret MacDonald’s genealogical research, Joanna Hiffernan was born July 8, 1839,
and died of pneumonia on July 3, 1886 (The Woman in White: Joanna Hiffernan and James McNeill
Whistler. [New Haven CT: Yale University Press, 2020], 15 and 31). If she had been alive, she would
have been 64 when Whistler died. Orban’s timeline, placing Jo at Whistler’s funeral, aligns with what
scholars thought about Hiffernan at the time the novel was written.
 190

pyramidical and triangular shapes creates a spiraling movement around the vaginal opening of

the figure represented on the canvas, focusing visual tension on the figure’s sexual center.

However, the vagina itself is not visible and thus the spectator’s gaze cannot rest when it arrives

at the focal point. Orban’s text is structured similarly: she deliberately evokes the void at the

center of Courbet’s composition as well as the visual cyclone that encircles it. She creates a

series of textual lacunae and surrounds them with an abundance of descriptors, metaphors, and

intertextual references that deflect the reader’s attention from these gaps.

The novel is framed with two letters from Joanna “Hifferman” (Orban’s spelling)

addressed to an unnamed “Cher éditeur.” These letters function like Courbet’s model’s two

thighs, which point viewers’ attention towards the pubic triangle at the center of the painting.

Jo’s opening and closing letters both direct readers into the text: the first one introduces the

primary themes and important tropes of the novel, while the final missive subtly redirects readers

back to the text, inviting a recommencement of the narrative’s cyclonic movement. The first

letter begins with the question “Est-ce pour moi que vous êtes venu à l’enterrement de

Whistler?” (11). Orban thus opens her novel with a burial, setting the stage for the continual

references to death and absence throughout the text. Furthermore, this question introduces Jo as a

narcissistic character who expects that a stranger might attend a funeral merely to meet her rather

than to honor a well-known painter’s memory. Jo’s letter continues: “Quand j’ai soulevé mon

voile, vous m’avez reconnue, dites-vous, à l’ondulation de mes cheveux roux malgré les mèches

blanches dont ils sont parsemés aujourd’hui” (11). 373 Here, Orban activates the trope of

As mentioned above, the real Joanna Hiffernan could not have been present at Whistler’s funeral.
373

However, she and her sister, Agnes, raised Whistler’s son, Charlie. (MacDonald, Woman in White, 29-
31). Charlie Hanson was born to Whistler and Luisa Fanna Hanson on July 10, 1870 (MacDonald,
Woman in White, 29). After Joanna’s death, Charlie lived with Agnes and her husband (MacDonald,
Woman in White, 29). Agnes remained in touch with Whistler and attended his funeral with Charlie
Hanson in 1903 (MacDonald, Woman in White, 29). Orban’s description of Jo’s appearance at Whistler’s
 191

unveiling, suggesting that Jo will reveal herself to the editor and the reader just as she did to

Gustave when she posed for L’Origine du monde. This suggestion invites readers to share

Gustave’s and the editor’s desire to view Jo’s body and know her secrets.

However, each chapter and scene circles around the central moment of Jo’s posing and

the painting itself like the triangles in L’Origine du monde spiral around the hidden innermost

parts of the woman’s body. She shares intimate details of her inner thoughts and physical

sensations, such as the feeling and sound of the scissors when Gustave trims her pubic area

before he begins to paint. Yet, the author also deliberately creates displacements and lacunae

within the text that structurally recreate the sense of fragmented, veiled identity present in

Courbet’s painting. Another example of textual displacement is Courbet’s canvas itself: although

the entire novel is about her choice to model for L’Origine du monde, Jo ends her narrative with

a letter in which she tells the editor that he will never see and cannot even imagine the painting.

Orban thus negates the paintings’ presence while constantly reminding readers of its existence.

Orban also creates a protagonist who cannot always be trusted, casting doubt on the

narrative itself. Jo is sometimes deceptive and manipulative. Jo’s relationship with Gustave

begins with a flirtation while she is still with James. Later, when James takes a long voyage to

Chile, Jo goes to Paris to live with Gustave. At one point Gustave leaves Jo alone in his

apartment for several days while he travels to Ornans to work on a posthumous portrait of his

friend, Proudhon.374 Jo finds a box of love letters from Gustave’s various women, and she reads

graveside is most likely based upon an account by Charles Lang Freer to Louisine Havemeyer describing
“a woman with thick, graying, wavy hair, whom he thought was Joanna, standing for a while beside
Whistler’s coffin” (MacDonald, Woman in White, 29). Freer mistook Agnes for Joanna (MacDonald,
Woman in White, 29).
374
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809-65). Courbet included Proudhon among the portraits on the right side of
L’Atelier (as discussed in chapter one of this dissertation). The deathbed drawing Orban is referring to in
her novel is based on a photograph taken by Étenne Carjat on the day of Proudhon’s death, 19 January
 192

all of them while he is away. These letters partially motivate her choice to pose for L’Origine

because she wishes to distinguish herself from all of Gustave’s other lovers by agreeing to help

him create the scandalous image. Jo’s narrative also frequently contradicts itself. When Jo finds a

message from Khalil Bey and discovers that the price of her portrait is twenty thousand francs,

she feels justified in finding a way to profit from Gustave’s financial gain: “Vingt mille francs,

était-ce mon prix? Si je valais aussi cher, cela me donnait le droit de me servir” (55). “[P]our

sécher [ses] larmes” she steals two paintings (55). 375 However, after Gustave returns from his

short trip to Ornans, Jo reacts as if she were unaware of his plans for the canvas. She is overtaken

by a flood of tears when she discovers that Gustave means to sell L’Origine to Khalil Bey: “voilà

qu’une troisième personne se joignait à nous, participait au festin avant de m’emporter roulée

dans une couverture avec la toile” (85). Gustave has also already told Jo that the painting is a

commission created explicitly for Bey’s masturbatory pleasure, a measure intended to protect

1865 (Petra ten-Doesschate Chu, “Courbet’s Last Drawing?” Master Drawings 12, no. 4, (1974): 391).
Courbet also painted a portrait of Proudhon and his family, completed posthumously (Proudhon et ses
enfants, 1865, Petit Palais, Paris). Proudhon’s theories of social equality and individual liberty were
highly influential on Courbet, who saw in them an echo of his own belief in the necessary independence
of the artist (Alan Bowness, “Courbet’s Proudhon.” The Burlington Magazine 120, no. 900, (1978): 123.
However, Thierry Savatier suggests that Courbet felt he could express himself more freely after
Proudhon’s death. Savatier writes:
[...] depuis 1863, [Courbet] travaillait sous le regard inquisiteur du philosophe Pierre-
Joseph Proudhon, qui exerçait sur lui un magistère encombrant. Là où Courbet
revendiquait son individualisme dans le cadre du réalisme et d’une autonomisation de
l’art, Proudhon voyait un artiste moralisateur et définissait l’art comme « une
représentation idéaliste de la nature et de nous-mêmes, en vue du perfectionnement
physique et moral de notre espèce […]. Après la mort de Proudhon, avec [L’Origine du
monde], […] Courbet donne l’impression de s’être libéré du joug, pour aborder le nu
féminin dans une dimension plus érotique encore que dans les années 1850, marquées par
un réalisme radical. (L’Origine, 13)
375
Although there are no records of the full transaction between Bey and Courbet, according to
Teyssèdre, Bey paid twenty thousand francs for both Le Sommeil and the small unnamed painting that
was L’Origine du monde (Roman, 36-40).
 193

others because he was infected with syphilis.376 Furthermore, the narration explicitly underlines

Jo’s slippery relationship with veracity: “(...) je n'ai jamais fait la différence entre le mensonge et

la vérité. Le mensonge du passé est la vérité du moment et il arrive à la vérité du passé d’être un

mensonge du présent. Je vivais dans l’instant [....]” (34). Jo’s infidelity to James, her infiltration

of Gustave’s personal correspondence, her theft of artwork, and her blurring of truth and fiction

establish Jo as an unreliable narrator, inviting readers to identify the contradictions and partial

truths within her version of events. Orban thereby subtly points to the existence of textual

lacunae using a compositional strategy similar to the arrangements of triangles pointing to the

invisible vaginal opening of Courbet’s painted figure.

The author calls attention to the visual void at the center of Courbet’s canvas early in the

novel, alerting the reader to the similarities between the text’s narrative structure and the

painting’s composition. Jo’s choice to write her story is meant to counteract the anonymous

silence of the figure in Courbet’s masterpiece, however, Orban packs the narrative with

references to the finitude of human existence, the inevitability of death, and the empty silence of

the grave.

Le ventre de la femme, c’est le néant. Au centre, il n’y a rien. De ce rien

Courbet était devenu fou. Alors il a peint les alentours et moi tout entière. Ainsi a
été conçue L’Origine du monde dont il ne subsiste aucune trace depuis que Khalil
Bey, ruiné, a vendu sa collection aux enchères. (16)

Orban seeds this citation with references to ruin (ruiné), decline (devenu fou), and disappearance

(aucune trace). The term “le néant,” (nothingness), here describes the human female womb, “le

ventre de la femme.” The word “rien” (nothing), a synonym for the empty void of the “néant,”

376
Teyssèdre, Roman, 28; Orban, JLOM, 36.
 194

appears twice in quick succession, further emphasizing the idea of nullification and death.

Analogous linguistic patterns that contain negations occur throughout the novel.

Similarly, L’Origine du monde, the painting by Gustave Courbet, is simultaneously ever-

present within Orban’s text yet it remains an unseen absence. The name of the painting is part of

the title, and the characters refer to it frequently, but the author never describes the canvas as a

whole, in its entirety. Instead, the text reveals different aspects of the painting with each

fragment of description scattered throughout the narrative, creating a spiraling movement like in

Courbet’s composition. Orban also uses the title currently assigned to Courbet’s canvas

anachronistically, creating a purposeful gap between the world in the novel and historical fact.

As Teyssèdre and Savatier both point out, the title was probably not provided by Courbet

himself. There is no evidence that it was used before 1867, while the first time it appeared in

print was in 1929.377 Jo mentions the painting by name repeatedly, yet in the final letter she

reminds the editor that he will never see it, that she will be dead before it is rediscovered: “Vous

ne verrez pas cette toile et votre imagination aussi fertile soit-elle ne pourra vous la restituer”

(137). In the same letter, Jo points to one of the titles Courbet’s painting may have had

temporarily: “Le Vase de Khalil” calling attention to the multiple mysteries surrounding the

canvas itself and underlining its absence from the narrative.378 Even assembled into one stand-

alone ekphrasis of L’Origine du monde, the fragmented descriptions scattered throughout Jo’s

memoirs would not communicate the power of the work itself. Thus, Orban continually evokes

the painting itself, yet it never fully appears.

377
Savatier, L’Origine, 83 and Teyssèdre, Roman, 401-8.
378
Other titles may include: Torse de femme, Sexe de la femme, and La Création du monde, Bernard
Teyssèdre (Roman, 401-8.) Savatier cites another as simply Le vase (L’Origine, 83).
 195

In chapter one, Jo, as narrator, ends the introduction of her story with a summary of the

events she intends to recount. She emphasizes her own importance and her singular knowledge

of the creation and existence of L’Origine du monde. Models are privileged viewers, intimate

with details of the creation of the work and the life of the artist.379 However, Jo narrates from the

perspective of age and distance: the artist is dead, many of his letters have been destroyed, and

the painting itself has disappeared. Jo is the sole remaining witness: “le témoin muet, le modèle

sans visage, l’inspiratrice cachée” (16). Jo’s desire to tell her story is a need born from a loved-

one’s death: “Le besoin de raconter m’est venu sur la tombe de Whistler” (13). Jo seems to

assume that her readers are familiar with Courbet’s canvas when she says: “Ce corps tronqué, ces

jambes ouvertes sur la pilosité d’un pubis fendu comme un melon éclaté au soleil, c’est moi,

Joanna Hifferman [sic]” (15). Jo’s description is brief but dense with metaphor. Comparing her

pubic area to a melon that has burst open in the sun activates concepts of ripe fecundity and

exposed vulnerability: in claiming the painter’s representation of her, Jo is opening herself to the

judgment of others while also reconsidering her perception of herself. Using the deictic pronoun

“ce” suggests Jo is referring to something previously mentioned or something that she can point

to, an object of which she and her reader share awareness. This shared awareness happens

outside the timeline of the novel: it is a shared reality between Orban and her readers, a slippage

between the fictional world of the text and the real world of the writer Christine Orban, the

model Joanna Hiffernan, the artist Gustave Courbet, and the painting L’Origine du monde.

The author also invokes the image of the cyclone several times in the text, further

emphasizing the novel’s spiraling structure and its connection to Courbet’s canvas. Gustave calls

Jo his “tornade,” telling her: “Tu portes en toi la révolution picturale. Tu es une tornade dans ma

379
Steiner, Real Thing, 25.
 196

vie” (34). “Révolution” carries a double meaning, referring to the revolving, rotating movement

of the painting’s composition and to the changes Gustave wishes to inaugurate in

representational visual art. Later, Gustave associates the tornado with stormy emotions and with

the heartbeat of life itself when he tells Jo: “(…) même si je ne me remets pas de la tornade que

tu déclenches en moi, tant pis! J’aime les ciels en colère, l’eau glacée, j’aime entendre mon cœur

tonner à tout casser entre mes côtes” (67). 380 This spiraling, unceasing, cyclonic movement

becomes a metaphor for the messy ambivalences of human life: “Je serai le dernier amour de

Courbet. ‘Sa tornade,’ comme il me disait” (72). The model’s body thus symbolically contains

both life—the womb, the origin of each human being’s swirling cyclone of feelings, thoughts,

and sensations—and death, the empty nothingness of the néant to which being born condemns

everyone.

In Balzac’s, the Goncourts’ and Zola’s tales, the moment of the woman’s willing

unveiling of her body is an important climatic moment in the narrative structure of the story.

Instead of appearing during a dramatic moment of visual revelation, in Orban’s novel, the

detailed descriptions of the model’s body occur while Gustave is seducing Jo, convincing her to

pose and are told from her perspective. Even when she is citing Gustave’s words, his words are

framed by her experience of the events. These fragmented views of Jo’s body also provide partial

descriptions of Courbet’s painting. Gustave discusses each detail of Jo’s torso while describing

his purposes and plan for the composition of L’Origine du monde. Orban’s language is laced

with eroticism and sensuality, creating a liaison between the artist’s description and the reader’s

380
These metaphors used to describe strong emotions (ciels en colère, l’eau glacée) subtly refer to
landscape paintings in Courbet’s oeuvre. Some examples include: La Mer orageuse, (1870, Musée
d’Orsay, Paris) and La Vague (1879, Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin).
 197

experience of both the text and Courbet’s canvas itself. Gustave first smooths Jo’s body with the

palm of his hands, as if preparing to draw on its surface:

Voilà. Je veux que tu saches ce que je vais garder et ce que je vais cacher
ou laisser dans l’ombre et que tu comprennes pourquoi. Là, dit-il, en traçant une
ligne au-dessous de la poitrine, je prends le sein droit, j’abandonne le gauche, un
seul me suffit. Je veux la taille et le bourrelet qui la souligne, je veux le nombril—
j’adore le nombril—, je veux ces hanches replètes et grassouillettes. Voilà de quoi
remplir les mains d’un honnête homme. Je veux l’amorce des cuisses que je
sectionnerai à vingt centimètres du genou environ, je laisserai un peu plus de la
cuisse gauche pour compenser le sein que je n’aurai pas de ce côté-là. Et tes
cuisses ouvriront sur la forêt, les dunes, l’oasis du désert, le gazon brun, la
pelouse brûlée par le soleil, là, surtout là, à la lisière du fleuve qui serpente, le
long de la virgule où s’élève une rangée de poils roux, une haie dressée,
menaçante presque, pour cacher le trou, la grotte, la source de la Loue, la fente, la
faille, le chemin bordé de ronces, la rivière enchantée, les lèvres magnifiques qui
descendent jusqu’à la raie du cul. (77-8)

This paragraph is a condensation of both Orban’s narrative and Courbet’s painting. It begins with

the frank “Voilà” – there it is. This one word neatly communicates L’Origine du monde’s bold

confrontation of the viewer. It also invokes the sense of sight, a variation of the verb “voir” (to

see). With his description, Gustave invites Jo into a deeper understanding of his art and includes

her in his creative process. However, he also imposes his view upon his model, asking Jo to

become a spectator to her own body through visualization of the proposed composition. Touch

and sight merge for Orban’s Gustave as he caresses Jo’s flesh. His preparation for the painting

becomes elaborate foreplay. Notably, there are two distinct parts to his description. The first half

is centered on the artist himself, what he wants and feels. He speaks in a commanding tone,

repeating “je veux” (I want) five times, every sentence peppered with the self-centered “je.” The

author evokes the violence of the painting’s composition as Gustave inscribes lines on Jo’s body,

identifying where he will section (je sectionnerai), what he will take (je prends), and what he will

cast aside (j’abandonne). Gustave’s verbal dissection of Jo’s body echoes nineteenth-century
 198

medical and anatomical illustrations, possible source materials for Courbet’s composition of

LOrigine du monde, as mentioned above.

Then, with the phrase “Et tes cuisses ouvriront sur la forêt,” the tone of the passage shifts

from the clinical to the poetic, the possessive adjective “tes” (your) also marking a turn away

from the self (“je”), towards the other. The last part of Gustave’s description of his planned

canvas is a series of metaphors that transfigure Jo’s anatomy. Of these, landscape and geography

are the central themes, including a direct reference to Courbet’s series depicting the source of the

Loue river.381 He begins as an artist, laying out a composition; he becomes a macabre surgeon,

dissecting a body; he ends as a poet, overflowing with lively literary devices to describe Jo’s

vagina. Gustave’s fragmentation of Jo’s body and his panoply of colorful metaphors circle

around her vagina like the composition of Courbet’s painting. The poetic synthesis that ends the

paragraph is like the frame around L’Origine du monde: it brings a sense of unity to the

fragments, transforming Jo’s seduction into an aesthetic literary experience.

Jo’s body hair is an important link between Orban’s novel and Gustave Courbet’s

L’Origine du monde. In Courbet’s painting, the dark pyramidal shape representing the model’s

pelvic mound creates a dramatic visual contrast against the pale flesh tones surrounding it. This

draws the viewer’s attention, directing the eye towards the unseen vaginal opening and initiating

the spiraling movement as described previously. Jo’s pubic hair serves a similar role in the

structure of the novel: it directs the viewer’s attention to important scenes and its frequent

reappearance adds to the feeling of circling repetition. Throughout the text, Orban refers many

381
As mentioned in chapter one of this dissertation, the Loue is a river near Courbet’s childhood home in
Ornans. The composition of these paintings focuses on the opening to a cave from which the Loue
originates.
 199

times to Jo’s intimate “fourrure” (84), her “pilosité” (15) or her “poils” (90). As Gustave

describes his planned composition, he tells Jo:

Laisse-moi tes poils, ne les cache pas, ne proteste pas, j’aime cette touche
d’animalité sur ton corps. Laisse-moi peindre cette touffe, je tiens à ce côté
bestial, cette différence entre ta peau lisse, douce et ce mont fleuri. [...] Tu es une
femme. La femme épurée de sa toison n’en est pas une. (79)

Gustave’s words animalize Jo’s mature female sexuality, reinforcing the image of her body as

hunting trophy, her “toison” (fleece) collected and displayed. It also represents strong and

unpredictable passion, “ce côté bestial.” Gustave expresses appreciation of Jo’s untamed “touche

d’animalité.” On the other hand, he also wants to control and possess this part of her, enacting

this desire by grooming her pubic area before he captures it in paint.

Sexuality, artistic creation, and Gustave’s efforts to control his art by controlling Jo’s

body are allied during the most overtly erotic sequence in Orban’s novel. Gustave stimulates Jo

orally to reestablish the color of her labia when it shifts tones suddenly while he is painting. Such

love making brings into direct contact his mouth and facial hair with Jo’s pelvis. This act further

reinforces the metaphors of body hair and secretions as signs of both sexual prowess and artistic

fecundity. Aesthetic and erotic desires merge: Gustave cultivates the colors he wants to paint by

making love to his model. He creates his desired palette on Jo’s body itself before capturing

those hues on the canvas:

[…] Quand il terminait une toile, il lui arrivait de s’étonner qu’elle ne

sente pas les sous-bois s’il s’agissait d’un paysage, la sueur d’une bête traquée
quand il égorgeait un cerf ou le parfum de fourrures pubiennes quand il peignait
une rousse. Quels que soient les bleus azurés, les cuivres mordorés, les carmins
virulents ou anémiés qui coloraient mes chairs avant qu’un idée malfaisante n’ait
tourné mon sang en blanc neige ou en brun de roches d’Ornans, l’odeur qu’il
aimait demeurait et il venait humer l’entrecuisse, s’enivrer à ma source, coller ses
moustaches contre mon pubis pour s’en imprégner. Et je sentais son souffle
chaud, son nez se frayer un chemin, sa langue s’aventurer plus loin au fond, pour
dénicher les arômes qui ne remontaient pas à la surface.
[…]
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Et tandis que sa langue se promenait avec bonheur dans mon sillage, il me

caressait le ventre et sous ses mains mes couleurs réapparaissaient; au bleu de
Chine il ne sera pas nécessaire d’ajouter l’encre de la nuit. (124-5)

The narrator attributes a type of synesthesia to Gustave, implying a connection between color

and odor.382 The male artist impregnates himself (pour s’imprégner) with his model’s scent to

give life to his painting. Orban further compares Gustave’s creative passion to childbirth,

describing his state while painting as “l’excitation, la douleur d’avant un accouchement” (124).

Reversing the reproductive roles of the sexes, the male painter gestates and gives birth to the

work of art. Gustave tells Jo: “Je peindrai en déchiffrant ton parfum, en reniflant tes effluves, en

avalant tout ce qui sort par les pores de ta peau” (124). Jo’s secretions provide the painter with a

different sort of raw material—inspiration. Their bodies both contribute to the birth of the

painting.

Additionally, as Gustave’s nose and tongue explore Jo’s body, Orban emphasizes a trope

of connecting, reversing, or merging genitals and facial features. Initially, when Gustave first

tells Jo of the proposed canvas, he tells her that all women wear their sex on their face: “Chaque

femme porte son sexe sur son visage, Jo. On ne verra pas ton visage. Un visage est plus obscène

qu’un cul, Jo” (37). Gustave emphasizes what will not be seen on the canvas while upending

expectations about privacy and identity: her face reveals more than her pelvis and is therefore

more “obscène.” Gustave tells Jo he caressed her lips before he painted her portrait in Trouville

“pour comprendre ton con” (38). Again, in the scene where Gustave grooms Jo’s pubic hair,

cited above, he tells her: “ta pelisse raconte ta bouche et tes cheveux” (90). Telling Jo he wants

to paint her “sourire” (83), Gustave explains to Jo that her beauty is just as visible between her

382
Orban also reprises a Baudelairian trope in erotically connecting odor and hair, (See for example
Baudelaire’s “La Chevelure” in Les Fleurs du mal, 1857). Naming Jo’s pubic hair openly increases the
sensual detail in the scene and further echoes Courbet’s audacious portrayal of his model’s body.
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legs as elsewhere on her body, again calling attention to what will not be in the painting: the

unseen will provide the deep meaning of what is seen: “Ton visage inondera la toile: on ne triche

pas avec l'invisible. Et ton ventre reflétera le bien-être mieux qu’un sourire, aussi expressif soit-

il” (69). This reversal of facial features and genital area has the curiously contradictory effect of

personalizing the represented body while obscuring the model’s identity, creating another

connection with Orban’s novel and the composition of L’Origine du monde. Gustave emphasizes

the unique beauty of Jo’s privates while simultaneously reducing her entire identity to her sex

and eliminating her recognizable features.

The author further echoes the frank subject matter and composition of L’Origine du

monde on the lexical level of the text with Gustave’s frequent use of vocabulary that is “cru,”

both in the sense of “raw” as in uncooked and in the sense of “crude,” or uncouth and shocking:

“Même ses mots étaient crus, terre à terre, taillés dans la chair comme sa peinture. Des mots

d’homme” (20). For example, Gustave refers to Jo’s sex using vulgar words such as “con”

(“cunt”), “cul” (“ass”), and “chatte” (“pussy”). His rough ways are signs of his independence,

strength, and zest for life, “son appétit de la vie” (111). These qualities align with known aspects

of Gustave Courbet’s personality and his artistic goal of boldly rejecting artistic idealization.

Orban recreates the physicality of Courbet’s painterly style with Gustave’s rough language,

volatile responses, and coarse behavior. Thus, the structure of Christine Orban’s novel J’étais

l’origine du monde parallels Courbet’s painting in its subject matter and its composition.
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C. Gender Stereotypes in J’étais l’origine du monde

In J’étais l’origine du monde, the author joins in the tradition of evoking the studio

romance and its accompanying gender norms while simultaneously resisting them. In many

respects, Orban’s portrayal of both Gustave and Jo remains anchored in gendered stereotypes and

reminiscent of the nineteenth-century atelier fantasy. Furthermore, like her predecessors, Orban

uses heteronormative metaphors of sexual pleasure and childbirth to portray the complexities of

artistic production.

Several times within her narrative, Jo mentions rumors that Gustave and others have

mixed their semen into the physical material of paint, thereby aligning male sexual prowess with

artistic production.

Whistler le croyait capable, comme Titien, dit-on, de mélanger les

substances vitales de son être à sa palette. Et quand Courbet se vantait d’utiliser
de vulgaires tubes de peinture pour peindre ses chefs-d'œuvre, Whistler pensait
qu’il ne disait pas toute la vérité, qu’il lui arrivait de diluer les couleurs de sa
palette aux sucs de l’amour. […] Je ne pouvais répondre que de mon expérience.
Nous étions si nombreuses à avoir posé pour Courbet et à l’avoir aimé! Toutes les
fois où j’ai été son modèle, je n’ai jamais rien remarqué qui puisse donner du
crédit aux suspicions de Whistler. (46-7)

The narrator activates this trope only to deny its truth immediately afterwards, saying she never

saw evidence to support the claim. This establishes a contradiction and creates doubt in the

reader’s mind. The tubes of paint contain a material substance vital to the creation of Gustave’s

art, like semen is necessary to create human life. While Orban uses euphemisms such as

“substances vitales” (46) and “sucs de l’amour” (47) to refer to Gustave’s semen, she also

compares the tubes themselves to limp penises, reinforcing the comparison of paint and sperm:

“Pendant que Gustave me parlait, je regardais cet amoncellement de tubes, repliés, récupérés,

comme autant de sexes d’hommes rabougris” (98). The myth of the atelier fantasy, inherited
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from the nineteenth-century predecessors and the Ovidian story of Pygmalion, includes the male

artist’s unconscious womb envy, his desire to create life with his own hands. The woman is not

the one who creates life in the studio. Her role is transformed from nurturing mother to

inspirational muse. Instead, the male painter claims this power for himself, displacing and

sublimating his sexual energies towards artistic creation.

The author compares the completion of a painting to sexual fulfillment, a goal the female

model helps the male painter obtain. Like Zola’s Christine, who realized modeling for Claude

only helped him become further invested in his art rather than in her, Jo assists Gustave in

creating her replacement:

(…) Cette œuvre était une longue volupté et, quoi qu’il advienne, il fallait
que Gustave aille jusqu’au bout, qu’il jouisse de son art. Parce que s’il tenait à ma
chair transposée, réinventée, accouchée de ses mains. Je devais renaître de tous
ces tubes alignés, pointés, prêts à couler pour moi et devant moi. Gustave recréait
l’ordre du monde: une femme allait être engendrée par un homme, sortir de ces
cylindres verrouillés, fermés, vissés par des bouchons multicolores. (100)

Gustave’s painting itself is a work of art that Gustave and Jo produce together: her body, his

skill, and the material of paint (metaphorically his semen) combine to create a life-like

representation of a woman. Linking creativity in this manner to the biology of human procreation

establishes binary gendered roles for the male painter and female model.

Gustave is an example of masculine power and sexuality, a paragon of male genius. He

radiates confidence in himself, demonstrating “une singulière connaissance de soi et de son

propre génie” (21). However, his passion also makes him volatile. He is subject at times to

creative furies bordering on madness; he sees everything in his environment, including the

women who love him, as fuel for his artistic creation; he is powerful, aggressive, and controlling

towards Jo; and, like all the painter protagonists before him, he passionately desires to create life

with paint and canvas. As Jo describes her affair with Gustave, retracing the relationship from
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their initial meeting to her departure in the night after L’Origine du monde is completed, the

narrative frequently mentions aspects of Gustave’s personality that represent him as brutish and

devouring. Like Zola’s Claude, Gustave sees everything and everyone as primarily a subject to

paint. “Pour cet homme-là, tout était bon à peindre. Le bonheur comme le malheur. Il aime

Virginie et la peint nue; il aime Proudhon et le peint mort” (60). Gustave’s behavior is

unpredictable and brusque, a quality Jo associates with his manly and artistic prowess. His rough

ways are signs of his independence, strength, and zest for life, “son appétit de la vie” (111). The

text depicts Gustave as a man of strong physical appetites, both gustatory and sexual. “Après

l’amour, Gustave avait faim” (73). He paints better after sex and a meal: “Gustave travaillait

mieux l’estomac plein, les sens apaisés, les exigences de son corps satisfaites” (75). 383

When Gustave returns after his trip to Ornans, the narrative compares him to a violent

monster: “Il a poussé la porte à la manière d’un ogre qui rentre chez lui” (65). The ogre is a

frequent figure in French fiction, used to represent voracious violence and predation, an apt

symbol to communicate Gustave’s “mauvais caractère” (27). 384 The narrative includes

animalistic metaphors to communicate Gustave’s uncouth ways. In a letter Jo finds in Gustave’s

apartment, one of his lovers addresses her letters beginning “Gros chien…,” thus implicitly

comparing him to a dog. Jo also describes Gustave as sexually aggressive: “pressé, bestial pour

les choses de l’amour, son désir, irrépressible, indélicat, n’attendait pas” (66). For Gustave,

lovemaking resembles a battle or wrestling match: “Les gémissements du plaisir ressemblent à

383
In this regard, Gustave is the opposite of Zola’s Claude Lantier, who saw sexual activity as
incompatible with artistic creation.
384
See: Jonathan Krell, The Ogre’s Progress: Images of the Ogre in Modern and Contemporary French
Fiction, (Newark NJ: University of Delaware Press, 2009).
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ceux de la douleur. C’est comme une lutte mais c’est l’amour” (66). 385 This forceful sexuality is

part of everything Gustave does, and most particularly of his artwork: “Gustave ne m’a-t-il fait

l’amour que pour me peindre? Parfois, je le pense. Ses mains avaient besoin d’exploiter la chair

pour la comprendre.” Gustave’s need for flesh, for a body to examine, to explore and exploit for

his art is compared to a hunting instinct, a quality Gustave believes he shares with all men.

Gustave tells Jo: “Il faut toujours laisser les hommes venir à soi. Crois-moi, si tu vas les

chercher, fais en sorte qu’ils ne le sachent pas. Les hommes sont des chasseurs, ne leur enlève

pas cette joie-là, Jo” (81). Orban’s Gustave thus equates the urge to capture prey with both the

pursuit of women and the desire for artistic prowess.

Orban reinforces the theme of hunting with references to Jo as quarry. Gustave often uses

the common term of affection “ma biche” (my doe/hind) (34, 87), emphasizing her role as his

targeted prey, his chosen model for L’Origine du monde. Gustave the “gros chien” is not a well-

trained lap dog; he is a relentless hunting hound. His artistic desire becomes bloodlust as he

doggedly pursues his goals:

Gustave, cette fois, venait me chercher jusque dans mes derniers retranchements
avec une sorte de furie, il ne voulait pas seulement mon image, il voulait ma
chair, mon sang, mon âme, il abolissait vêtements et décor, je n’avais plus
aucun moyen de me protéger de son regard, je devenais une proie à sa merci,
une femelle bonne à peindre (…). (109-10)

Using the term “femelle” instead of “femme” animalizes Jo, reinforcing the hunting imagery.

Orban’s comparison of the fictional Gustave to a zealous hunter calls upon known works of

Gustave Courbet, who painted many hunting scenes, often showing hind or stags either already

This reference to “une lutte” is yet another example of Orban’s subtle references to Courbet’s body of
385

work. Courbet famously depicted two male wrestlers in Les Lutteurs (1853, Museum of Fine Arts,
Budapest, Hungary).
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dead or in their death throes.386 One of the most well-known of Courbet’s hunting paintings is

L’Hallali au cerf (Death of the Stag, 1866-7, Musée d’Orsay, Paris), a large canvas depicting

men on horseback and a pack of hounds bringing down a wounded stag.387 In L’Hallali au cerf,

several of the hounds display prominent male genitals, while the wound in the stag’s flank is

reminiscent of vaginal shapes. The juxtaposition of masculine aggression (represented by the

hounds, horses and hunters) and feminine vulnerability (represented by the suffering deer’s open

wound) visually dramatizes the inherent violence of gender binary stereotypes. The painting

portrays “a narrativizing of aggression [that] underwrites a theatricalizing of pain and

suffering.”388 In Orban’s novel, When Jo sees herself as Gustave’s quarry and imagines posing

for the proposed L’Origine du monde, she proclaims: “Malgré la passion que j’éprouvais pour

lui, j’ai cru devenir folle en imaginant mon corps tronqué exposé, un jour, entre La Raie de

Chardin, et l’Hallali au cerf, de Gustave: un tableau de chasse parmi d’autres” (40). 389 Orban

thus creates a parallel between Courbet’s representation of human female genitals with wounded

animals and hunting trophies. In that regard, she reinforces traditional masculine and feminine

gender roles, portraying the male as powerful and aggressive and the female as a pursued victim.

386
Some examples of Courbet’s hunting scenes include The German Huntsman (1859, Musée des Beaux-
Arts de Lons-le-Saunier, France), The Quarry (1856-7, Musem of Fine Arts, Boston, MA).
387
The canvas is 355 x 505 cm, about 12.5 x 16.5 feet. The stag itself is life-sized, as can be seen in a
photograph by Étienne Carjat of Courbet at work on the painting. See Fried, Courbet’s Realism,188.
388
Fried, Courbet’s Realism, 188.
389
Jean Simon Chardin’s (1699-1799) La Raie (The Skate, 1728) is held at the Louvre. It depicts a table
laden with various household items, fish, opened oysters, and a cat, with a gutted skate hanging above the
table. “The eerily human ‘face’ and glistening interior of the hanging, hacked-open fish dominate the
center of the composition in a recollection both of an anatomist’s exploratory study and of paintings of
human martyrdom.” (Sarah R. Cohen, “Chardin’s Fur: Painting, Materialism, and the Question of Animal
Soul. Eighteenth-Century Studies 38, No.1, Hair (Fall 2004): 48).
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Gustave’s masculine power and artistic genius become metaphorically concentrated in his

eye: “Courbet voit plus que les autres. Son œil décortique, analyse, prend, interprète, rapporte sur

la toile. Il triomphe de tout, du jour comme de la nuit” (108). Jo senses the power of his

predator’s eye and experiences a thrilling hint of danger in modeling for Gustave. From the first

time she poses for him in Trouville, his deliberate gaze dissects and defines her:

J’ai observé son œil prêt à m’écorcher vivante. Son œil mathématique qui
calculait ma carnation, son œil de légiste qui découpe le corps pour voir
transparaître l’âme, les veines. Comme si c’était la circulation des passions qu’il
cherchait. (20)

Gustave is not satisfied with exploring merely the surface of Jo’s body; he wants to examine her

from the inside. However, his absorption of Jo’s essence to empower his artistic expression

requires her acquiescence. He first seduces her with words, appealing to her desire to be unique

in his life, repeatedly telling her exactly what she wishes to hear, slowly convincing her to pose

for L’Origine du monde. He repeats “Tu es la seule, Jo” (34, 39, 40). His eye hypnotizes her,

preventing her from refusing to pose:

Je m’étais soumise à l’œil de Gustave. Cet œil si particulier dont l’iris et la pupille
se confondaient, tant que la pupille était noire et l’iris dilaté. Quand le cercle brun
disparaissait sous l’astre central, c’était l’éclipse totale: un regard de fauve, de
rapace, diabolique et diabolisé par la concentration, par ce magnétisme
hypnotique qui me fixait. (108)

Gustave’s genius affects him like a powerful drug or illness that dilates his eyes and increases his

concentration.390 However, Jo proclaims, “Courbet voyait son pinceau à la main, le reste du

temps il était aveugle” (76). Like the painters in Balzac’s “Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” who are

blind to Gillette's suffering, Gustave is blind to everything but his art.

390
Using words like “diabolique” and “magnétisme hypnotique” points to the supernatural power of
artistic genius, connecting Orban’s depiction of Gustave to Balzac’s portrait of Frenhofer and thus to the
Hoffmannesque tradition of the fantastic.
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Orban’s Gustave is subject to fits of creative fury like Balzac’s Frenhofer. The narrative

describes Gustave’s paintbrush while he is working on L’Origine du monde. It moves frantically,

like a living thing:

Le pinceau devenu fou l’entraînait dans le tunnel, le bout de bois vibrait, se

cabrait et s’enfournait dans je ne sais quelle cavité, quel labyrinthe, emporté par
un élan frénétique, une nécessité physiologique, comme si la vie lui avait été
transmise de la main de Courbet. (127)

The frenetic motion of the brush as Gustave creates a representation of his model’s sex

metaphorically reenacts phallic sexual movements as if it were penetrating a woman’s body, its

tip vibrating as it plunges into a labyrinth of tunnels and cavities. Orban describes Gustave’s

erotically charged creative frenzy using imagery similar to Balzac’s Frenhofer, who works so

passionately that he seems to be possessed by a demon (421-2).391 Gustave, too, is at times

feverish in his creative passion: “Son front suintait, il avait de la fièvre” (125). Orban’s portrayal

of Gustave is therefore consistent with the nineteenth-century myth of the male genius, thus

maintaining the gendered roles of the studio romance.

In the atelier fantasy framework, the sexual and aesthetic desires of the male artists

motivate the creative process. This is true for Orban’s Gustave, who remains entirely in control

of the painting’s creation, from conception to completion. The model may choose to pose or not

to pose, but she does not direct the project. A more transgressive version of Jo might have

proposed the composition herself or suggested significant changes to the concept, for example. 392

In Orban’s novel, Jo sacrifices herself to help Gustave achieve his artistic goals. She endures

391
“Tout en parlant, l’étrange vieillard [Frenhofer] touchait à toutes les parties du tableau [...]. [...] il allait
si rapidement par de petits mouvements si impatients, si saccadés, que pour le jeune Poussin il semblait
qu’il y eût dans le corps de ce bizarre personnage un démon qui agissait par ses mains [...].” (Balzac, “Le
Chef d’oeuvre inconnu,” 421-2)
392
In this sense, Manette is more transgressive than Jo because by striking her initial pose without
direction from Coriolis, she effectively suggests his painting’s composition.
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emotional turmoil and physical pain because she chooses to pose for L’Origine du monde.

Giving voice to another typically obscured part of creation within the studio romance, Jo

describes intense physical discomfort during the creation of L’Origine. The ability to hold a

painful pose for a long time is an essential quality for a model.393 Such difficult work comes at a

price: “Voilà venu le temps de l’immobilité et du silence. Le temps des crampes, de l’ankylose et

des fourmillements” (103). After the painting is finished, Jo’s legs are so numb she cannot stand

and Gustave must support her while he walks her around the studio to regain circulation (161).

Jo is a martyr to art, a role of stereotypical feminine self-sacrifice. Additionally, Jo finds

Gustave’s raw, uncultivated behavior attractive: “Je préférais ses façons à celles trop raffinées de

Whistler” (20). She understands Gustave’s domineering behavior as simply a manifestation of

his masculinity. “Il fallait croire en l’amour pour le servir à ce point, pour accepter la domination

d’un homme, parce que c’est en dominant qu’ils aiment aimer” (108). Jo seems to both accept

and enjoy the idea that men exist to dominate.

Furthermore, Jo’s sense of self-worth is connected to her youth and beauty; they are the

tools she uses to attract male painters. She seeks always to please the men around her, using their

desire for her body to procure material security and to fulfill her own need for attention and

physical satisfaction. Jo thus uses her sexuality as a tool, enacting a stereotype of feminine

manipulative behavior. Her decision to move to Paris is partially motivated by James’ departure

for Chile and her subsequent need for financial support: “Si mes souvenirs ne me trompent pas,

je me suis rendue au 32, rue Hautefeuille pour la première fois en octobre 1866. […] J’arrivais

393
Borzello, Model, 38.
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de Londres où Whistler m’avait laissée sans un sou” (24).394 The narrative suggests that Jo

arrived without invitation or warning on Gustave’s doorstep, fully expecting that he will take her

in:

J’ai pensé aux femmes qui avaient dû franchir le seuil de la porte de Gustave […].
Mais qu’importe! Aucune d’entre elles n’était venue avec sa valise. Mon statut
d’étrangère précipitait les choses. Si l’on m’aimait, il fallait me loger. Courbet n’a
pas hésité. (25)

Jo is very conscious of the fact that her beauty allows her access to the male painters she chooses

to love. Because she enjoys posing, Jo seeks painters as lovers. She feels compelled to use these

powers before they fade, saying: “Surtout il y a la considération de ma beauté, ma seule richesse.

Faut-il en jouer comme d’un bien qui serait gâché si je le cachais?” (17). Her decision to pose for

L’Origine du monde is partially motivated by the awareness that she will not always be young

and lovely. Jo also describes her narcissistic wish for exhibitionistic pleasure and her enjoyment

in having artists’ admiration, a quality she believes is simply one of her personal characteristics,

something she has felt since childhood: “J’ai adoré poser nue: je me trouve toujours à l’aise sous

le regard d’un homme. Petite fille déjà ma mère me traitait d’exhibitionniste” (27). Jo’s

awareness and enjoyment of her allure, her pleasure in her body, and her longing for the painter’s

gaze exemplify the stereotypically feminine quality of exhibitionistic desire. She further

replicates the desire to display herself by writing the letters to the unnamed editor. Jo and

Manette both find pleasure and gain security in the experience of posing for artists. They desire

to be seen, and they act to increase their own enjoyment by seeking opportunities to pose.

Jo has a sense of pride in her ability to inspire works of art, a sign of vanity, which is

another quality traditionally gendered feminine. The visual trope of the goddess of love and

394
It was probably not the case that James McNeill Whistler abandoned Joanna Hiffernan in London with
no means of support while he was traveling. In fact, he left her in charge of his affairs during his absence
(Savatier, L’Origine, 61, and MacDonald, Woman in White, 27).
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beauty, Venus, gazing into a mirror is a frequent subject of western painting.395 Venus imagery

“conflat[es] beauty, vanity, and sexuality.”396 The mirror itself functions as a dual symbol,

carrying connotations of both self-deception and self-revelation because its reflective surface can

distort as well as reveal one’s appearance.397 Joanna Hiffernan posed for La Belle Irlandaise

(1865), modeling for Courbet’s interpretation of the Venus-holding-a-mirror theme and

providing a link to Orban’s vain and narcissistic Jo. Jo sees her loveliness as a natural resource,

hers to use as she pleases, declaring: “La nature m’a faite belle. Je n’y suis pour rien et je n’ai

pas à me le faire pardonner” (28). In addition, like Manette, Jo desires to see her unique beauty

preserved in art. Jo is attracted to the artist’s need for her body to inspire his art; she believes she

is essential to the creation of L’Origine du monde: “Il avait besoin de ma nudité pour s’exprimer

[…] Ce corps tronqué serait donc le mien ou ne serait pas” (62). As Jo recounts Gustave’s efforts

to persuade her to pose, she consistently emphasizes his need for her, thus positioning herself as

the source of Gustave’s inspiration.

Jo also shares with Balzac’s Gillette and Zola’s Christine the desire to please her lover

and the hope that doing so will capture his time and attention. Certainly, an artist’s entire project

can unravel if the model refuses to pose, therefore the women’s choice is essential to the success

of the painter’s plans.398 Gustave’s dependence upon Jo becomes clear because he cannot create

the masterpiece he envisions without a willing woman. Knowing his art requires her presence, Jo

hopes her choice to model for L’Origine du monde will leave an indelible impression on

395
Helena Goscilo. “The Mirror in Art: Vanitas, Veritas, and Vision,” Studies in 20th & 21st Century
Literature 34, no. 2 (June 2010): Article 7. 11.
396
Goscilo, “Mirror in Art,” 11.
397
A. Hollander, Seeing, 391, and Goscilo, “Mirror in Art,” 10.
398
Sitzia, L’artiste, 100.
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Gustave’s work and on the man himself. She declares, “Je serai le dernier amour de Courbet”

(72). Jo’s desire to please Gustave is also part of her narcissistic longing for exclusive love.

While the studio romance often celebrates the youth and beauty of the model as a

gateway into aesthetic ideal, women’s bodies can also elicit feelings of revulsion for both males

and females, the sight of female genitalia reminding human beings of the site of their birth and

the inevitability of their death. Courbet’s painting depicts this disturbing sight directly,

potentially activating viewers’ feelings of discomfort as well as desire. In Orban’s novel, when

Jo sees the completed canvas for the first time, her response is a violent rejection, an intense

experience of disgust:

Le choc que je reçus en plein visage fut si grand qu’il me fallut des
années pour parvenir à retrouver l’image de cette toile dans ma mémoire.
[…]
Les hommes ont mauvais goût. Je ne partage pas leur attirance.
J’étais triste que ce soit la partie la plus laide du corps d’une femme qui
les captive autant.
Devant moi, ces lèvres carnassières souriaient férocement et
s'apparentaient davantage à une sombre méduse, à une tarentule velue,
qu’à une inoffensive petite chatte. (132-4)

Jo’s sense of revulsion is so strong that she loses consciousness and blocks her memory of the

image. Jo compares the vulva depicted in the painting to threatening, poisonous creatures: “une

sombre méduse” (a dark jellyfish) and “une tarentule velue” (a hairy tarentula). The narrative

repeats a stereotype that female genitals are an ugly, horrifying sight, “la partie la plus laide du

corps d’une femme,” that mysteriously captivates men. Using the word “méduse” activates

references to Freudian theories about female genitalia being symbolized by the Gorgon of

ancient mythology, the terrifying Medusa whose face paralyzed all who saw it. 399 Jo is

399
See Freud’s essay “Medusa’s Head:” “The terror of Medusa is thus a terror of castration that is linked
to the sight of something. [...] it occurs when a boy [...] catches sight of the female genitals, probably
those of an adult, surrounded by hair, and essentially those of his mother” (Sigmund Freud, “Medusa’s
 213

simultaneously seduced by her own appearance, yet she also rejects the most overtly sexual parts

of herself. With Jo’s terror at a representation of her own body, Orban reinforces negative

stereotypes about female biology and sexuality.

Therefore, in Christine Orban’s novel, both the male artist and the female model have

characteristics stereotypically associated with their sex. Orban maintains the gendered roles and

power structures of the studio romance: Gustave is a powerful male painter, who controls the

creative process and uses his model’s body to achieve his artistic goals; Jo accedes to Gustave’s

demands while using him to provide her with financial support and a rapt audience for her

exhibitionistic pleasure. Although in Orban’s novel the gender roles are narrowly defined, telling

the story from the model’s point of view allows the author to explore these binary limits from a

different perspective, ultimately challenging them.

D. A Voice of One’s Own

One way that Orban simultaneously activates and then undermines her protagonist’s

traditional feminine role is with the recurring motif of Jo’s hair, introduced in the opening letter

to the editor and sprinkled throughout the text like the white hairs “parsemés” among Jo’s long

red locks. Jo’s undone tresses symbolize both the seductive power she has over men and her

desire for freedom, for a life outside domestic and marital conventions. Jo’s copper curls

represent her youth and beauty—her sexual allure—while the white hairs scattered amongst the

russet ones represent aging, the passing of time, the inevitability of death, and the desire to

reflect upon one’s past. Additionally, in Western culture, red hair is a trope frequently associated

Head,” in Writings on Art and Literature, edited by Werner Hamacher and David E. Welbury. [Stanford
CA: Stanford University Press, 1997], 264).
 214

with a passionate and sensitive nature.400 As mentioned above, Joanna Hiffernan’s curly red hair

was featured in works of art by both Gustave Courbet and James McNiell Whistler. Orban uses

this fact to assign particular importance to Jo’s hair and the attraction it holds for male artists.

Jo proclaims that all the painters who visited James’ Paris studio were captivated by her

tresses: “Tous s’extasiaient sur l'or de mes cheveux” (24). One of Gustave’s nicknames for Jo

further underlines the importance of her hair: he repeatedly calls Jo “ma Roussotte” (65, 66, 67,

90). Jo purposefully uses her curls to increase her own narcissistic power and exhibitionistic

pleasure: “Avec mes cheveux libres de toute attache, j’aimais—je l’avoue—me donner en

spectacle” (48). Wearing her hair down is, in itself a spectacle because in the nineteenth century

the only place a woman could respectably leave her hair undone was when dressing or

sleeping.401 Therefore, there is a cultural association between long, abundant hair left to fall

freely, or “les cheveux défaits,” and the intimacy of the bedroom.402 Jo’s locks carry a strong

erotic charge, particularly when allowed to flow around her. However, she anticipates losing her

power to attract men as she ages, just as her hair will lose its bright color. This fear is one of her

motives for choosing to pose for L’Origine du monde: “Quand les hommes ne me regarderont

plus dans la rue, quand j’aurai coupé mes cheveux, quand je n’inspirerai plus aucun peintre et

qu’il ne me restera rien, mis à part le sentiment d’avoir vécu, regretterai-je de ne pas avoir choisi

une autre existence?” (49-50). Jo does not want to live a bourgeois life and her beautiful curls

make it possible. Her red hair is distinctive and attracts artists to her, giving her the option of a

400
MacDonald, Woman in White, 35.
401
Carol Rifelj, “Le Langage des coiffures.” In Le Roman du signe: fiction et herméneutique au XIXe
siècle, (Saint-Denis, France: Presses universitaires de Vincennes, 2007),
http://books.openedition.org/puv/5521, 13.
402
Rifelj, “Langage des coiffures,” 13.
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life outside “les conventions de la société” (50). The author thus associates Jo’s hair with her

personal power to choose a life she prefers.

Orban endows Jo with awareness of her choices. Jo proclaims “Je n’ai jamais été une

femme convenable” (29). She chooses to engage in her affair with Gustave, prefers relationships

with painters over other men, and acts to procure both sustenance and pleasure for herself. The

narrative underlines Jo’s conscious decisions and her ambivalent emotional responses—both to

the options available to her and to the effects of her decisions. Jo’s repeated ruminations about

her choices and their consequences are another element in J’étais l’origine du monde that spirals

through the text, revealing nuances of Jo’s personality with each iteration: “À l’amertume d’une

vie frileuse, j’ai préféré mes excès, quitte à les payer un jour” (17), she explains. “Une vie

frileuse,” is a cold and timid life, devoid of passion and risk—the opposite of what Jo seeks in

her amorous artistic adventures. Jo’s narrative equates the life of a respectable bourgeois wife

and mother with confinement and constraint:

[…] Tourner une mayonnaise, attendre un seul homme ou le déluge,

limiter, cloisonner mon univers, le clôturer comme un champ de vaches, pour être
sûre de ne pas désirer plus que mon lot, ne pas prendre le risque d’avoir mal, j’en
étais incapable. (50)

The narrative compares proper women who follow the rules to cattle (un champ de vaches),

corralled and safe in their pasture. Jo would rather be pursued through the forest, the quarry of

the passionate Gustave, than wait quietly in the enclosed (“clôturer”) safety of a respectable life.

“Oser être soi-même, tout le monde en est là” (28).

By writing her memoir, Jo creates her own version of herself and also claims all the

male-created ones, thereby taking ownership over her image. Emphasizing her agency, Jo insists

repeatedly on her purposeful choice to live as a model, aware that each painter’s whims

temporarily define her, knowing that “le choix de cette vie [...] interdisait une autre” (73-4) This
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mutability of identity is partly what appeals to Jo about her life as a painter’s model. She

imagines telling the housewives of Paris how narrow their world is:

Vous pensez, parce que vous vous déshabillez devant un seul homme, que
vous m’êtes supérieures? [...] Rentrez chez vous, attendez que votre mari revienne
du bordel [...] pendant que moi, je fouille, je découvre d’autres vies, je voyage, je
comprends [...]. (53)

She deliberately allows herself to assume each role, seeking a multiplicity of experiences

in the gaze of the painter. Even knowing her choices might later bring regret, Jo chooses

to be herself, on her own terms. Orban’s strategy of emphasizing Jo’s agency creates a

fictional female model with a fully-dimensional personality.

If Gustave appropriates some of Jo’s creative energies to create his painting, Jo, in turn,

takes possession of Gustave’s artistic ability in writing her story. When Gustave performs

cunnilingus on Jo, his face, mustache and beard come into direct contact with her pelvis, which

provides the painter with the inspiration he needs to complete L’Origine du monde. In the closing

letter to the editor, the author again reprises references to hair, this time likening Gustave’s beard

to Jo’s “poils,” the hair of her pubic region: “[...] lorsque je me regarde dans un miroir, j’ai

l’impression de voir la barbe de Courbet se mélanger à mes poils [...]” (138). Here, Jo’s merging

with Gustave becomes a source of power and inspiration for her artistic expression. Orban’s Jo,

in writing her own story, has adopted the masculine role reserved for the artist in the traditional

atelier fantasy. Therefore, she has also claimed some of Gustave’s creative powers, just like both

Gustave and James use Jo’s body and life energy to produce the masterpieces for which she

modeled: “Les peintres qui m’ont aimée ont absorbé un peu de ma vie” (109). Jo’s letter

continues: “Courbet habite L’Origine du monde comme il m’a habitée tout au long de ce livre”

(138). Indeed, Orban’s fictional version of Gustave Courbet inhabits the book via Jo’s

remembered direct quotes of his words to her and the continual use of his name. However, if he
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is in control of the creation of the painting, and if his voice can be heard in the direct dialogues,

Jo keeps control of the narrative. Artistic creativity is an act of expressing one’s own identity.

Gustave and James each assert their version of Jo when they paint her portrait. In writing her

narrative, Jo creates her own self-definition, and she claims her understanding of the two famous

painters who were her lovers.

Jo’s intensely negative experience when she first sees the completed painting seems to

reinforce stereotypes regarding the sight of female genitals. In her essay “Le Rire de la Méduse,”

Hélène Cixous confronted the image of Medusa and urged women to reclaim it, to refuse the

shame and negative associations traditionally assigned to female bodies, and to write the

multifaceted embodied experience of women’s lives. 403 However, if the structure of Orban’s text

is like Courbet’s painting, then it also metaphorically recreates the shapes of the female body,

answering Cixous’ challenge for women to write themselves: “Il faut que la femme s’écrive.”404

This suggests that Jo not only wishes to control how others see her, as established with her

appeal to the editor to refrain from judging her, but that her narrative is also an attempt to

reclaim her self-image and recreate a positive view of her own body.

In Orban’s version of the studio romance, the roles of the artist and the model remain

unchanged and align with gendered heteronormative stereotypes. Orban’s novel repeats many

tropes and stereotypes inherited from the nineteenth century: Gustave is the forceful masculine

painter and the confluence of his creative and aesthetic impulses determine the parameters of the

painting. Jo is the objectified recipient of his desiring and defining gaze, a manipulative model

who is simultaneously self-sacrificing and self-absorbed. However, the studio romance gender

Hélène Cixous, Le Rire de la Méduse: et autres ironies, (Paris: Galilée, 2010); and “The Laugh of the
403

Medusa.” Signs 1, no. 4, (1976): 875–93.

404
Cixous, Rire, 39.
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roles are also undone. In writing her confessional narrative, Jo has become the artist of a new

text, a version of the studio fantasy that includes her desires and claims her self-image. Now, she

has a voice, a point of view, evolving emotions, and multifaceted motivations. Furthermore, the

novel itself is written by a female author in response to Courbet’s creative invitation. Hence,

what is new and different in Orban’s text is not what the character says, the studio romance

framework itself, or even the overt eroticism of the text. The novelty of Orban’s novel is that a

woman writer saw Courbet’s painting and responded with her own creative act, one centered on

the imagined embodied experience of the female model.

Jo sees herself in the painting and takes the place of the artist as she writes her story. If

the artist is a surrogate for the viewer, then in shifting the focus to the model’s point of view,

Orban’s text creates space for a female viewer of Gustave Courbet’s L’Origine du monde. Even

more, Orban depicts Jo as a woman rich with agency and complexity. Jo’s ambivalent feelings

when faced with the fragmented representation of her body do not negate the erotic pleasure she

experiences in posing, in being seen, in watching the sexual act, and in looking at herself. The

text itself, framed as a confession, increases the sense of pleasure through telling and reliving the

experience while also allowing the model to construct her own identity. Additionally, the artist is

now the object of the model’s gaze. Through Jo’s eyes, female viewers can reinterpret Courbet

and his painting: The woman claims a self-definition outside the parameters of patriarchy.

Suddenly, she has a complete body and this body can accept ambivalence. In the closing letter to

the editor, Jo writes “Nos existences sont d’étrange puzzles dont il manque tant de pièces quand

on arrive au bout” (138). Although Orban’s text evokes the absences that haunt Courbet’s

canvas, the novel restores the puzzle piece of the model’s missing body and voice.
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Conclusion

Gustave Courbet’s provocative painting L’Origine du monde is a perfect starting point for

an examination of the female model’s role in art and literature. Although the image seems to be

displaying everything openly, the figure’s truncated body emphasizes what the viewer cannot

see, cannot truly know, creating a dramatic visual representation of absence. At the same time,

the canvas itself becomes a physical presence, representing the body of the model and her

conscious choice to pose for this painting. The figure’s open legs invite interested viewers to

imagine entering her body, while her missing face and limbs also invite observers to complete

the cropped image with conscious and unconscious projections of their own emotions, memories,

and experiences. Deceptively simple at first glance, L’Origine du monde can provoke limitlessly

multifaceted individual responses. This is a distillation of the complex role the model plays in

depictions of the studio romance.

Honoré de Balzac’s novella “Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu;” Gustave Courbet’s paintings

L’Atelier du peintre: Allégorie réelle déterminant une phase de sept années de ma vie artistique

et morale and L’Origine du monde; Edmond and Jules de Goncourts’ novel Manette Salomon;

Émile Zola’s L’Œuvre, and J’étais l’origine du monde by Christine Orban each create a

gendered role for the members of the studio triad of painter/model/observer. According to the

stereotypes of the atelier romance, the painter is male and his artwork is an expression of his

virility; the female model is a willing sacrifice, giving her body to bolster the artist’s career; and

the external viewer is a voyeur of the model’s nudity and of her relationship with the painter.

Yet, these same works also contain details and structural elements that do not entirely align with

traditional gender stereotypes. Therefore, each work of art also subverts binary constructions of
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rigid masculine/feminine identities and roles. Within the texts and canvases in my corpus, the

female models are the subject of masculine artistic and erotic visual interest, but each model also

has her own gaze, symbolizing feminine subjectivity. The creators thus represent women as

having thoughts, goals, and desires separate from those of the male painter-protagonist. The

Goncourt brothers and Émile Zola use their fictional models as part of their novels’ composition,

thereby portraying women with more fully-developed individuality than women have in Balzac’s

“Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu” or Courbet’s L’Atelier. Gustave Courbet’s L’Origine du monde is a

complex image, provocatively inviting readings that can variously buttress binary thinking or

defy polarized reductionism. In response to Courbet’s powerful canvas, Christine Orban’s novel

J’étais l’Origine du monde presents a version of the studio romance from the female model’s

point of view, making the woman’s subjectivity the predominant organizing factor in the text.

The fictional models in the works chosen for this study therefore gain increasing agency over

time, with the later works containing more richly nuanced characters whose perspectives become

part of the deliberate design of the narratives.

The first chapter focused on Gustave Courbet’s L’Atelier du peintre. Allégorie réelle

déterminant une phase de sept années de ma vie artistique et morale (1855) and Honoré de

Balzac’s novella “Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu” (1831-37). Both Courbet’s canvas and Balzac’s

tale activate patriarchal myths of the nude model’s willing role as muse to the male painter.

However, I identified vantage points from which we can recognize feminine agency in these

works, and likewise the fallibility of masculine-dominated paradigms of artistic creativity.

Gilette can be read as a powerful agent in the text: she is an astute observer of the world around

her who is more aware of nuances than are the male painters; and the effects of her agency–her

ability to choose or refuse to pose for Frenhofer–drives the plot of the tale, making her an
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essential narrative focal point. Because the men in the novel do not see or understand her,

Gillette is, herself, a “chef d’œuvre inconnu.” Courbet’s model, who stands at the center of

L’Atelier, is placed spatially above the painter, and her pose is one of active stillness. She is an

evocation of feminine creative power. Traces of unstable binaries within Courbet and Balzac’s

works open avenues for viewer and reader participation in making meaning of works of art,

allowing a redefinition of the female model’s role as an active one.

In the second chapter, I demonstrated that in their novel Manette Salomon, the Goncourts

activate existing myths and stereotypes of the atelier fantasy, while simultaneously creating or

allowing gaps in meaning that undermine strict gender categories. The authors represent Manette

as having her own desires and goals, portraying her as exercising agency. From her initial

decision to pose for Coriolis to her calculated manipulations of his life, Manette’s choices are

central to the structure of the novel. Although the Goncourts depiction of Manette is fraught with

misogynistic and antisemitic stereotypes, they also created a female model who can be read

against the grain as a representation of powerful feminine subjectivity.

In the third chapter, I established that the character of Christine plays an essential role in

the narrative and composition of Émile Zola’s novel, L’Œuvre (1886). The author employs a

shifting perspective between Claude, the painter-protagonist, and Christine, the model who

becomes his wife. Like Manette and Gillette before her, Christine’s choice to reveal or hide her

body is central to the action and organization of the story. Zola builds tension around four

important scenes when Christine poses nude, and he uses her perspective to create the emotional

ambiance in these segments. Incorporating the female model’s gaze in the organization and

structure of the novel portrays her as having subjectivity, undermines the myth that she is merely

a passive object, and invites a multiplicity of readers into the space of the text.
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The final chapter analyzes Gustave Courbet’s painting L’Origine du monde and Christine

Orban’s novel J’étais l’origine du monde. With its bold subject matter and skilled artistic

rendering, Courbet’s canvas enacts the studio romance fantasy and activates all the associated

gender binaries: artist and viewers alike gaze upon the faceless female model’s exposed body.

The movement of the spiraling composition mimics intimate touch while the truncated figure

invites viewers to complete the image with their own projections. Thus, observers are

participants in the visual exchange between artist and model, each viewer’s response becoming

part of the painting’s meaning. Orban’s novel accepts Courbet’s invitation, imagining the process

of creating L’Origine du monde. On the one hand, Orban maintains heteronormativity and binary

paradigms in her portrayal of the aggressively masculine Gustave and the exhibitionistic Jo. On

the other hand, Orban portrays the model as an individual acting to fulfill her own desires. As

she recounts posing for L’Origine, Orban’s protagonist, Jo, is simultaneously model, artist, and

observer. Jo creates her own work of art in writing her memoirs: the novel is a portrait of the

fictionalized Gustave Courbet, an homage to L’Origine du monde, and Jo’s own self-portrait.

Orban uses erotic imagery and crude language to mimic L’Origine’s shocking effect on viewers,

while structuring the text in a circular manner, similar to the composition of Courbet’s canvas.

Thus, both Gustave Courbet’s painting and Christine Orban’s novel use binaries inherent to the

studio romance while also eliciting a variety of ambivalent emotions, motives, and reactions that

undermine gender dichotomies.

This dissertation questioned binary representations of gender, proposing that the female

model plays an essential role in the meaning and structure of the works in the corpus. The model

is more than merely a secondary character who supports the painter’s story arc, nor is she simply

a subservient victim of patriarchy. The artists and writers whose work I have discussed each
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create fictional characters or render painted representations of a female model posing in a male

painter’s studio. I have identified compositional elements in each work that represent feminine

subjectivity and undermine rigid binary gender paradigms. These binary representations are not

limited to male artists. In many respects, Christine Orban’s novel illustrates the persistence of

heteronormative gendered representations. Her portrayal of the relations between Jo and Gustave

maintains a patriarchal dynamic of the controlling male painter and the self-sacrificing female

model. Yet, the narrative transgresses gendered roles within the atelier fantasy in some respects,

primarily by positing the female model as the author of the text.

Towards New Understandings of the Studio Romance

Twentieth and twenty-first century creators of all genders and identities have engaged

critically with the longstanding stereotypes of the studio romance and, specifically, with the

representation of female bodies in paintings and texts that portray the relationships of the artist,

model, and observer.405 Studying these later works can further enrich our understanding of

literary and visual means of reimagining gender binaries, particularly as social changes over time

have allowed a greater number of feminine and gender fluid individuals to become artists and

writers.

Picasso’s body of work is a rich potential source for our analysis. Picasso, as we have

seen, identified with Balzac’s fictional Frenhofer and even created a series of illustrations for a

405
For example, Marcel Duchamp’s Étant donnés (1946-66, Philadelphia Museum of Art) may be a
purposeful response to Courbet’s L’Origine du monde (Teyssèdre, Roman, 312). The nude female figure,
which viewers see by peering through two small holes in a wooden door, is posed like the one in
Courbet’s canvas and Duchamp may have been among those who saw it at Lacan’s home (Teyssèdre,
Roman, 312).
 224

1926 edition of “Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu.” Additionally, he made over a hundred drawings,

etchings, and paintings depicting a male artist (frequently resembling himself) at work in his

studio with one or more nude female models posing. 406 Particularly during the latter part of his

life, Picasso also reimagined a variety of well-known nineteenth-century paintings and works by

old masters: Courbet’s Les Demoiselles des bords de la Seine (Courbet 1856-7, Picasso 1950);

Delacroix’s Femmes d’Alger dans leur appartement (Delacroix 1834, Picasso 1954-55);

Velasquez’ Las Méninas (Velasquez 1656, Picasso 1957) Manet’s Déjeuner sur l’herbe (Manet

1862-3, Picasso 1959-62) and Olympia (Manet 1863, Picasso 1964); Ingres’ Raphael et La

Fornarina (Ingres 1813, Picasso 1968).407 Picasso’s choice to interpret Velasquez’s Las Méninas

and Ingres’ Raphael et La Fornarina is particularly relevant to our study of the studio romance

because both paintings represent artists at work. 408 Additionally, like the versions of the studio

romance we have discussed, Picasso often linked sexual potency to artistic prowess; thus, his

paintings depicting female figures can be interpreted as expressions of his erotic desire and

personal insecurities.409 However, this is but one reading, and it is a reductive one. As Karen L.

Kleinfelder explains, Picasso deliberately resisted such restrictive interpretations:

The “plot” [of Picasso’s artist and model series] is inherently self-reflexive: an
artist, Picasso, makes a picture of an artist, who is also busily at work making a
picture. The theme continually turns in on itself, while at the same time Picasso is

Karen L. Kleinfelder lists 154 such works: The Artist, His Model, Her Image, His Gaze: Picasso’s
406

Pursuit of the Model, (Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press, 1993), ix-xiii.
407
See Timothy Anglin Burgard. “Picasso and Appropriation.” The Art Bulletin 73, no. 3 (1991): 489.
408
Diego Velasquez’s Las Méninas (1656, Museo Nacional del Prado, Spain) shows Velasquez himself at
work on a portrait of King Philip IV and Queen Mariana of Spain while their daughter, Infanta Margaret
Theresa, and her entourage entertain the royal couple. Ingres’ painting Raphael et La Fornarina (1813,
Fogg Museum, Harvard University) portrays the Renaissance painter, Raphael, in his studio. He sits upon
a stool and holds a beautiful young woman on his lap. While the female figure gazes obliquely at the
viewer, the painter’s head is turned towards his portrait of her.
409
Burgard, “Picasso and Appropriation,” 490.
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busily turning the theme outward in one variation after another. By continually
suspending climax and delaying closure, Picasso’s structural strategy is designed
precisely to frustrate narrative expectations […]. His continual play of variations
on a theme promotes a more open-ended, process orientation. 410

Further inquiry into the strategies Picasso used in his portrayals of the artist and the female

model can therefore expand our understanding of the studio romance.

Additionally, Picasso’s variations on Delacroix inspired Assia Djebar’s Femmes d’Alger

dans leur appartement (1980), an innovative text that, like Picasso’s work, resists reductive

readings.411 The gender binary in many nineteenth-century French works is accompanied by a

second but likewise gendered Orientalist bias. As discussed in chapter 2, the Goncourt brothers'

portrayal of Coriolis’ attraction to Manette as influenced by his love of all things deemed

“Oriental” is an example of this colonialist perspective.412 Naming her text after Eugène

Delacroix’s painting Femmes d’Alger dans leur appartement (1834), Djebar explores and

redefines the meanings assigned to Algerian women and reinterprets Picasso’s variations on

Delacroix, thereby challenging misogynistic and Orientalist bias. Delacroix’s canvas, currently

in the Louvre, depicts several women surrounded by luxurious objects and décor. The

implication of the image is that the artist is offering viewers a secret window into the exotic

“harems” of Algeria. In Djebar’s text, the author reframes Delacroix’s image as a stolen glance

into private space, a manifestation of both colonialism and patriarchy that casts Algerian women

410
Kleinfelder, The Artist, 6.

Assia Djebar (née Fatima-Zohra Imalayen, 1936 – 2015) was the first Maghrebian author elected to the
411

Académie Française.
412
Orientalism is a Eurocentric view of the peoples and cultures of the Middle East and/or Asia: “The
Orient […] [has] been since antiquity a place of romance, exotic beings, haunting memories and
landscape, remarkable experiences” (Said, Orientalism, 1). This fantasized view also presumes masculine
and European moral, physical, and social superiority.
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as the exotic Other and confines them within a restrictive, yet emotionally isolated

composition.413 Picasso created his series of drawings and paintings based on Delacroix’s work

during 1954-55, coinciding with the beginning of the Algerian War of Independence (1

November 1954 – 19 March 1962). Picasso’s versions all contain the abstracted figures for

which he is known. Djebar views Picasso’s fragmentation of female bodies as a healing image

that honors Algerian women and their role in the Revolution: “Picasso renverse la malédiction,

fait éclater le malheur, inscrit en lignes hardies un bonheur totalement nouveau.”414 Djebar

invites readers to consider the lived experiences of Algerian women, the trauma of war, and the

effect of the French outsider’s gaze on the women’s lives and identities. Although Djebar’s text

does not directly enact the studio romance through inclusion of atelier scenes, it deconstructs the

patriarchal and Eurocentric power structures behind the masculine gaze. Echoing the

fragmentary composition of Picasso’s images, Djebar juxtaposes a variety of polyvocal textual

forms that William Berg calls “kaleidoscopic:” examples include: conversations, flashbacks,

anecdotes, and fragments of songs and tales.415 Djebar thereby claims creative power for the

feminine gaze, using it to redefine Arab women of the past, present and future.

Paula Rego (1935-2022), Portuguese-born British artist, has also created a powerful

feminine response to nineteenth-century works by men. Her series of three pastels in response to

“Le Chef d’œuvre inconnu” dismantles binary structures. Entitled The Balzac Story (2011),

Marie of Egypt (2011), and Painting Him Out (2011), Rego’s images portray feminine

possession of the act of creation. In Painting Him Out, a female artist covers a male figure with a

413
Assia Djebar, Femmes d’Alger dans leur appartement: Nouvelles, (Paris: Des Femmes, 1983), 241-3.
414
Djebar, Femmes d’Alger, 260.
415
Berg, Imagery, 229.
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layer of green paint, expelling masculine presence from the creative space.416 The Balzac Story

portrays three women painting portraits of themselves and one another, thereby repossessing

their own images and collapsing the distance between model and artist.417 Thus, the female

figures claim their own representation, rejecting the need for a masculine gaze: “la femme-

peintre et modèle à la fois se donne à soi-même.”418 A further study of Rego’s work could reveal

further dismantling of gendered binary power structures within the creative space of the studio.

The collaborative work of Claude Cahun (née Lucy Schwob 1894-1954) and Marcel

Moore (née Suzanne Malherbe 1892-1972) is a powerful reimagining of the atelier fantasy’s

heteronormativity. They offer a fluid version of the studio romance that ultimately confounds the

gendered roles of the nineteenth-century schema. In the portrait photographs the two women

created, the roles of artist, model, and viewer become shifting positions that can be occupied by

the self or the same-sex other alternately and simultaneously. Cahun and Moore were stepsisters,

romantic partners, and artistic collaborators, living and working together for over forty years.

Cahun resisted reductive and binary categories, often expressing an androgynous gender

identity.419 Likewise, her writing defies categorization, comprising essays, poems, novellas,

translations, letters, and other prose forms.420 Moore, who was trained at the École de Beaux-

416
Dufrêne, “Faire voir,” 56.
417
Dufrêne, “Faire voir,” 56.
418
Dufrêne, “Faire voir,” 56.
419
Kristine Von Oehsen, “The Lives of Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore,” in Don’t Kiss Me: The Art of
Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore, (New York: Aperture Foundation/Jersey Heritage Trust, 2006), 12.

Francois Leperlier, Claude Cahun: L’Écart et la métamorphose: Essai, (Paris: Jean-Michel Place,
420

1992), 15.
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Arts in Nantes, wrote and illustrated articles on fashion.421 The two women were active in

Surrealist and leftist political circles during the 1930s until they moved to Jersey in 1937.422

Cahun exhibited a sculpture and other pieces with the Surrealists in May of 1936 in the

Exposition Surréaliste d’objets at Chez Charles Ratton.423 The couple created a large collection

of photographs, including many nudes featuring Cahun. Although Cahun and Moore could have

published or exhibited the images if they had so desired, they shared only a few, suggesting they

deliberately limited viewership. While these photos have traditionally been labeled self-portraits

and attributed to Cahun, there is evidence that Moore collaborated with most if not all of them.

For example, the photographer’s shadow is frequently visible in the pictures, demonstrating the

presence of the other.424 The couple also produced two books together, with Cahun authoring the

texts and Moore creating visual material: Vues et visions (1919), which is a very structured text,

each two-page spread featuring illustrations by Marcel Moore and prose poems by Cahun; and

Aveux non avenus (1930), for which Cahun created a fragmentary, multivocal, non-linear

autobiographical text, and Moore created collages from Cahun’s photo portraits. Their

collaboration itself defies the patriarchal model of single authorship, and their use of homoerotic

tropes presents an alternative to the masculine-dominated schema of the traditional studio

fantasy.

Examining the tropes of the woman as artist’s model and as creator over the last two

centuries demonstrates that feminine engagement with the creative process has moved from a

421
Von Oehsen, “Lives,” 11-12.
422
Gen Doy, “Another Side of the Picture: Looking Differently at Claude Cahun,” in Don’t Kiss Me: The
Art of Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore, (New York: Aperture Foundation, 2006), 75.
423
Von Oehsen, “Lives,” 16.
424
Doy, “Another Side,” 74.
 229

passive role towards a more active role where the woman becomes an observer and creator

herself. Rather than merely reversing the traditional gendered power structure to make women

the observers of men, women artists of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries redefine the gaze

and the creative process itself. Close analysis of these women’s works reveals a variety of visual

and literary strategies that express their active engagement in the creative process.

A Return to the Beginning

Having followed a shifting path through various iterations of the studio romance in

nineteenth and twentieth century works of art, and having posited avenues for further exploration

of non-binary representations of women and artists, we return to the beginning, to the origins of

this study, to my first day in Paris, on the first floor of the Musée d’Orsay where I stood,

stunned, facing L’Origine du monde. The powerful, multifaceted, and even disorienting response

I experienced upon first seeing L’Origine du monde stamped the image in my mind. It stayed

with me, continuing to inform my understanding of art and literature and inspiring the subject of

this dissertation. L’Origine du monde hovers between misogynistic pornography and artistic

masterpiece. Savatier says of Courbet’s painting “[…] par son sujet et son cadrage, ce tableau

s’affirme d’emblée comme un symbole de la liberté de créer, affranchie de toute contrainte

morale […].”425 L’Origine du monde is, indeed, a bold claim of creative liberty–not merely the

freedom allowing Courbet to paint such an image, but also the model’s right to pose for it, the

museum’s choice to display it, and the viewer’s freedom to look at and think about L’Origine du

monde. Even more, the choice to investigate, to discuss, and even to create an artistic response to

425
Savatier, L’Origine, 16.
 230

L’Origine du monde remains an act of personal liberty in a society that still censors and

constrains individual expressions of sexuality and gender identities outside heteronormativity.

When facing L’Origine du monde, observers become both witnesses to and participants in a

moment of artistic creation that recreates the collaborative nature of all art and literature.
 231

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