Birthing the modern : modernity, maternity, and subjectivity in the art of Berthe Morisot
department or school: Arts, Faculty of
department or school: Art History, Visual Art and Theory, Department of
data provider: DSpace
degree campus: UBCV
creator: Krogh, Schuyler
issued: 2022-02-10T16:52:53Z
issued: 2022
related degree: Master of Arts - MA
degree grantor: University of British Columbia
description: The category of “woman artist” has proven itself to be a perpetually troubling object for the history of French art in the late nineteenth century. Berthe Morisot (1841-1895) is an especially troubling figure within this category as an artist who declined public alignment with the category of “woman artist” during her lifetime but has nevertheless been repeatedly classified as such in later scholarship and curation, and whose paintings of domestic scenes have been dialectically opposed to scenes of modernity located in public space. My project addresses the problematics in this scholarship by analyzing Morisot’s work as inscribing specific conditions of modernity through her navigation of the categories of artist and woman. My project will specifically address her paintings of maternal scenes as the sites that most directly grapple with the intersections of modernity, gender, and the woman artist’s own subjectivity when confronted with the category of mother. The first section of the thesis addresses Morisot’s paintings of her elder sister Edma Pontillon (1839-1921) and her daughters from the early 1870s as sites of mediation and confrontation between the role of mother, as occupied by Edma, and artist, as occupied by Berthe. The second section addresses Morisot’s paintings of her daughter Julie Manet (1878-1966) and Julie’s wet nurse as sites of a complex series of deferrals of labour, with the intrusion of capital into the private sphere. Finally, Morisot’s paintings of Julie with her doll, with her father Eugène Manet (1833-1892), and with Morisot herself explore Morisot’s simultaneous occupation of the roles of mother and “woman artist.”
aggregated CHO: https://circle.library.ubc.ca/rest/handle/2429/71484
note: BIRTHING THE MODERN: MODERNITY, MATERNITY, AND SUBJECTIVITY IN THE ART OF BERTHE MORISOT by Schuyler Krogh B.A., Kenyon College, 2015A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTDOCTORAL STUDIES (Art History and Theory) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) January 2022 © Schuyler Krogh, 2022 Explanatory Note This MA thesis, dated January 2022, is a revised version of one initially submitted in August 2019. The initial version of the thesis was subsequently found to inadequately reference the work of another scholar, and it has been permanently withdrawn. The current version of the thesis has been thoroughly revised to provide appropriate credit to previous work and has been re-examined and approved in this light. This 2022 version of the thesis supersedes the previous version for all citation purposes. ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies for acceptance, a thesis entitled: Birthing the Modern: Modernity, Maternity, and Subjectivity in the Art of Berthe Morisot submitted by Schuyler Krogh in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Art History and Theory Examining Committee: Catherine M. Soussloff, Professor, AHVA, UBC Supervisor Erin Silver, Assistant Professor, AHVA, UBC Supervisory Committee Member iii Abstract The category of “woman artist” has proven itself to be a perpetually troubling object for the history of French art in the late nineteenth century. Berthe Morisot (1841-1895) is an especially troubling figure within this category as an artist who declined public alignment with the category of “woman artist” during her lifetime but has nevertheless been repeatedly classified as such in later scholarship and curation, and whose paintings of domestic scenes have been dialectically opposed to scenes of modernity located in public space. My project …
has type: Thesis/Dissertation
date issued: 2019-09
is shown at: 10.14288/1.0380669
language: eng
degree discipline: Art History
provider: Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
publisher: University of British Columbia
rights: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
rights URI: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
scholar level: Graduate
type: Text
identifier URI: http://hdl.handle.net/2429/71484