Odalisque
Artist
Julien Vallou de Villeneuve
(French, 1795 - 1866)
Dateca. 1853
MediumSalt print
DimensionsImage and sheet: 6 9/16 × 4 11/16 inches (16.67 × 11.91 cm)
Mount: 13 3/8 × 10 7/16 inches (33.97 × 26.51 cm)
Mount: 13 3/8 × 10 7/16 inches (33.97 × 26.51 cm)
Credit LineGift of the Hall Family Foundation
Object number2016.75.353
Signednone
InscribedDated on image, lower left, in negative: “1903”;
Dated on mount recto, bottom center, in pencil: “1903”.
MarkingsOn mount recto, lower left, in pencil: “88”;
On mount recto, lower right, in pencil: “22”;
On mount verso, upper left corner, in pencil: "7” [circled].
On View
Not on viewCollections
DescriptionImage of a woman seated with one leg crossed over the other. Her arms are crossed and her elbows rest on her legs with one hand on her chin. She’s topless with fabric draped across her waist and a long scarf over her head. She’s adorned with jewelry - rings, bracelets, and a necklace. The chair and side table are covered in patterned fabric as is the floor beneath her bare feet.Gallery LabelTo avoid having his photographs categorized as erotica or pornography, Julien Vallou de Villeneuve posed his female nudes with the exoticizing trappings of an artist’s studio. Here, a partially clothed model poses amid rugs, drapery, turbans, spears, and beads. Giving his photographs names like Odalisque or categorizing them as “studies” for artists, Vallou de Villeneuve used any possible means to help legitimize his nude photographs as art and therefore elude government censors.
Purchased from James Hyman Photography, London, England by The Hall Family Foundation, Kansas City, MO, 2016;
Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 2016.
Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 2016.
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