Copyright by Laura Mareike Sager 2006 - The University of Texas at ...

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perception thus defined as “an activity that cuts against the grain; it proceeds not in consonance with the body’s activities but in contradiction to them” (139). An image of and about looking, then, this painting becomes self-reflexive, thematizing spectatorship and the viewer’s gaze. In returning the viewer’s look, the girl in the painting unsettles the hierarchy of seeing/seen and subject/object, uncannily becoming the seeing subject and transforming the viewer into the observed. Moreover, the painting’s ambiguous status as seemingly a portrait, yet not really one, situates it within the portrait tradition by emphasizing its defiance against it. In the traditional Renaissance profile portrait, the woman is seen from the side, passively looking into emptiness, representing an object of exchange or material wealth. This tradition of “gendered and possessive seeing” (179) is countered in The Girl with a Pearl Earring by the active turn of the girl’s head and eyes toward the viewer, affirming the female gaze and her power to break that male tradition of looking at and objectifying women. 211 Tracy Chevalier’s novel in which the girl of this painting herself talks not only about the creation of that work, but also about other art works, further underscores that challenge to a male-dominated tradition by making the girl an actively looking and speaking subject through the use of ekphrasis. The film, on the other hand, focuses on the issues of social class in Vermeer’s work by foregrounding the relationships between servants and masters and the social power structures of seventeenth century Holland. 211 Wolf interprets Woman with a Pearl Necklace, rather than The Girl with a Pearl Earring in the tradition of the Renaissance profile portrait (178-79). However, I believe that this context applies at least partly also to The Girl with a Pearl Earring. 200
TRACY CHEVALIER AND PETER WEBBER: GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING A virtually unavoidable change made in film adaptations of novels is the condensation or deletion of scenes. Peter Webber’s film coalesces into a single scene two separate, relatively secondary episodes of the novel: the birth celebration of Vermeer’s eleventh child and the viewing of Woman with a Pearl Necklace by his patron Van Ruijven. The film merges these episodes into a pivotal scene that not only foregrounds class and power relations in Vermeer's world, but also changes the point of view from which the painting is interpreted. Moreover, the film cuts one and significantly modifies two of Griet’s previous three ekphrases of that painting that occur in the novel. 212 In Chevalier’s narrative, Griet’s first view of Woman With a Pearl Necklace (ca. 1664) occurs when she is cleaning up in Vermeer’s atelier for the first time. Contemplating the painting, Griet begins to reflect on its meaning for herself, ending in the desire to identify with the subject of the painting and to enter the world of its creator: “I wanted to wear the mantle and the pearls. I wanted to know the man who painted her like that” (36). Moreover, she muses 212 There have so far been only two longer studies of Chevalier’s Girl with a Pearl Earring., neither of which compares it to the film adaptation. Deborah H. Cibelli in “'Girl with a Pearl Earring': Painting, Reality, Fiction,” Journal of Popular Culture 37.4 (2004): 583-92, compares Chevalier’s treatment of the painting and Vermeer to art historical accounts, and seems to be mostly interested in clarifying what is “reality” and what is “fiction” in this novel. Martina Wagner-Egelhaaf, “Ein anderes Zeichen,” Dinge: Medien der Aneignung, Grenzen der Verfügung, eds. Gisela Ecker, Claudia Breger, and Susanne Scholz (Königstein/Taunus: Helmer, 2002) 87-90, emphasizes Griet’s process of emancipation and her resistance to fulfill the roles accorded to her by the men in her life. She does not, however, connect this interpretation to the original painting nor to Griet’s ekphrases of other works, which I believe is significant for understanding not only the full extent of her emancipation, but moreover, the importance of the changes in the film, which undo her agency and emancipation. 201
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Copyright by Laura Mareike Sager 20
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Writing and Filming the Painting: E
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Acknowledgements I would like to ex
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After developing a framework of fou
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Chapter 4: Goya’s El sueño de la
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INTRODUCTION Chapter 1: Toward a De
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arts as well as between academic di
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value” than painting, and to offe
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(ut pictura poesis).” 14 But inte
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Similarly, Ernest B. Gilman has dis
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studied in terms of composition and
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Supper, a Crucifixion), but produce
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also lose their potential to be ekp
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etween art history and film studies
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In contrast to the films Poulton di
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words, filmic ekphrasis reenacts in
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to musical ekphrasis, I allege that
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films revert to the traditional mal
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Paris 1989 and Musée du Louvre IV,
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Moreover, the woman in the green co
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hear, read or talk about the art wo
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man in the blue shirt. The man next
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fruitfully applied to poetic ekphra
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has a similar goal and will adapt h
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Poulton describes sixteen categorie
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means and other filmic devices such
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paintings by Renoir with which the
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Attributive Ekphrasis The first cat
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conflictive, and one conflictive an
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instances of ekphrasis will play a
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hohen Brauen, den breiten Mund mit
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Blas de Otero’s poem “Guernica
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Inquisition trial, the works are di
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is in the film reduced to an expres
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present, and constitutes a device c
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contrasting images. In Plett’s te
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Similarly, Camilo José Cela’s Lo
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the addition of Dirck van Baburen
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I have discussed examples of dramat
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has identified three groups of pict
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Chapter 3: Goya’s The Sleep of Re
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an espousal of the Enlightenment an
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(Capricci, 1743), and Giambattista
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audience would probably be familiar
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intended meaning of the Caprichos
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of his Obras has a frontispiece tha
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almost any sort of satire” since
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more explicit in literary texts, si
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y Goya,”1961). 112 In both these
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political opportunism of those indi
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have not a separating but a complem
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The drama takes place in December 1
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King’s minister Calomarde, take o
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works, rather than his mistress Leo
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While the first phrase (“Tal para
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with the perspective represented in
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interpretation also points to Buero
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decapitated by one of his own paint
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azón and his own involvement in an
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Goya’s aquatint and of the text-i
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adopt Goya’s perspective, puts th
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point, allowing the viewer a glimps
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eally happened. Boccherini’s musi
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moving characters are superimposed
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eason. However, this positive note
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Likewise, in Kunert’s poem, the r
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ends the nightmare sequence. Howeve
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Chapter 4: Goya’s El sueño de la
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anger at his constant surveillance
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USES OF EKPHRASIS IN THE NOVEL AND
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phantastischen Gefunkels hart, nack
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sphere. Unlike the novel, the inter
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power and their inability to rule S
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Entering the Quinta del Sordo, on t
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that emphasizes the personal, aesth
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his source of hope and spiritual gu
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drawings and paintings of his exter
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struggle with himself and his inter
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y strange creatures from his imagin
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Page 161 and 162: of ekphrasis in both produces a cer
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Page 165 and 166: interpretive ekphrases), or visuall
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Page 173 and 174: competition on another level, by re
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Page 177 and 178: the renowned artist from classical
Page 179 and 180: Thus, as was the case with the Self
Page 181 and 182: wearing not his usual white cap or
Page 183 and 184: Thus, it is no surprise that such a
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Page 187 and 188: has not adopted it in his film. The
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Page 191 and 192: While Korda also does not show Sask
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Page 197 and 198: However, Zuckmayer’s interpretati
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Page 201 and 202: The use of the spoken word in this
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Page 205 and 206: etween social classes and as the co
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Page 209: viewer’s gaze into actively seein
Page 213 and 214: differences between the two women,
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Page 219 and 220: Vermeer’s economic dependence on
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Page 223 and 224: thereafter at an auction of that pa
Page 225 and 226: Likewise, the two central ekphrasti
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Page 235 and 236: In short, these two novels foregrou
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Page 239 and 240: promotion of his public image throu
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Page 243 and 244: PARAGONE But why do the ekphrastic
Page 245 and 246: Since its invention, film has been
Page 247 and 248: contemporary art historians. By for
Page 249 and 250: Berger, John, and Nella Bielski. Go
Page 251 and 252: Daniel, Howard. “Introduction.”
Page 253 and 254: Hartmann, Lucrecia. Capriccio - Bil
Page 255 and 256: Lopez-Rey, José. Goya’s Capricho
Page 257 and 258: Richter, Rolf. “Goya - der Weg zu
Page 259 and 260: Stoll, Andre. “Goyas Illumionatio
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Yacobi, Tamar. “The Ekphrastic Mo
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Vita Laura Mareike Sager was born i
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