Art Criticism - The State University of New York

ennui or physical distress leads them to pass moral judgement. Zatlin comments:
The only picture in Rops's oeuvre in which a man overtly expresses
his rage at woman is Cavalry. Here, a crucified man with an
erect phallus, whose rage has distorted his features, uses his prehensile
toes to bind the hair of the naked woman in front of him
tightly around her neck. As she strangles and dies in recompense
for arousing his lust, her arms jut out in mimicry of his crucifixion.
The religious references, the title and the cross, brand the woman
as the Antichrist, the cause of man's misery. But the illusions are
blasphemous, for we see not only the cause but the symptoms of
man's plight: his contempt and self-disgust.9
Looking at the over-the-top nature ofRops, it is clear how his deliveries
are not commensurate with the decadent idea of the anti-climax. In fact, he
has been considered one of the least decadent of his peers. He is interested in
sex divested of mystery and foreplay. The Ropsian woman is, as ZatIin alluded
to in the title of her essay, "naked" rather than "nude." That is to say, Rops
strips his· women. Further, his contempt for them is obvious in his choice of
titles such as Human Detritus, Heart in Hand, and Deplorable Attitude. Heart
in Hand portrays a woman reclining with her skirts pulled up and her legs
spread, inviting the male viewer. She appears to be swooning with pleasure,
while in her left hand, she is holding a heart with a stylized vagina in the center.
In the exposure of two available vaginas, Rops declares the wanton nature of
woman, so lusty she needs two sex organs through which to receive the pleasure
she needs. Further, in looking at the symbol of the heart, a connection can
be made as to what is supposedly closest to a woman's heart: sex. Unlike the
successful sexual anti-climax in Las Bas, Rops's is an immediate simulated
climax without the essential decadent ingredient of heightened lust. The viewer
does not benefit form Durtal's slow assent to a passionate frenzy for his mysterious
admirer or from the frozen sublimity of Beardsley's Salome.
Similar judgment is passed on Mme. Chantelouve. She is one- dimensional;
only out for sexual pleasure. Her arousal at the Black Mass can be taken
further and seen as phallic worship. This idea manifests itself, more literally, in
Rops. Again, Zatlin: "In Temptation, naked satyrs lie on the grass. Drooping
birds (spent phalluses) rest on branches below her, while she reaches for a bird
perched on the satyr's finger. Behind them, a cupid rushes toward her carrying
a cage, imprisoning yet another 'fresh' bird. At the center bottom of this print
is a stylized vagina, which summarized Rops's point: woman craves so much
sex that she is tempted by anything in the approximately correct shape."10
Both of these examples are ripe with judgment. Whether she is woman an
insatiable whore or woman as the Devil's whore, she is sacrificing herself
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Art Criticism