A Body of Evidence: An Art Historical perspective on Eighteenth and ...

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was important in associating the figures with the rich tradition <strong>of</strong> learning and art <strong>of</strong> the Renaissance. The attention to the detail <strong>of</strong> the external dressing and appearance <strong>of</strong> the models also made the viewing <strong>of</strong> the anatomy more acceptable to an educated audience. The familiarity with these paintings in both France and Britain would have been widespread through the medium <strong>of</strong> engravings. 80 The outward appearance models served to engage with art, elevating the science <strong>of</strong> anatomy by association with paintings and sculpture. Ludmilla Jordanova compares the bodies <strong>of</strong> the female wax anatomical figures to Bernini’s sculpture The Ecstacy <strong>of</strong> St Theresa (Fig. 23), observing that both display an ambiguous mix <strong>of</strong> religious and sexual ecstasy. 81 Unlike Jordanova, however, I would argue that this similarity was not a consequence <strong>of</strong> a common desire to excite or titillate the audience, but arises from a deliberate attempt by the makers <strong>of</strong> wax figures to associate these works with art so as to improve the public acceptance <strong>of</strong> anatomy. In other words, this ambiguous mix <strong>of</strong> the religious and the sexual was the result <strong>of</strong> an attempt to sanitise the harsh realities <strong>of</strong> dissection. But rather than the aim <strong>of</strong> the artists and anatomists to portray the body as being 80 The circulation <strong>of</strong> engravings <strong>of</strong> popular Italian renaissance images in the nineteenth century was particularly popular in the weekly magazines such as the Penny Magazine in London. See example in Fig. 27. 81 Jordanova, 1989, p. 45.
sexually alluring, as Jordanova claims, their aim was to idealise the body into the realms <strong>of</strong> respectable or ‘high’ art. <strong>Art</strong> Schools and the Écorché model. In 1854 a collection <strong>of</strong> wax figures by Italian artists <strong>of</strong> the sixteenth century, the Gherardini Collection, was purchased for what was then the South Kensington Museum, later the Victoria and Albert Museum, in London. 82 These figures, sixteen <strong>of</strong> which were attributed to Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564), are mostly described by Eric Maclagan as being ‘sketches’. One figure was made between 1505 and 1513 and was most probably the sketch for a Slave for the tomb <strong>of</strong> Pope Julius II. 83 These models demonstrate the early association <strong>of</strong> wax, dissection and art. Wax provided a quick and cheap medium in which artists could ‘sketch’ what was before them in three-dimensional modelling. Furthermore, the purchase <strong>of</strong> these figures by the South Kensington Museum demonstrates a renewed interest in the process <strong>of</strong> anatomical learning and art in the middle <strong>of</strong> the nineteenth century. The artist’s ability to produce an accurate rendering <strong>of</strong> the body was paramount in Europe from the sixteenth century onwards, and consequently there was a need for artists to understand the muscular and skeletal systems. 84 By the 82 MacLagan, 1924, p. 4. 83 MacLagan, 1924, p. 8. 84 Kemp and Wallace, 2000, p. 11.
Page 1 and 2: A Body of<
Page 3 and 4: 1. Introduction. 2. The Emergence <
Page 5 and 6: The anatomical models were made by
Page 7 and 8: epresent Adam standing with his ski
Page 9 and 10: Vitruvius’ architectural treatise
Page 11 and 12: dissected with his own hand, depict
Page 13 and 14: dissection, which were based largel
Page 15 and 16: ook made it prohibitive to the ordi
Page 17 and 18: paintings and antiquities that he s
Page 19 and 20: anatomical models for their private
Page 21 and 22: was his desire to portray the body
Page 23 and 24: In 1775 the Imperial Royal Museum <
Page 25 and 26: The quotation demonstrates Goethe
Page 27 and 28: part. 62 The way that the body was
Page 29 and 30: Chapter Two -The Model Audience. Bu
Page 31 and 32: The distinction between dissection
Page 33 and 34: Skeleton emerges from the grave (Fi
Page 35 and 36: needs of each <str
Page 37: anatomical models in the ennobling
Page 41 and 42: Écorché models of</strong
Page 43 and 44: most representations of</st
Page 45 and 46: the number of corp
Page 47 and 48: problems relating to disease. Moula
Page 49 and 50: particularly by the medical world t
Page 51 and 52: models began to be made which were
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Page 63 and 64: Conclusion. We can see from the ear
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Page 67 and 68: List of Illustrati
Page 69 and 70: Fig. 25 Jean-Antoi
Page 71 and 72: Appendix. The Tramond Company in Pa
Page 73 and 74: suggesting that it is a replacement
Page 75 and 76: Descartes, 1901: René Descartes Di
Page 77 and 78: Leoussi, 1998: Athena Leoussi, Nati
Page 79: Acknowledgements. I would like to t

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