Featured Google Lens an' Nudes; Content Violation

It hasn't escaped my notice that in the current political environment we are daily hammered by revelations of scandalous behavior, utterances, offenses an' ludicrous denials from our elected officials, with F-bombs casually scattered an' the occasional performative apology thrown in for seasoning...but such images as mine can be an' are judged as dangerous, to be proscribed by the State. WTF?

 

USA puritanical values still exist ...

 

Indeed they do, dammit.

I think they're cyclic. Sometimes worse than others. The mid 70's to the mid 80's were a good time. A good friend of mine pointed out that when we graduated high school in the mid 70's, we were in a golden age. As she put it, we came along at the tail end of the "sexual revolution", and before they invented AIDS.

 

Before it got into the mainstream anyway.

 

Just for the sake of conversation....why aren't there more male nudes in the world? Jeesh.

 

maybe cuz Man Ray took too much heat for his versions.....

 

Spot ON, Komo!

 

This photo is highly symbolic. The girl's white face (makeup was used) symbolizes her European ancestry (though she is apparently not European, but a young Indian dancer). The two rings on her hand are attributes of the Indian dance Bharatanatyam (a largely religious dance). This dance was banned by British colonizers in India in 1910. However, Indians began to protest and began performing it outside of temples. The statue seems to be dragging the girl forward. In this case, the statue subjugates the European woman.

In my understanding, this photo symbolizes the subjugation of European culture to Shaivism and Hinduism (Indian culture) in general. There is very little eroticism in the photo, but a lot of Indian patriotism and religious motifs. Incidentally, Bharatanatyam is characterized by 108 key poses. The girl, made up to look like a European, corresponds to one of these poses. This pose is number 78 and is called śūci-viddham

In other words, with this photograph, the Indians were saying, "The British will dance our dance." The photo was most likely taken shortly after the ban on Bharatanatyam in 1910.

 

In that case she is wearing full body paint, because the rest of her body is also very light in tone.

Those armbands were highly fashionable in the Western world at the time. I still have a few my grandmother used to wear.
Bharata Natyam dancers wear a number of regular Indian bangles, generally on the lower arms, not the upper arms, and not single ones like the girl in the photo.

Btw, I have seen quite a few Bharata Natyam dancers, but have yet to see one in the nude. And yes, a Southern Indian dance troupe could have toured France at the time when this photo was taken, but I doubt very much that one of the dancers would have undressed for a French photographer and posed as a European model would.

The only religious item is the Buddha statue, which is from Myanmar, not from Southern India, the homeland of the Bharata Natyam. And it is of course Buddhist, not Hindu.

By a French photographer in France, and no doubt with a French model.
From the link Marote posted:

"Page from La Beaute, Album XXI, The most beautiful photographs of the most beautiful models (Paris Art Editions, c 1910)."

There was already a lot of interest in Asian art, and many W. European collections had Buddha statues and other Asian religious art. This interest started with the travels by Europeans to other parts of the world, but reached a peak with the 1889 Paris Exhibition, about 20 years before this photo was taken.

I don't expect Europeans like yourself to fully understand Asian cultures. I am part-Asian myself, and I can't even pretend to understand Asian cultures fully. But in my opinion fantasizing about perceived "oriental/exotic" attractive images can lead to touching on the sensitivities of such a culture.

This model and setting are not unusual for W. Europe in the early 20th century.
It is possible that you, being from Eastern Europe, don't know what went on in Western Europe at the time. Especially because growing up in the Soviet Era you were not exposed to many facets of Western culture.

 

She does look a lot like Kiki de Montparnasse, and also has the white face Man Ray and others often photographed. But according to Wikipedia, Kiki was born in 1901, so she would have been nine when this photo was taken.

 

Aha!

 

Any Jewelry? Copy and paste? Well ill go to the foot of our stairs!

AJ does sound a bit like AI :/

 

Davey didn't mean me, but someone else.

Go wash your mouth out!

 

Her hair style is a bob. And I don't think men can understand how liberating -- and what a symbol of liberation -- it was. Before bobs, women would wash their hair which was grown long and pinned up (typically once a week) and then have to wait hours, homebound, for it to dry. The bob seriously shortened the wash-to-wear time and allowed women to be more active. The portable hair dryer did the same thing for women in the 1970s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_cut

Debora

 

Well, folks...I have learned quite a bit about our Lady of the Moment...as well as about a few of you who've taken the time to comment; Thank you, all! She continues to have pride of place above the door in my bathroom (loo for some of you, I believe).
As AJ mentioned early-on, the photographer knew a thing or two about lighting...an' other essentials of their craft. I'm grateful to enjoy her company during contemplative interludes!

 

she's well fed...

 

Her pose reminds me of the art deco/orientalist sculptures of Demetre Chiparus, roughly contemporary.