With ‘The Black Model,’ the Musée d’Orsay makes a political statement.
Marie-Guillemine Benoist’s “Portrait of a black woman” is presented as “Portrait of Madeleine” in a new exhibit at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. By James McAuley James McAuley Foreign correspondent focusing on French and European politics and culture Email Bio Follow March 27 at 5:00 AM PARIS — At the Louvre, the striking painting is identified simply as “Portrait of a black woman.”
This is the project of “The Black Model: From Géricault to Matisse,” a major exhibit that opened at the Orsay on Tuesday. The show attempts to restore the identities and perspectives of black figures who were depicted on canvas but largely written out of history. The exhibit looks at French involvement in the institution of slavery through works such as “The Abolition of Slavery in the French Colonies, 27 April 1848” by François-Auguste Biard The show notably addresses France’s role in the slave trade and the manifestation of the slavery debate in the arts of the period. Slavery was abolished in France during the French Revolution in 1794, briefly reestablished under Napoleon Bonaparte, and outlawed again during the revolution of 1848.
She noted that the show conveys something different when hosted at a fine arts museum like the Orsay than if it had been staged, for example, at the Quai Branly, a nearby space specifically devoted to the arts of Africa and Oceania. “You make a statement,” des Cars said. Given that Dumas wrote about race during his lifetime, Murrell said, the show was a means of “recuperating an aspect of his life and his thinking that was perhaps marginalized over time in history.”
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