Author: humanitiez303

My recapturing of Picasso was the idea of bringing forth the pictures of the faces. I felt they made the most impact to me due to the fact that they were the most significantly different parts of the women that were portrayed in the painting. By having the different faces, it shows to me the differences in looks among women and how they are thought of differently depending on the eyes of the beholder.

After studying the portrait a bit more and understanding background information, I learned he drew his inspiration from African art, which makes more sense after looking at the faces that are pictured on the women. There was also inspiration coming from different cultures, and this painting was gradually leading toward his era of Cubism with his art.

Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau is an artistic style that lasted from 1890-1914. It set up the basis for what we think of as urban life in present day society. Art Nouveau is French for “new art”. It didn’t just emphasize the ideas of this style through painters and graphic artists, but also through architecture, furniture, and other decorative artists. It was a style that was internationally known for being based on decoration. By being able to use different technologies and ideas, artists were able to have higher standards for the craftsmanship that went into these pieces.

An example of a key player in this new style was Alphonse Mucha. He was a Czech painter and decorative artist. This art style was originally named Style Mucha (or Mucha Style), but soon became known as Art Nouveau. Through his art and decorative pieces, he has became known as the face of this style.

 

The assignment I’ve chosen for myself is to compare and contrast the various “poisons” we’ve focused on during class this semester.  The first view of the poisons we’ve looked at is prostitution.  Throughout the semester, we have seen many different examples of prostitution.  The first was in “A Modern Harlot’s Process.”   The other one’s we read were “The Ruined Maid,” “The Great Social Evil,” and “Mrs. Warren’s Profession,” among others.  In these readings, women take the “fabulous” life given to them by selling themselves.  They lose their morals and lives as they know it, in order to live for the riches.  We compared this to today’s world.  One comparison was the girls who pose as playboy bunnies and work for Hugh Hefner.  We look up to their lives of money, parties, and celebrities.  But in real life, would we be willing to sell this part of ourselves for it?

The next “poison” we learned about was in “The Goblin Market,” which was actually referring to a poison.  The goblins would continuously try to sell the maids their fruits.  Like Eve in the biblical story of Adam and Eve, one of the maids got curious and decided to eat one of the fruit.  She quickly became addicted and needed the fruit to survive.  This is strange because she knew that the fruit would only do her harm, yet curiosity caused her to doubt what she was told and try the fruit. This relates to life today because many people make decisions without thinking them through, and do things they know can only harm them.  Quick to follow, addictions form.  This is another poison we covered in class, the curiosity of humans to try what they know is wrong for them.

The last poison I compared was gambling.  It is an addiction that has affected people from way back when to now.  Unlike prostitution, there is no guarantee that anything good will come from gambling.  However; it is something that can be chosen to stop, unlike the true fruit addiction.

In each of these addictions, a lot had to be given up to (possibly) earn something in return.  For me, not worth it.  Others may disagree.

This assignment has short and long-term values because it relates all the different “evils” we have learned in class and allows me to be able to compare them to everyday life for the future.

Throughout the many poems that we have read, we have seen these harlot women be portrayed as being ruined, adulterer individuals. All the things we think of when we read these poems are the negative consequences of being a harlot, and how these women were persecuted by society.

One of my favorite movies has always been Moulin Rouge, which is based in the 20th century and follows the story of a young writer and his forbidden love with a courtesan woman. Throughout the story we find the pair being faced with many trials and issues, all coming from a mean source, a duke who has got eyes for Satine (the courtesan), and takes the Moulin Rouge under control to make sure that he gets what his heart (and ego) yearn for.

I chose this movie to focus on for this post because Satine isn’t described as your regular courtesan or the ones that are represented through the poems we have gone over in class. Instead of being ruined, we find her growing instead. Starting as a woman who is obsessed with materialistic objects, and the opportunity of being a star, she instead becomes the hero of her own story, and puts the wellness of others above her own.

This seems to counteract many of the ideas that the poems portray, and instead of these courtesan women being creatures of the night and negative aspects of society, we see one that does good to that around her, even with her profession. By focusing on her, we see a different light of things, and that even though people may become ruined by their profession, there is always room for growth and change.

In Charles Baudelaire’s Gambling many interesting topics are discussed but one that I feel is the most interesting is the author’s awareness of his own jealousy of the fallen, and his shame at this jealousy.
“My heart took fright at its envy of so many
Wretches running fiercely to the yawning chasm,”
I think that this is interesting because I am sure this is a feeling that many people have had at one point or another. Someone who is generally not “ruined” could look at people who are and want to be that loose with their morals. It often looks like way more fun to be immoral. But when you catch yourself feeling jealous of people who you know are “sinners” it often makes you feel guilty like you are committing the sins yourself. Another reason there is that twinge of the heart is because you know exactly where these people are bound.
“Wretches running fiercely to the yawning chasm,
Who, drunk with their own blood, would prefer, in a word,
Suffering to death and hell to nothingness!”
With every religious view of the world, sinners are punished for what they have done in life. And the author clearly feels that this is the fate of these gamblers.
By portraying the people as less than human or not human at all, we get a feeling of physical disfigurement also by their ruined state, or possibly that their humanity has left them.
“Around the gaming tables faces without lips,
Lips without color and jaws without teeth,
Fingers convulsed with a hellborn fever
Searching empty pockets and fluttering bosoms;”
By being addicted and giving over all they have, they give over themselves to this obsession and action. When you have nothing left physically, all that’s left are the things that truly matter and are worth something. Such as a man’s honor or a woman’s beauty. You know you’ve truly fallen when you sell over yourself over to these actions.
“All blithely selling right before my eyes,
One his ancient honor, another her beauty!”
Something I found very interesting in this poem is the lines:
Who, drunk with their own blood, would prefer, in a word,
Suffering to death and hell to nothingness!
The fact that the author calls in “drunk with their own blood” makes it sound as if their own sin keeps them going and gives them the “buzz” they need.  He is exclaiming that rather than kill their habits; they’d rather suffer.  He also explains how these addicts would choose hell over anything.  They love what they take part in, whether it be morally wrong or not.  They probably suffer through their addictions; yet love the luxuries and feelings it gives.  Its not worth it to overcome these addictions to them.

DIY homework assignment: humanities 303

Assignment: Create a visual artistic piece. It should display a person who you would consider to be “ruined.” Any medium is allowable. Submit to your blog then analyze the piece with  regards to this class, and previous homeworks, assignments, and projects.

The piece I created shows Death hanging over a girl, who is about to commit suicide. I feel that there can hardly be a more ruined state then being on the edge of suicide. This piece took me a lot of time, and I really tried to emphasize the contrast between the light and dark here. The light skin tone of the girl with the darkness of the Reaper. Some of the most important things about this piece lie in the details. For instance the blood soaked bandages on the girls arm and leg, showing that this isn’t the first time she has tried to end her life. Another important detail is the hour glass that the Reaper is wearing on his belt. Almost all of the sand has run out of the glass, and yet there is still more there, so mayhaps today is not the day she dies.

I feel that this assignment was beneficial for several reasons. In the short term it allows for reflection about death and suicide, and the kind of ruined state someone must be in to find solace in this final extreme option. In the long term, I am hoping that for the next large essay I will be able to use this picture or this idea, to help define my view on Victorian era ruin.

Being interested in history for a good deal of my life, while going through the ideas of ruin that we have came to see throughout class, I started to relate ruin to the deliberate ruin that has occurred within human history. During class we have related ruin to the ideas and the virtues of mostly women and how they are interpreted in the past and the present. What I want to focus on is this idea of ruin placed in a larger scheme.

We have seen the changes of different cultures and societies in the past due to revolution and peaceful democracy, but we have also seen the imposition of foreign forces hungry for power on an area. With these forces, we see the destruction of people along with the destruction of property, held by the state and the people themselves. With this destruction we lose ideas, theories, beliefs, and many more aspects of culture that are no longer capable of being shared through written documents. These aspects have to rely on the word of mouth in order to be passed along, generation to generation. Examples of these being:

The destruction of Warsaw, which was the destruction of this area by the Germans during World War II. Being able to use this town as an example for societies that attempted to rebel against the German government, they destroyed buildings, and planned to level the city to attempt to build a more “Germanised” city.

All the way back to 392 AD at the Library of Serapeum which was burnt and looted by Theophilus of Alexandria, which was ordered by the king at that time.

Our world has a history of ruin, and it can come in many different forms. Whether it be ruin of virtue, property, or any means.

– Kelsey Lawson

Symons quotes that art in any form (painting, singing, etc.) is just the same thoughts expressed differently.  That art is just a way to express views in life, and everybody does that differently.  He recognizes seven types of art in his work. One type of art Symons shows is Auguste Rodin as being one with the nature through his artwork in sculpting. Instead of using life as a way to sculpt artwork, he uses artwork to show life. Symons emphasizes this link to nature by emphasizing the ways in which Rodin links with the earth, and how this link is one of the main ways in which Rodin performs his art. He uses rhythm to show the ways in which the movement of bodies to be in equilibrium and how Rodin uses this equilibrium in order to produce his pieces. Symons explains that Rodin’s way of thinking about beauty is that everything is beautiful due to the fact that it lives, and if people start over thinking the beauty of things, then those things lose their beauty, and therefore they die. This all encircles one major theme that Symons believed Rodin lived by: Life is Beauty. An example of how Symons accurately portrays the way that Rodin uses the movements and details of a subject in order to brings the beauty and life into his artwork is through a quote from Rodin about his “Thinker” sculpture:

“What makes my Thinker think is that he thinks not only with his brain, with his knitted brow, his distended nostrils and compressed lips, but with every muscle of his arms, back, and legs, with his clenched fist and gripping toes.” – Auguste Rodin

Also Symons feels that Rodin appreciates beauty in a more raw form. Rather than other artists who carve their works as completely separate entities. Rodin leaves his carvings imbedded in the stone that they are carved from. This makes for a feeling of struggle, not only in the piece with the characters therein but also with the stone itself like a drowning man trying to get free of the waters that pull him down.
Symons describes this style in this manner, “It is at once the flower and the root; that of the others is the flower only, and the plucked flower.” In this manner the separation is compared with the death of the piece. How freeing it from its stony prison forces some mystic quality of beauty to be released, never to be seen again.

I chose the word prostitution to blog about.  This has been a major theme in a few of our readings; such as The Ruined Maid and Mrs. Warren’s Profession.  Among looking up words on OED.com to decide which to blog about, I found something interesting in this definition.  It describes prostitution as 1. The action of prostituting or condition of being prostituted; the practice or occupation of engaging in sexual activity with someone for payment; (in early use also more generally) licentiousness, lewdness, harlotry.  The thing I found interesting, however; was the online dictionary also gave quotations in relation to prostitution from texts, etc.  The first set of quotations is under the heading “of woman or girl.”  The second set of quotations is under the heading “of a man or boy (esp. with reference to homosexual activity).”  I found this interesting because in class we really only talked about woman prostitutes.  I always believed that it was because even today when woman have more freedoms, no woman wants to pay a man to sleep with her.  Its a lot easier for a woman to pick up a man because men seem to have less values when it comes to random hookups, etc.  But more woman say no than men, so men often have to pay for them.  Seeing all the references to homosexual prostitution verified this thought.  Because male prostitutes are still purchased by men rather than woman, it seems.  This is an interesting thought.  Maybe because men do have less values when it comes to whom they are sexually active with.  They’re willing to pay for it, while women are not.  It seems to be proven historically true, as well. 

Ruin

1. Total destruction or disintegration, either physical, moral, social, or economic.
2. A cause of total destruction.
3. The act of destroying totally.
4. A destroyed person, object, or building.
5. The remains of something destroyed, disintegrated, or decayed. Often used in the plural: studied the ruins of ancient Greece.

Ruined

1. To destroy completely; demolish.
2. To harm irreparably.
3. To reduce to poverty or bankruptcy.
4. To deprive of chastity.
   To fall into ruin.

In the “Ruined Maid” we see a common occurrence of the word “ruined” being used. While this is also the main subject of our class, we also see it being used throughout the readings we come across. In this poem, we see two women speaking with each other, one having attributes of lower class, the other having attributes of a higher class. The problem we see with this is the idea of being ruined, and how the girl who is of the higher class sees herself as. By using the word “ruined” so many times during the poem, we see an emphasis on this idea. It seems that this word is being used in the sense that all moral aspects of the woman is destroyed, due to her behavior and means of life. It gives an idea of destruction, and a sense of not being able to recover to an original state. Being ruined means being ruined for life, or forever. Destruction to a certain object is something that is impossible to put back to full functioning order, or at least without some difference or consequence. Being ruined is never a positive thing, and although we can find some kind of beauty out of it, for the bearer it seems to be a means to an end. The ending being what it is, an ending.

References:

Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus, and Encyclopedia: Ruined. 

“The Ruined Maid” by Thomas Hardy, 1866