Une lecture phénoménologique des nus féminins de Francis Bacon et Lucian Freud : vers une éthique identitaire
The painters Francis Bacon and Lucien Freud both transformed and rejuvenated the genre of the female nude. Through the specifics of their handling of paint, they incarnated new modes of corporeality. In recognition of this innovativeness, the thesis offers a new, more ethically informed reception of their works. In this context, the usefulness of the phenomenological approach of Maurice Merleau-Ponty for interpreting the corpora of the two artists will be demonstrated. The ontology of the flesh developed in Merleau-Ponty’s later works provides a vital vocabulary for articulating the painterly fleshiness present in both Bacon’s and Freud’s artworks. It is nevertheless necessary to supplement Merleau-Ponty’s approach with more recent scholarship in phenomenology, particularly feminist and queer approaches, that enables greater discussion of sexuality. In Western culture, traditional conceptions of sexuality are being increasingly questioned. The painted nude, particularly when female, has conventionally affirmed patriarchal and heterosexist values. In Bacon’s and Freud’s female nudes, however, there is a marked effort to move beyond these limiting conventions and liberate the body from them. Through its analysis of the two artists, the thesis gestures towards a new ethics of identity that resists the constraining effects of cultural and social influences. The thesis concludes with an analysis of the art of Jenny Saville which it reads as synthesizing the corporeal insights of Bacon and Freud, embracing their nascent queer politics and more fully realizing its fleshy potential.
Merleau-Ponty Jenny Saville flesh feminist thinking queer thinking