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I. THE PROMISE OF FERTILITY

A. Fertility Goddesses and Gods
1. Earliest fertility artifacts from the Paleolithic and Neolithic periods were small
sculptures of females depicted as:
a. Fleshy with swollen bellies breasts, and thighs accentuated
b. Goddesses dominated ancient rituals for thousands of years before gods
came to prominence.
c. This small, regal figure is enthroned and is attended by lions.
d. She was found in a grain bin, suggesting her role in the success of her
culture’s fecundity.
B. THE PROMISE OF FERTILITY
1. Some of the earliest artifacts thought to relate to human fertility come from the
Paleolithic and Neolithic eras of history. Small sculptures showed female figures
as abundantly fleshy and swollen, with their bellies, breasts, and thighs
accentuated. They are called fertility or mother goddesses, suggesting that they
were part of a fertility ritual and cult.
2. Art has functioned to ensure human reproduction likely with “sympathetic
magic” invoked through the art object.
3. The Venus of Willendorf dates from 25,000 BCE.
4. Although sometimes labeled as a fertility goddess, this small sculpture was
likely more a charm or a fetish.
5. She may have been used: during childbirth
a. to ward off death
b. to wish for good health
c. for good fortune.
6. The Venus of Willendorf does not realistically represent someone, it represents
the physical essence of fertility.
7. She was likely a talisman for good fortune.
8. Slender and delicate, this abstract nude seems to emphasize feminine youth
9. These “plank” figures were found in burials, and they may have been meant to
give new life to the dead.
10. These figures are sometimes called “plank idols.”
11. In the 19th C., male fertility pieces were produced by Oceanic cultures.
12. The large penis, in comparison to the rest of the figure, emphasizes the virility
of
13. Te Rongo.
14. Male sculptures were carved for religious rituals by Ta’unga, or “priest”,
trained through an apprenticeship.
15.The art object was:
a. meant to endure, passed from one generation to the next
b. a symbol of prestige and rank exclusive to those of power and rank a
source of sacred information
16. Specific ancestor deities known as Tangaroa figures represent a creator in the
act of creating human beings.
17. Lineage was important in Oceanic cultures, this god-creator may have been
connected to a family ancestor.

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C. Fertility and Rituals

1. This fresco depicts a ritual of the mystery cult of Dionysos, associated with
sexual intercourse and fertility.
2. Nearly life-size figures, convincing volume, move in a shallow space, on a
trompe l’oeil (“fools the eye”) ledge.
3. This male love doll was used as “medicine” to control human behavior and
health.
Potawatomi Male Figure was used as a charm to cast a spell on someone whose
attentions 4. were desired.
5. The Bamanian Female Figure made of wood and brass is associated with a
female fertility cult.
6. These figures were brought out in public to aid women who were having
difficulties in conceiving and childbearing.
7. Akua’ba from the Ashanti in Ghana are fertility sculptures created:
a. solely for women having difficulty in conceiving
b. to ensure a healthy and beautiful baby.
8. Beauty reduced to uncomplicated forms.
9. We see female beauty reduced to uncomplicated forms:
a. head, neck, arms, torso – circular disk and a series of cylinders
b. a round face with a small mouth
c. a high forehead
d. a long neck and torso
e. linear facial features
f. disk-like forms as necklaces breasts, navel - minimal forms
II. ART DEPICTING PRIMORDIAL AND HUMAN COUPLES
1. Human couples have been depicted throughout the ages as:
a. the primordial or first couple
b. the mother and father of humankind
c. representing the marriage ritual within cultural contexts
2. These depictions were rooted in creation myths.
a. Adam’s pain
b. their shame and agony.
A. Primordial Couples
1. Adam and Eve are found in the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religions.
2. Told to,“be fruitful and multiply,” they were then expelled from The Garden of
Eden.
3. In The Expulsion, we see: Eve’s anguished cry
4. Compare Adam and Eve with the Dogon Primordial Couple
5. The Dogon Primordial Couple: are equally exalted represent their fertility
a. the male unites the figures by embracing the female
b. he symbolizes their sexual union by touching his penis
c. by wearing jewelry they symbolize their sexual power
d. their balanced design, is a symbol for an ordered human culture
B. Human Couples
1. The Wedding Portrait, or Giovanni Arnolfini and His Bride, is more than a
double portrait, it is a wedding certificate, with obvious and hidden symbolism.

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2. Symbolism - the couple:

a. shown in the bedroom rather than church, suggesting the hope for many
children
b. the woman holds her clothing as if pregnant
c. have removed their shoes, they are on holy ground
d. he raises his hand in a gesture of blessing
3. Surrounding the couple:
a. one candle burning in the chandelier represents divine presence
b. the frame of the mirror has medallions that depict the passion of Christ
c. on the chest and windowsill oranges, representing the conquest of death
d. the dog symbolizes fidelity
e. on the bedpost finial a statuette of St. Margaret, patron saint of
childbirth
4. van Eyck depicts witnesses, including himself in the mirror
a. written above the mirror, “Jan van Eyck was here.”
5. Aztec Marriage Couple, depicts a man and woman seated on a mat, the bride
was powdered with yellow earth and adorned in red feathers.
6. The formal vows took place in the groom’s home, the marriage performed by
tying together their wedding garments---tying the knot.
III. ART ABOUT LOVEMAKING
1. Sexuality is a libidinal urge that is gratifying, positive, and energizing.
2. The Lupanar Lamp from Pompeii, likely lighted a bedroom.
3. It shows a couple in an intimate gaze while engaging in sexual intercourse.
4. An inscription found in Pompeii on a wall from an ordinary house reads “Hic
Habit
5. Moche pottery is matter of fact, the depictions of lovemaking---explicit and
candid.
6. Numerous sexual acts between a man and a woman appear.
7. They may have been designed as visual aids for sex education, illustrating
human reproduction and perhaps birth control as well.
8. This work reflects the ukiyo or “floating world” theme. The “floating world,”
refers to the Buddhist concept of the transience of life.
9. Non-samurai classes translated that concept into prizing life’s fleeting moments
of pleasure—in other words: eat, drink, and be merry.
10. Shunga prints (spring pictures) centered on: female beauty the theater
entertainment erotica
A. CONNECTION Komurasaki of the Tamaya Teahouse (Figure 12.32, is a ukiyo-e print
depicting a courtesan.
1. Erotic images in India appear as sculptures on Hindu temples and in miniature
paintings.
2. Radha, a shepherdess, and Krishna, an incarnation of the god Vishnu, are
depicted in a highly idealized scene of lovemaking.
3. Pleasure, affection, sweetness, and erotic energy were meant to be like the
physical and spiritual union humans could experience through lovemaking
and by a union with God.
4. Radha and Krishna in the Grove

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5. were meant to be instructive, and the mythical sexual act was intended to be
reincarnated regularly among living couples.
6. Many carvings on Hindu temples are erotic. This carving shows intertwined
voluptuous bodies.
7. The Hindu religion celebrates sexual love. Intercourse and self-pleasuring
reflect the divine union with the Unbounded.
8. Carnal bliss is a virtue and a path that leads to redemption.
B. ART ABOUT SEXUALITY IN WESTERN CULTURE
1. Sexuality is complicated in modern Western art because: of power
relationships between men and women
2. homosexuality and heterosexuality are also part of political debates sexuality
is used to sell products
3. abstract works on sexuality capture the energy, but leave other specifics
undefined.
4. The woman in this painting, by Ingres, is an odalisque, a member of a Turkish
harem.
5. 19th C. female nudes in Europe and the U.S. were made for 19th C. men.
6. Men were the privileged audience for such pictures, as the
7. viewer’s gaze completes the sexual exchange implied in the painting.
8. It is significant that there is only a woman in this scene. Without a lover, the
odalisque is sexually available for the viewer, who gazes upon her and
“consumes”.
9. The viewer took the place of the imagined Turkish sultan, who had many
women at his disposal.
10. Manet’s Olympia scandalized the public because:
her sexuality and nudity were contemporary and Western
11. Olympia, was recognizable as a famous Paris courtesan
a. it is similar to a famous Italian Renaissance painting of Venus
b. her unromantic expression made clear that sex and money would be
exchanged
c. it shattered illusions
it reveals the difference in social status according to race
12. Manet’s defenders praised the work for its innovative paint quality: thick paint
applied directly on the canvas
a. flat, bright color
b. light areas separate from the dark, few mid-tones gestural mark
making
c. flatness versus illusion of depth
d. experiments in applying paint
C. Sexuality, Politics, and Consumerism
1. Sexuality is used to deliver a range of messages.
2. In her computer-video installation Deep Contact, Lynn Hershman looks at
ways mass media uses sexuality in Western culture to attract attention.
3. The “guide” dressed in sexually seductive clothing, knocks at the touch screen
and asks the viewer to touch her to begin the performance.
4. By touching different parts, the viewer can create interactive fictions.

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5. Not all of the content of Deep Contact is sexual, but everything has been
eroticized, including ideas about technology, self-awareness, and intimacy.
6. The viewer of Deep Contact cannot be passive; if you do nothing, nothing
happens.
7. The viewer is dislodged from the position of anonymous, distant voyeur.
D. Sexuality is Politicized
1. This image by Barbara Kruger, deals with the shifting attitudes and conflicts
that surround women, sexuality, and reproduction in Western culture.
2. Kruger uses relative pro- nouns that are gender neutral to imply that attitudes
about sexuality and race are not fixed by nature.
3. Kruger sees these categories as
4. changing entities under social, political, and religious influence.
5. This is a photograph of a cross- dressing male, his attire and hair suggest both,
“good girl” and sexual potential.
6. Catherine Opie’s photographs of homosexuals, transsexuals, and dominatrixes
reveal the complexities of gender and sexuality.
7. Opie’s photograph complicates the idea of the privileged male viewer.
8. Justin Bond meets the viewer’s gaze directly and with confidence, challenging
any attempt by the viewer to see his behavior as pathological.
E. Abstracted Sexual Imagery - alludes to the human body, but humans need not be
represented.
1. Georgia O’Keeffe’s Grey Line with Lavender and Yellow, is an enlarged
flower image.
2. The structure resembles female genitalia.
3. Feminists have seen in her work positive, female-based imagery that glorifies
and beautifies female sexuality.
4. Torso of a Young Man, by Constantin Brancusi, is an abstracted form of male
sexuality. The simplified torso becomes an obvious phallic symbol.
5. Brancusi was influenced by:
a. the philosophy of the 11th C. monk Milarepa
b. Romanian folk art African tribal art
6. He created works intended to capture the essence and universality of pure
form.
7. Louise Bourgeois’s Blind Man’s Bluff, is clearly sexual. Its appearance and
name invites touch.
8. The sculpture is like a large phallus covered with round, organic forms.
9. The piece suggests a fixation on sexual parts without attachment to an
individual as a whole.
10. The combination of male and female sexual imagery blurs genders as discrete
categories in this work.
IV. IMAGES OF PREGNANCY, CHILDBIRTH, AND
PROGENY - are seen in many cultures. This figure is a Western image by Alice Neel.
1. Her painting, Pregnant Woman, shows us the physical effects of pregnancy on
one woman’s body and emotions.
2. The Kidder Figure is a pregnant seated female figure.
3. She emphasizes her enlarged abdomen by resting her hands on it.

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4. Her face reflects contentment and joyous anticipation of the expected event.
5. This Moche ceramic vessel depicts childbirth in a straightforward manner, just
as their depiction of sexual intercourse.
6. The scene seems to be clinically illustrating an event rather than a moment of
emotion, anticipation or pain.
7. This vessel shows the Moche birthing position and technique.
8. The mother and child image is a familiar Christian icon.
9. Mary is enthroned in a delicately carved architectural space, crowned as the
Queen of Heaven.
10. She nurses the newborn redeemer, holding him tenderly.
11. The gentle, loving gaze of Mary upon her baby, Jesus is calm, yet ominous
because of Old Testament prophecies.
12. The Mother and Nursing Child is a image of a woman and her baby.
13. The simple, geometric form adds to the stability and calm of the figure.
14. Representing a mother and her progeny in life, the effigy vessel may have
ensured her potential to bear children in the afterlife.