The "Dance of the Seven Veils".

Salome and Erotic Culture around 1900

Author(s): Udo Kultermann
Source: Artibus et Historiae , 2006, Vol. 27, No. 53 (2006), pp. 187-215
Published by: IRSA s.c.

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/20067116

REFERENCES
Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article:
https://www.jstor.org/stable/20067116?seq=1&cid=pdf-
reference#references_tab_contents
You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

IRSA s.c. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Artibus et
Historiae

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN
The Dance of the Seven Veils.
Salome and Erotic Culture around 1900
The Dance of the Seven Veils is the center piece of the play
by Oscar Wilde and the opera by Richard Strauss as well as
a large number of literary works, paintings and dances and has
its own attraction as it unveils the female body for imaginative
and creative purposes. It has produced erotic nudity for gains of
power and exploration and it represents a strategy which is - in
the form of striptease - still alive in most parts of the world today,
transcending the earlier forms of religious or historical context.
The focus is on the establishment of female identity. Ironically, it
is exactly that part of the world, the Middle East, in which the leg
end is located, which prohibits the topic up to today. But, never
theless, the combination of dance and death, seduction and lib
eration, is predominantly located in the oriental world.
The Dance of the Seven Veils contains both the use of the
female body exploiting the male gaze and the transformation of
earlier female dependencies to a new form of freedom, includ
ing its positive and negative aspects. This fight for freedom
continues up to today in controversial interpretations and has
expanded to forms as the New Woman, Feminist Movements,
Same-Sex Marriages etc. Salome can and has been seen at the
same time as the femme fatale of old and new history and as
the fighter for independence, freedom and equality of the
sexes. The fact that in all its many genres and media it has its
own life and makes it the worthy subject of study and attention.
This content downloaded from
141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
1. Prehistory
One of the earliest mythic figures, related to dance and
erotic attraction and the concept of fertility in general, is the
goddess Ishtar of Babylonia, who performed a Dance of the
Seven Veils in order to regain her lover from the underworld.
Ishtar is part of one of the oldest literary documents, the epos
Gilgamesh, which predates Homer about two millennia. One
of the prominent historians of dance, Wendy Buonaventura,
defined Ishtar's function: "In order to enter the most secret
chambers of the underworld, she has to pass through seven
times-seven gates; after every set of seven gates, as the price
of admission, she diverts herself a jewel and a veil, stripping
off the last of each at the final gate".1 Ishtar's unveiling and
journey to the underworld and especially her successful
return has been seen as the symbol of natural fertility, as all
life during her absence was coming to a halt. The term given
to the dance of Ishtar therefore was the Welcome Dance,
regarding the renewal of nature itself, similar to the later
Greek myth of Demeter and Persephone. There are also pos
sible relations to Salome and the Dance of the Seven Veils, as
Salome or Shalome in Hebrew stands for welcome or peace.
Thus also her dance can and has been called "Welcome
Dance".
187
UDO KULTERMANN_
1) ?Salome's Dance?, relief from the Bernward column,
early 11th century, Hildesheim, St. Mary's Cathedral.
The historical Salome was born about 15 AD and was mar
ried to Philipp (Philippus), Tetrarch of the Trachinitis in ancient
Palestine. He died in 34 AD after ruling 37 years in a country of
upheavals and transition and had left Salome as a widow after
only a few years of marriage. She became the wife of Aristobo
lus, who was her first cousin, and had three sons by him. Aris
tobolus was appointed by the Roman Emperor Nero, accord
ing to Tacitus, as king of Armenia in Asia Minor and later king of
Chalcis, a position he held until his death in 92 AD. A coin was
issued during his rule which shows Aristobolus in profile on
one side and that of his wife Salome on the other.
The historical Salome has little resemblance with the bibli
cal figure; in the gospels of Mark and Matthew the woman who
188
This content downloaded from
141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
demanded the head of John the Baptist after having danced
before the ruler and seduced him to fulfill her demand is just
mentioned as the daughter of Herodias and remains
unnamed. In the gospel of Mark it is written that the daughter
of Herod, the tetrarch's wife, "came in, and danced, and
pleased Herod and his guests [...]".2 The historian Flavius
Josephus was the first who named this woman as the daugh
ter of Herodias which later was perpetuated in writing by
Seneca, Livy and Plutarch.3 As much as the historical evi
dence faded legends and gossip stories found a large number
of manifestations throughout the centuries with different con
figurations in the Middle Ages, where Salome is occasionally
presented as a strange acrobatic dancer.4
Among the earliest images of Salome is a Carolingian
Evangelar from Chartres from the first half of the 9th century,
which depicts Herod between personifications of Virtus and
Voluptas. He is seated like a judge, with John the Baptist on
one side, being decapitated, and Salome on the other, danc
ing. Another early medieval representation of the dance of
Salome is at the Column of Bernward in Hildesheim from the
early 11th century [Fig. 1]. Salome here is fully dressed and
her dancing is watched by Herod and Heriodias sitting at
a table. The head of St. John is brought in on the other side of
the table on a silver platter. A modern interpreter writes about
the figure of Salome: "The dress unveils more than it hides. In
violent sensual movement the upper part of the body turns
back. Obviously it is an oriental dance of veils or a dance du
ventre".5
In one of the sculptures on the tympanum of Rouen Cathe
dral (left-side entrance) Salome is depicted balancing on her
hands "much like a medieval mountebank" [Fig. 2].6 Further
medieval representations of Salome dancing can be found on
the door of S. Zeno in Verona from the 11th century, in the Hor
tus Deliciarum of Herrade of Landsberg from the end of the
12th century, in a miniature of an English Psalter from the early
13th century [Fig. 3] and in a mosaic of S. Marco in Venice
from the 14th century.7 Important versions can also be found in
works by Giotto in S. Croce in Florence, Andrea Pisano in the
bronze doors of the Baptistery in Florence and in woodcuts by
Albrecht D?rer of 1510 and 1511. In Roger van der Weyden's
triptych at the Stadel Institut in Frankfurt Salome is presented
receiving the head of John the Baptist.
Many of the representations in the 15th and 16th centuries
alter the view of Salome, who now is represented as lady in
a courtly context. This is evident in a relief by Donatello in the
Cathedral of Siena, where the atmosphere of the court shows
the scene of the dancing Salome and the presentation of the
head of St. John. Lucas Cranach paints the same event with
Herod and Herodias at a table and Salome holding the platter
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

*t0*?pmmnimtm.fi^j '",'!' .ZJ*rik#i

SM.

p Jk
VJ
r. -

bfflvr-w A -* ru**

11
m#L-iki 5m? TW*
~*#*r^

2) ?Dance of Salome?, north portal of the west fa?ade of Rouen Cathedral.

with the head of St. John [Fig. 4]. In a painting by Henry de
Bles the scene is changed to the beheading of St. John in an
urban environment. And in an etching by Israhel van Mecken
em The Dance at the Court of Herod a multifigured event is
shown with dancing couples and musicians [Fig. 5].8 A most
significant example of Salome is by the Italian Bernardino
Luini, entitled Salome Receiving the Head of St. John the Bap
tist in the Uffizi and depicting Salome in a somber and non-vio
lent manner, as later in Caravaggio [Fig. 6].9
The representation of Salome in Andrea Solario's painting
Salome with the Head of Saint John the Baptist of c.
1506-1507 in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York
shows Salome in a somber state, in spite of the fact that she is
holding the decapitated head of the Baptist on a silver platter
with the blood still running down from it.10
Salome as a subject plays a very important role in the
work of Caravaggio and it is surprisingly in a non-violent mood
which one is mostly not familiar in this artist. His painting
Salome con la testa del Battista in the National Gallery in Lon
don of c. 1607/1610 gives an unorthodox interpretation of the
scene as described by Helen Langdon: "Here Caravaggio
transforms the story of the dancing girl who so flippantly
asked Herod for the head of John the Baptist, into a grave
meditation on the vanity of human life. He ignores any erotic
potential, rejecting the well-worn artistic contrast between
a chic and seductive Salome, and a coarse and brutal execu
tioner, and binds the three figures together in an arch of
melancholy contemplation."11 In Guido Reni's Salome with the
Head of Saint John the Baptist of c. 1639 [Fig. 7] Salome is
again depicted in a serene and reserved composure and
shows nothing of the earlier and later violence and emotional
tension.12
Still famous in many of Baroque representations, the
theme was less and less frequently used in the 18th and 19th
centuries, only to be rejuvenated by a new literary imagination
which gave evidence of a change of taste. It was the transfor
mation of a period and a new attitude toward the oriental cul
ture and - at the same time - of a new awareness of feminine
power.
2. Transformations of the 19th Century
The new direct connections of Europeans with the land of
the Middle East and its tradition was part of a new sensitivity
and became essential for the cultural context of change. Since

189

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN_

out mentioning Salome by name. The historical event is

focused on Herodias, who incorporates much of the character
of Salome, including kissing the head of St. John.

In her hands she carries ever

That sad charger, with the head of
John the Baptist, which she kisses:
Yes, the head with fervour kisses.14

Although, since Baudelaire, there was a strong impact of

the music of Richard Wagner in France and with it a new sen
sual imagination, the most important contribution to a general
change of attitude can be attributed to Gustav Flaubert, who
was intensely fascinated by the Orient on his travels to Egypt
and his personal contacts with Arab women.15 In the dancer
Kutchuk Hanem Flaubert found a female companion in Cairo
which opened new ways of seeing and evaluating his own atti
tudes toward the relationship between men and women. His
experiences later manifested in his works. Both in Salommbo
and The Temptation of St. Anthony not only his personal inti
mate encounter also the historical reverberations opened up
new perspectives in Western literature which from then on
expanded its horizon and inaugurated previously unknown
attitude in the psychology of women.
In Flaubert's later story Herodias of 1877 he refers to
a dance by Salome in which the resemblance of his personal
experiences and the historical tradition are merged. He may
have been impressed by a sculpture of the dancing Salome at
Rouen Cathedral, in which Salome is dancing on her hands,
but he definitely also knew the gospels of Mark and Matthew
as well as the documentation of Flavius Josephus. The culmi
nation of the short novel is the passionate description of
Salome's dance before the audience at the banqueting hall,
instigated by her mother Herodias: "Her feet slipped back and
forth, to the rhythm of the flute and a pair of castanets. Her
arms curved round in invitation to someone who always elud
ed her. She pursued him, lighter than a butterfly, like some
curious Psyche, like a wandering spirit, and seemed on the
3) ?Dance of Salome?, psalter, England, 13th century.
point of flying away [...]. With eyes half closed, she twisted her
waist, made her belly ripple like the swell of the sea, made her
breasts quiver, while her expression remained fixed, and her
feet never stood still."16
Napoleon's military campaigns in Egypt and Syria at the The description continues: "She danced like the princes
beginning of the century a fascination with oriental cultures ses of India, like the Nubian women from the cataracts, like the
from the past influenced much of the European culture, includ Bacchantes of Libya. She bent over in every direction, like
ing fashion, as well as a new scientific interest focused on a flower tossed by the storm. The jewels in her ears leaped
rediscovering the past.13 about, the silk on her back shimmered, from her arms, her
One of the earliest reappearances of the theme of Salome feet, her clothes invisible sparks shot out, firing the men with
is Heinrich Heine's Atta Troll of 1841, but the story is told with excitement [...]. Opening wide her legs, without bending her

190

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

i*?.
V

.*% #

4) Lucas Cranach, ?Feast of Herodes?, 1531, Frankfurt am Main, Stadel.

knees, she bowed so low that her chin brushed the floor
[-]."17
The literary description of the dance indeed resembles
many of the later performances of the stage: "The dance itself
progresses from a mood of youthful expectations, to funeral
despondency, to languid surrender, to brutal quest of satisfac
tion, and finally to a frenzy which mimes the female lascivious
ecstasy."18
The vivid descriptions of Salome's dance reflect
Flaubert's own previous experiences in Egypt and soon will be
seen as an anticipation of future literary and painterly figura
tions. St?phane Mallarm? had worked for some time on
a poem entitled Herodias, which remained incomplete but had
a strong impact on Oscar Wilde when the two poets met in
Paris. Mallarm?'s poem is concentrated, as was Flaubert's
novel, on the figure of Herodias, who in his version instigated

191

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN

5) Israhel van Meckenem, ?The Dance at the Court of Herod?, c. 1500.

the dance of her daughter Salome and the death of St. John. Thou that art chaste and diest of desire,
Looking into a mirror Salome reveals parts of her character: White night of icy and of the cruel snow.19

The horror of my virginity
Delights me, and I would envelope me
In the terror of my tresses, that, by night,
Inviolate reptile I might feel the white
And glimmering radiance of thy frozen fire,
There were further representations of the theme in France
at the same years. Jules Massenet's opera Herodiade of 1881
with the libretto by Paul Millie and Henri Gremont, as well as
the works by Wilde, Jules Laforgue and Mallarm? are influ
enced by Flaubert's genius. In Laforgue's Moral Tales for the

192

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 _THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

6) Bernardino Luini, ?Salome Receiving the Head

of St. John the Baptist?, Florence, Ufizzi.

first time Salome is kissing the decapitated head of St. John

the Baptist. Other less important manifestations of the topic
are J. C. Heywood's Salome, the Daughter of Herodias of 1862
and 1867 as Theodore de Banville's La Danseuse of 1870,
dedicated to Henri Regnault who had exhibited his painting
Salome in the same year in Paris. Even before the play of
Oscar Wilde the figure of Salome was in the center of the
debate of the period. Sylvia C. Ellis concluded: "Salome was 7) Guido Reni, ?Salome with the Head of Saint John the
the subject of poems by Mallarm? and Symons, as well as Baptist?, 1638-1639, Rome, Galleria Nazionale d'Arte
many lesser poets [...]. Salome was a heroine of Decadence; Antica.
Beardsley's illustrations to Wilde's Salome set the tone, and
there is ample evidence of the degree to which she appealed
to artists in search of a fantastic Decadence."20
The figure of Salome is also represented in significant
work of painters before and after the world wide success of in the air, and still another one entitled Salome at the Column
Wilde's drama, among them by Puvis de Chavannes, Gustave of c. 1885-1890.21
Moreau and Odilon Redon. Especially Moreau had an enor The first painting by Moreau played a crucial part of Joris
mous influence on later representations. -Karl Huysman's novel Against Nature published in 1884. The
Moreau presented the theme in several versions, one author describes that the protagonist Des Esseintes had
showing Salome Dancing Before Herod (Private Collection, bought the two works by Moreau and watched them night after
Los Angeles), another one entitled LApparition (Louvre, Paris), night with increasing intensity: "This painting showed a throne
both of 1874-1876, showing the dancer in a mysterious build like the high altar of a cathedral standing beneath a vaulted
ing with raised arms and pointing toward the head of St. John ceiling - a ceiling crossed by countless arches springing from

193

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN_

who extorts a cry of lust and lechery from an old man by the
lascivious movements of her loins; who saps the morale and
breaks the will of a king with the heaving of her breasts, the
twitching of her belly, the quivering of her thighs. She had
become, as it were, the symbolic incarnation of undying Lust,
the Goddess of immortal Hysteria, the accursed Beauty exalted
above all other beauties by the catalepsy that hardens the flesh
and steels her muscles, the monstrous Beast, indifferent, irre
sponsible, insensible, poisoning, like the Helen of ancient
myth, everything that approaches her, everything that sees her,
everything that she touches."23 In his further reflections Huys
mans expands on the history of the motive beyond the Biblical
tradition to Babylon and directly relates Salome to Salommbo
and Isis, without mentioning the name of Flaubert. Huysmans
even went so far to let his protagonist Des Esseintes reflect in
the old myths of Oriental fertility.24
Huysman's description of the second painting by Moreau,
L'Apparition [Fig. 8] points to the moment after the Dance of
the Seven Veils and the decapitation if St. John: "She is almost
naked; in the heat of the dance her veils have fallen away and
her brocade robe slipped on the floor, so that now she is clad
only in wrought metals and translucent gems. A gorgerin grips
her waist like a corselet, and like an outsize clasp a wondrous
jewel sparkles and flashes in the cleft between her breasts;
lower down, a girdle encircles her hips. Hiding the upper parts
of her thighs, against which dangles a gigantic pendant glis
tening with rubies and emeralds; finally where the body shows
bare between gorgerin and girdle, the belly bulges out, dim
pled by a navel which resembles a graven seal of onyx with its
milky hues and its rosy finger-nail tints."25
Huysman's protagonist comes to the conclusion that
Salome inherits both sides of the emotional contrast between
innocence and the deadly idol that by means of her actions
the lusts and fears of human emotions had been awakened.
Salome for him was at the same time the harlot and the inno
8) Gustave Moreau, ?L'Apparition? Paris, Louvre, Cabinet cent lover, as it soon also will be articulated in a different way
des Dessins. in the one-act play by Oscar Wilde. The time was prepared to
come to a new culmination.

thick-set, almost Romanesque columns, encased in poly
chrome brickwork, encrusted with mosaics, set with lapis
lazuli and sardonyx - in a palace which resembled a basilica
built in both the Moslem and the Byzantine styles."22
After detailed characterization of the participants of the
scene, Herod, Herodias and Salome with historical references
to Matthew and Marc, Huysmans gives a description of Salome
and her dance: "Here she was no longer just the dancing-girl
3. Gesamtkunstwerk
Without a doubt Oscar Wilde's play of Salome can be seen
as one of the most significant highlights of the late 19th centu
ry, both dedicated toward a re-evaluation of the historical leg
end and articulating a new sensibility for the future. Combined
with the illustrations of Aubrey Beardsley and the music of
Richard Strauss it also is one of the most famous Gesamt
kunstwerks of the period.26 Written with knowledge of the ear

194

This content downloaded from

f:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff on Thu, 01 Jan 1976 12:34:56 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 _THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900
lier versions of the topic, including Flaubert, Huysmans and
Mallarm?, Wilde gave it a completely new meaning, changing
the character of Salome according to his own original interpre
tation. While several of his contemporaries saw it just as an
imitation of Maurice Maeterlinck and pointed to Princess
Maleine, it definitely has its own originality. It was first written
in French and only later translated into English. Its premiere
was supposed to be in London in 1892 with Sarah Bernhardt
in the title role, scheduled to play both the actress and the
dancer, including the Dance of the Seven Veils in the nude.27
The performance in London was banned by the English
authorities in applying an old law which prohibited biblical
themes in the theatre; it was considered as "UnEnglish filth"
and the first performance was thus in Paris a few years later in
1896. Wilde's play included a section which was entitled The
Dance of the Seven Veils without further indications about the
way this was to be performed. The title of the dance was men
tioned here for the first time. In the play the dance was first
performed against the will of her mother Herodias, who only
later - after St. John the Baptist had been killed - agreed with
the action of her daughter.
The first performance in Paris in 1896 took place in the
Th??tre-de-Oeuvre under the direction of Lugue-Poe on
February 11. The stage sets were designed by Paul Serusier
and the title role was played by Lina Munte. Before the open
ing a fire broke out and the head of St. John which had to be
borrowed from the Mus?e Grevin's wax works, was dam
aged.28
Wilde's conception of Salome differs from the earlier ver
sions of biblical legends and versions of the 19th century. For
him the "unveiling" was corresponding with a complete new
awareness of independence and articulation of female identi
ty: "The passive child Salome of the Bible had been converted
by her nineteenth-century fathers into a classic femme fatale
of knowing evil and vicious intent. In a key shift of emphasis
from both these previous one-dimensional incarnations, Oscar
Wilde gave Salome what she had heretofore lacked: a person
ality, a psychology all by her own."29
For Wilde, who never saw any performance of his play, it
was significant to identify with his heroine and Elliot L. Gilbert
went so far to write that Wilde might - following Flaubert in his
attitude toward Madame Bovary - have proclaimed "Salome
c'est moi".30 There exists a photo showing Oscar Wilde in cos
tume as Salome, published by Showalter. The writer is
dressed in female outfit, kneeling down and reaching for the
head of St. John on a silver platter on the floor. It is unknown
who took the photo and when it has been taken, but it is a def
inite proof of how much Oscar Wilde did identify with his hero
ine.31
This content downloaded from
141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Of greatest importance in this redefinition of character is
the Dance of the Seven Veils, which had not been included in
any of the earlier versions. Wilde was aware of Flaubert's ori
ental experiences and especially of the description of the
"dance on her hands". By the introduction of the veil as a sym
bol of the earlier traditional oriental past and the specific men
tioning of the number seven he gave the transformation a new
dimension. It is not known whether Wilde was aware of the
dance of the goddess Ishtar of Babylon who descended to the
underworld to retrieve her mortal lover Tammuz. Ishtar's
dance was the unveiling of her body and, according to the old
Babylonian legend, it was performed at each of the seven
gates of the underworld.32 The modern inclusion of the unveil
ing symbolizes the exploration of a new freedom as it is still in
debate in many parts of the world today and has opened up
endless manifestation of music-hall entertainment and to
striptease.33
The play in its many performances had world-wide fame
and many different interpretations. The first performance in
England took place only in 1931. The play was enhanced and
expanded by means of visual additions which made it even go
further in its impact, as it was achieved by the illustrations in
the first publication of the English version of the play by
Aubrey Beardsley in 1894 [Figs. 9-11].34
Beardsley's illustrations gave an additional important ele
ment in the visual representation of the theme and caused
new attention and controversy. In spite of the fact that Wilde
was not happy with the drawings of Beardsley they were
nevertheless important and gave previously unknown per
spectives to the play. Wilde went so far to write in a copy, ded
icated to Aubrey Beardsley: "For Aubrey: for the only artist
who, besides myself, knows what the dance of the seven veils
is, and can see that invisible dance."35
The drawings by Beardsley as later also the music by
Strauss were not just illustrations of a literary work, but added
to its meaning by innovative elements which expanded what
was earlier defined. Beardsley's work is a powerful original
manifestation of the artist's vision. By concentrating on the lin
ear and contrasts of black and white Beardsley created a fan
tastic creation which has a life of its own, including his vision
of the Dance of the Seven Veils in the page he called "The
Stomach Dance", a sensual depiction of the body movements
of an oriental dancer. The title page is a powerful assembly of
organic configurations which in their visual exuberance define
the internal content of the actions.36 Culmination of the series
is the last image which shows the kneeling Salome with the
head of St. John in her hands, an antistatic composition which
cuts diagonally into the frame. Salome kneels in a white sur
face and with a lascivious expression holds the head of St.
195
UDO KULTERMANN_

9) Aubrey Beardsley, ?The Stomach Dance?, illustration for 10) Aubrey Beardsley, ?Dancer's Reward?, illustration for
Oscar Wilde's Salome. Oscar Wildes Salome.

John. The blood which flows out of the head forms a pool of
blood out of which a blossom is growing.
In Beardsley's vision the symbol of death is interconnect
ed with new organic life of a form, which no longer is limited
to representational or naturalistic imagery. The left upper cor
ner of the picture is filled with circular forms which are a non
representational indication for that which can not any longer
be expressed in a figurative manner. In these forms as well as
in the ornamental cover on the head of Salome non-figurative
or abstract expressions of feeling are realized which articu
late and define the complex reality of Salome's inner
thoughts. Parallel to works by Gustav Klimt and anticipating
later so-called "abstract works of art" of the 20th century,
a creative basic foundation for the new developments is here
inaugurated.
As in the drawings of Beardsley also in the music of
Richard Strauss the tneme received still another important
dimension.37 Strauss had seen the performance of Wilde's
Salome directed by Max Reinhardt in Berlin in 1903 with
Gertrud Eysoldt in the title role, and decided to use it as libret

196

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 _THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

Schoenberg, Alban Berg and Giacomo Puccini as well as the

teenager Adolf Hitler. The praise of contemporaries and the his
torians was great. The music historian Michel Kennedy wrote:
"More even than Electra with its moments of atonal harmony,
Salome seems to me the most influential score Strauss ever
wrote. It changed the nature of opera." He continued: "Strauss
is the liberator who has been able to extend the liberties taken
by Berlioz, and has given the wind instruments a new impor
tance, new at least for the time when he was writing." Alex Ross
wrote later: "Although music historians tend to sanctify the pre
mieres of Schoenberg's Second String Ouartet, in 1908, and of
Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, in 1913, as modernism's revolution
ary moments, Salome came first, and it foreshadowed practi
cally everything that came after".39
The Dance of the Seven Veils, in most cases performed by
a dancer and not by the lead singer of the opera, continuously
caused problems, as in the performance in Dresden in 1905
when the singer Maria Wittich refused to act with the decapi
tated head of St. John and a ballerina from the opera house in
Dresden had to be called in to dance. It was nevertheless, as
in many other cities, such as Paris and Brussels, an immediate
success, and the inherent scandal contributed to it. The sepa
ration of the title role, established from the beginning, was
kept for a long time. Whenever the officials interfered and the
performance was forbidden, it first was the part of the Dance
of the Seven Veils, which was cut, but found soon easily other
ways into areas of entertainment, such as into music halls or
night clubs where it began to have its own new life.
While Wilde had given the figure of Salome an identity,
Strauss gave her the chance of a voice and a dance, both
defining in extreme and challenging forms within her person
a new dimension of female reality. As the composer consid
ered the nine-minute dance the heart of the work so also all his

11) Aubrey Beardsley, ?The Kiss?, illustration for Oscar
Wilde's Salome.
to for his own musical interpretation.38 He had already read
Hedwig Lachmann's prose translation of Wilde's play. The
French language was changed into German, several passages
from the original French text by Wilde altered and nine minutes
of the total performance deserved for the Dance of the Seven
Veils, which - for Strauss - was the heart of his work.
The opera was completed in June 20,1905. It was planned
to open in Vienna, but as the performance was banned there, it
was first staged in Graz in 1906. It was a much expected event
and among the participants were Gustav Mahler and Arnold
previous developments merged into a new totality. The legacy
of Wagner and Nietzsche played an important role in this
female emancipation, opening doors into previously unknown
territories which often led to extreme excesses.
The fact remained that at the turn of the century another
kind of Gesamtkunstwerk had been created, encompassing lit
erature, theater, visual arts and music, inaugurating a world in
which - predominantly - the role of woman in modern society
was redefined.
4. Painting and Sculpture
The international success of Wilde's Salome had numer
ous reverberations in several art forms, high and low. But it
also influenced the traditional media of painting and sculpture,

197

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN

" S*i

12) Henri A. G. Regnault, ?Salome?, New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art.

198

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

!**
I

m
FW *^+^i

zm
m

< "!>.

g^W^^sf

13) Georges Rochegrosse, ?Salome Dancing Before King Herod?, 1887, Joslyn Art
Story Taught by One Thousand Picture Lessons, ed. by Ch. F. Home and J. A. Bewe

somber
predominantly painting as the theme had little scenetoin
to offer which the figure of Salom
sculp
ture. There existed influential works fromwatching
the time before 1890,
the decapitation from a distance.
such as Gustave Moreau's versions, HenriThere Regnault's Salome
are very few representations of Sal
of 1870 [Fig. 12] and George Rochegrosse's Dance
artists whichofasSalome
a topic is typical for the male p
of 1887 [Fig. 13]. While Regnault's painting gives
the a typical
period. fig
Exceptions can be mentioned suc
uration of the lascivious figure waiting with
by athe
silver platter artist
American for Ella Ferris Pell of 1890
the delivery of the head of St. John, the
ited in painting by
the Salon in Paris in the same year, an
Rochegrosse depicts a scene with many Juana Romani
attendants of 1898. Pell's version dep
watching
the dance of Salome. Puvis de Chavannes' Decapitation
woman withoutof St. violent or decadent feat
any
John the Baptist [Fig. 14] on the othermore
side within thea tradition
presents more of the Salon.40

199

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN_
14) Puvis de Chavannes, ?The Beheading of John the
Baptist?, Birmingham, The Barber Institute of Fine Arts,
University of Birmingham.
The official art of the Salon had already used the subject
matter before Wilde, as works by Jean-Jacques Henner in
France and Franz von Lenbach, Victor Mueller, Hugo van
Habermann (Salome of c. 1886), Otto Friedrich (Salome of c.
1912) and Franz von Stuck demonstrate. Lenbach's Judith II
(Salome) is of 1894 in the Bayerische Staatsgem?ldesam
mlungen in Munich depicts Mary Lindquist as Salome and
merged theatre and painting in a new way. The painting by
Max Slevogt of 1895 introduces the scene of the dancing
Salome with racial undertones, which especially soon in Fritz
Erler's Dance of 1898 leads to a stronger accentuation of
Salome as a Jewish figure and prepares for the advancement
of Antisemitism in the topic. The difference between "deca
dent" and "degenerate" were soon obliterated and the oriental
background of the topic interpreted in negative racial terms.41
Franz von Stuck's Salome of 1906 is furthermore signifi
cant as the dancer Maud Allan posed for it in the nude and
painting and dance merged into a new synthesis [Fig. 15]. The
three versions of the work gave an exuberant representation
with Salome dancing and laughing and the head of St. John
brought in by a black servant on a silver platter [Fig. 16].
Different interpretations are given in Odilon Redon's ver
sions of Salome, one of 1883 inspired by Moreau. Redon
changed the architectural environment into a one of a more
200
This content downloaded from
141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
rectangular form and in a new situation which emphasized the
subconscious subject matter.42 A second version by Redon
was exhibited at the Armory Show in New York in 1913 [Fig.
17]. The two figures here represent Salome and Herodias with
the decapitated head of St. John on the floor beneath them.
One of the two women with her breasts exposed and naked
feet is Salome, the fully dressed woman beside her Herodias.
The event is translated into a moment of calm and reflection
and different from the many violent scenes of other artists of
the times, especially in comparison to the scene by Lovis
Corinth in the Leipzig Museum of 1900.43
In contrast to earlier representations of the theme the
painting by Corinth depicts a dramatic scene. A most cruel
moment is chosen by the artist and the complex expression
of the heroine is markedly defined. The description by Horst
Uhr reads: "The executioner, still holding the bloody sword,
watches with satisfaction as the headless body of the Baptist
is carried away. Herod's daughter, arriving as if by chance,
with her female companions at the site for a better look, her
voluptuous breasts almost touching the Baptist's beard with
unruffled curiosity, she daintily pries open one of the Saint's
eyes, as if to force him to acknowledge her beauty, if only in
death."44
Salome in the time is defined as a sign of female brutality
and lustfulness. Gustav Klimt's work is an incarnation of what
was at stake. It involves female morbidity and danger, many of
them signs of the femme fatale of the turn of the century.
Klimt's Salome of 1903 which - probably under the impact of
Moreau - gave it his own personal articulation pointing to
a new type of non-objective representation of art in general, as
it was similarly manifested in the drawings by Beardsley. The
stories of both, Judith and Salome, can be compared in sever
al thematic details, specifically in the relationship of the female
desire and the decapitation of a male adversary or lover. In
Klimt's Salome of 1909 in the Galleria d'Arte Moderna in
Venice [Fig. 18] the head of St. John is contrasted to the bare
breast of the woman and her hands which received a danger
ous shape.45 The canvas is enhanced by abstract signs by
means of which the emotional aggression increased. In this
regard the quasi-abstract forms can be interpreted as tools for
murder, but not only murder in its physical matter but in a sub
limated emotional character. The spiraling abstractions have
a visual equivalent with those emotional complexities which
are within the feeling of Salome including desire and destruc
tion uncontrollably united. The impression of Klimt's painting,
as in the drawings by Beardsley before, is violence and mor
bidity, and both in close connection with sensual fascination,
as it already was recognizable in a literary manifestation in
Kleist's Penthesiliea many decades earlier.46
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

15) Franz von Stuck, ?Salome?, Munich, Lenbachhaus.

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN _

16) Franz von Stuck, ?Salome? (Maud Allan as a model).

Sculptural representations of Salome are only rare. Max

Klinger gave a sculptural version of Salome in his Head of
Salome of 1893 [Fig. 19] but has difficulties to catch her com
plex emotions. The sculptor Arthur Bock in Hamburg was for
a time engaged to Maud Allan and also made works of Maud
as Salome, barebreasted kneeling before the head of St.
John, embracing him with her arms. Alexander Archipenko
devoted one of his early sculptures to the theme, Salome of
1910, which was shown in the Armory Show in New York in
1913. More like several of his early dancing figures the com
plexity of the content is missing and the work can be com
pared to other early sculptures of his work, such as Der rote
Tanz of 1912.47
The 20th century has only few and often unconvincing rep
resentations of the topic of Salome in painting and sculpture,
but it is evident in numerous forms in the world of the music
hall and in film, where it is significant again, that the music hall
17) Odilon Redon, ?Salome?, Paris, Collection Olivier
Saincere.
performances of the theme of Salome very soon give up the
historic analogies and only concentrate on the unveiling of the
female body for the male gaze in night clubs and other public
entertainment schemes in the form of commercial striptease. It
often is used as a caricature, as in a drawing by Sergej M.
Eisenstein from his travels in America, about which Eisenstein
himself wrote: "I think of the 'serie', in which Salome drinks
from a straw, which is between the lips of the decapitated head
of St. John."48

202

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

m w

???.m ,1

4?^
vz

"Mm

19) Max Klinger, ?Head of

18) Gustav Klimt, ?Judith II (Salome)?, 1909, Venice,

Galleria d'Arte Moderna.

203

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN

Notary I'ii-tn
MALI) OLIVK IRKMSTA (.KUTRUUt: llOn-'MANN JULIA MARLOWE

All Sorts and Kinds of Salomes

S ALOMAN 1A is not a new craze. Mary Garden, who is manuscript which reveals her "vaulting before Herod" on
century
her hands, to several pictures by the old masters.
now impersonating the Daughter of Herodias in Strauss'
vivid music drama at the Manhattan Opera House, is onlyThe numerous versions of the story are conflicting. Some.
hr.s
the descendant of a long line of scantily-clad Salomes that ! upon the meager liiblical account, are historical, while others
have
cropped up from time to time during the last two thousand years. the Oscar Wilde dramatic poem, vivid in the color of its
tolk.w
Medieval legend depicts Salome blown upon by the Mighty word-painting and unpleasantly morbid in its imagination. His
torically
lircath for having caused the l'rophet's death by her dancing, and Salome was a "korasian." which in the Hebrew means
by way of punishment being whirled into space, where "dam-el."
she is innocent of evil motive, but the victim of her wicked
doomed to dance and whirl forever. Thus Salome joined motor's
the revenge. She is terror-stricken at the sight of the head
"furious host." a roaming band oi banished spirits which ii.i.unvd
medieval Europe with their restlessness, lierchard of Wormssuggests
re the interpolated love of Salome for the Prophet, and in
ports with twelfth century gravity that fully one-third Flaubert's
of the "Herodias" the motive is further emphasized. Suder
whole world worshipped her. We still seek her shrine, but mann's
we do"Johannes" deals with Ulis theme more gently, while in
not always worship. Wilde s version Salome is imbued with a revoltinglv morbid
motive
Salome, as we know her to-day, has evolved gradually from the for her crime ? sexual passion for John the liaptist.
brief accounts S o m e fifteen years ago,
given of her in the
Sarah llernhardt presented the
" >' r.ible. :m.l she has
/ inspired poets,
painters, dancers,
d r a mat ist s and
composers. The subject "Sa
lome Dancing" has appealed
particularly to artists of al!
ages, from the fourteenth

KVA TANOUAY LAURA (?I.KIU'?-:

20) ?All Sorts and Kinds of Salomes?, page from Theatre Magazine, April, 1909, with images of, among others, Gert
Hoffmann, Julia Marlowe, Lotta Faustamong.

204

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

5. Music Hall and Striptease

The developments of art forms at the turn of the century

had been significant not only in regard to the crossing or pre
vious borderlines and creating on one hand the Gesamtkunst
werk by Wilde, Beardsley and Strauss, constituted by a variety
of media combined, they also crossed the borderlines
between high art and low art which only much later will have
widespread consequences. It had concrete reverberations
specifically related toward the night-life entertainment since
the introduction of electric light and the culture of the masses
which introduced new forms of amusements unknown before.
One of these new media was the newly developed moving pic
tures or movies, the other were the mass entertainment facili
ties in music halls. Both proved to be most appropriate to the
topic of Salome and her Dance of the Seven Veils. The times
created the term "Salomania" for the new form of mass enter
tainment [Fig. 20].49
To a large extent influenced by the play of Oscar Wilde
and especially by the controversies of its public scandals,
including bans on the performances, the general public was
exposed to an enormous number of works which were not
done by actresses or singers but by female performers who
exploited their bodily appearances especially in various forms
of deshabillies or undressings. The Dance of the Seven Veils
became with or without references to the biblical topic a gen
eral attraction.
One of the first performances in America took place at the
World's Fair in Chicago in 1893. The dancer Ashea Wabe, who
called herself "Little Egypt", caused a scandal, which became
financially rewarding for the Fair. The dancer continued to
dance successfully in New York in 1897, first at a bachelor's 35.boul0 des capucines
party for one of P. T. Barnum's grandsons, which was raided by ^Bmr.i{ Sulx'i Paris
the police and led to a grand jury investigation. She continued
under the auspices of Oscar Hammerstein, and "Little Egypt"
became a lasting success in the Olympia Vaudeville theatre in
New York. 21) ?Loie Fuller in Salome (The Flower Dance)?,
In 1907 the dancer Bianca Froehlich was chosen to per
form the Dance of the Seven Veils in the premiere of Salome in
the Metropolitan Opera in New York, while Olive Fremsted
acted the other parts of the play, this in spite of her weight of
250 pounds: "The visual discrepancy between Fremsted, the de Paris in New York. The performance was an e
voice of the Salome, and Froelich, the body of Salome, was so cess, and Ms Peterkin opened a school for Salo
apparent that critic Franklin Foyles wrote that is was 'as if produced one hundred and fifty Salomes per mont
some anti-fat remedy had worked wonders for a few minutes The success of the Salome performances expa
and then suddenly lost its potency'."50 August 1908, when four Salomes were performing
Salome was soon included in the activities of the impresa alone, to twenty-four performances in Octo
rio Florenz Ziegfeld who selected the dancer Dazie-Daisy Salome as a topic entered the discussions of the
Peterkin for his performance The Follies of 1907 at the Jardin elections, whether it should be forbidden or all

205

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN_

Hammerstein presented in his 1909 performance of Salome at

the Manhattan Opera the dancer Mary Garden who for the first
time in America was able both to sing and to dance the role,
but not before she had traveled to Paris to study at the Opera
Ballet: "In Mary Garden's hands the princess was an amalgam
of the diva of German opera and the ballerina of the Paris
Opera rounded out by a good dose of the hootechy-kootchy
girl from American vaudeville."51
The European "Salomania" was stronger under the impact
of Wilde's play and the music by Strauss, but had also signifi
cant original contributions, among them an early performance
by Loie Fuller in the Com?die-Parisienne entitled The Flower
Dance [Fig. 21] and those by the dancers Maud Allan and
Mata Hari. James Joyce admired the Italian soprano Gemma
Bellincioni who in 1909 sang the role of Salome in the opera
by Strauss. Joyce also wrote an article entitled "Oscar Wilde: II
poeta di Salome" for // Piccolo della Sera.52
Maud Allan created one of the earliest versions of the
work with some independence from Wilde. She performed in
1906 in Vienna before an invited audience and also wrote
about it, relating the fate of Salome to her own earlier life. In
The Vision of Salome in 1908 she created a simultaneous
vision of an innocent and lascivious character, which in her
own recollections My Life and Dancing reads: "It takes
courage [...] to come out on the stage before hundred with
feet bare, with little dress [...]. Every time I appear, until the
spirit gets into me, it is as though I were about to undergo mar
tyrdom. Don't you think that is courage - to fight down and go
out and face the thing you dread? [...] Hundreds peering at
you from a darkened house. Eyes of men, eyes of women. In
how many are there other lights of contempt - of desire? Each
time I dance I think of it and I dread it." [Figs 22, 23].53 Maud
Allan successfully manipulated the audience and the media
and became famous all over Europe, in Paris she even com
peted with the premiere of Wilde's and Strauss' performance.
Herbert Read remembers her appearance in England: "She
was the Marilyn Monroe of my youth".54
Also Mata Hari was engaged in dancing the Dance of the
Seven Veils and gave her own version of Salome [Fig. 24].
Starting as an Eastern Temple Dancer in 1905 after her return 22) ?Maud Allan in her Salome Costume?, c. 1908.
from Indonesia, where she was married to an Army Captain of
the Dutch government, Mata Hari manipulated her audience
and her admirers by insinuating oriental traditions combined
with increasing and calculated nudity in her performances. In
1907 she applied for the role of Salome for the Paris perform made attempts to dance for Sergej Diaghilev and had an audit
ance, but was rejected by Strauss. But she did not give up by Leon Bakst in which she completely undressed, but was
and finally played the role of Salome in a private performance still not accepted. Her later life until her execution as a Ger
at the Palazzo Barberini in Rome, choosing to get to a degree man spy in 1917 had little resemblances with her earlier fame
of nudity which even at that time was unknown. Mata Hari and success.55

206

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

?&&% ***&' &

23) Maud Allan in ?The Vision of Salome?, c. 1908.

Still another dancer, the Russianmiming

Ida Rubinstein,
the scene gave
to an empty silver platte
a personal interpretation of Salome of aperformance
different kind was The
[Fig. Dance of the Seve
25].
a shocking
Greatly fitting into her own life experiences, it wasbut
she extremely
who first successful event.
performed Wilde's Salome in the Russian danced in Diaghilev's
version of the play.Paris
In performance
1908 in Paris she had became infatuated andtoBakst
play the rolethe
applied which
Dance of the Seven V
was at that time considered impossible increasing the
for a lady of number
society. In of veils from sev
reads
order to achieve her freedom she married, inwas
but thefree
description
to carry of Jean Cocteau
on her stage career. A trip to Palestineunwound herself
was due in a fashion
in order to of its own: o
study the environment of her protagonist Salome,
of subtle which another
touches, finally the deliberation
she was able to produce in St. Petersburg with the
a walnut, the help
thirdof the
the airy detachment of
choreographer Michel Fokin and Leon Bakst
and as the setmost
the eleventh, design
difficult at all, cam
er. First banned but due to Ida Rubinstein's influence
like the bark ofinansociety
eucalyptus tree."56
it was allowed to be performed in mime. As always
Again the different
in a very decapi form the Frenc
tated head of St. John was an obstacle26]
butwas
wasrelated
resolvedto
bySalome
Ida as an icon and

207

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN_

sexual portrait as a rite of passage into both financial and

emotional independence."58 Colette's Salome was one of the
first performances in which both the ?mages of the femme
fatale and the lesbian woman were combined opening up per
spectives which at that time were not fully explored.59

6. Salome in Film

It is only evident that the theme of Salome and the domi

outgrowth of earlier dramatic forms of entertainment. Film was
music halls and vaudeville theatres on both continents and it
Griffith not only included the equally famous topic of Judith in
24) ?Mata Hari as Salome?, c. 1907.
pendent interpretation. It was the world of the music hall in
which Colette performed her own often daring incarnations of
the independent woman, including her later fame as a writer.
The role of Salome reflected much of her own private life.57 In
the pantomime Le R?ve d'Egypte in 1907 she performed
Salome in The Moulin Rouge in Paris, together with her les
bian companion Yssim, whom she kissed during the perform
ance in a passionate gesture. For Colette, Salome was one of
the many figures, which reflected her mature life. Toni Bentley
wrote: "She tried on her shape to find its fit and then used this
nating "Salomania" of the period should easily transfer into
the new medium of film which was emerging as a technical
indeed a new step which had been established earlier in the
speaks that some of the earliest productions of movies should
take on the then prominent topics, including Salome. D. W.
his Judith of Bethulia of 1914, in which the heroine and the
head of Holofernes created eminent sensations, but also
Salome in several versions in his masterpiece Intolerance of
1916.60 Part of the ancient world and the mass scenes of
Egypt, Babylon and Rome created responses from an audi
ence which was familiar with the genre.
In 1922 the director Natasha Rambova created in her
silent movie Salome a fantastic performance of the dancer
Alia Nazimova, reinvigorating the play by Oscar Wilde
inspired by the illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley. Nazimova
had had before a successful career as an actress in Moscow
and St. Petersburg as well as later in New York where she
starred in plays by Ibsen and Chechov [Fig. 27]. Her silent
film version of 1922 created a sensation: "Salome first
appears as a Mack Sennett bathing beauty in a sequined gym
suit and a wig of big bubble-shaped pearls on little antennae,
copies from one of the Beardsley drawings of Salome's curls;
the pearls quiver erotically like stamens when she first sees
Jokanaan. In the dance scene, Salome wears a platinum
blond Cleopatra wig and white chiffon; when she kisses the
lips of the severed head, she is in a Japanese robe and has
her head tightly bound in a satin turban, a snaky phallic look
that both echoes Beardsley's drawings and suggests femi
nine decadence".61 Pantomime in character the dancer creat
ed a brilliant personification of the historical and contempo
rary figure. The highlight of the film was the performance of
the Dance of the Seven Veils with a fantastic arrangement of
hair and light and silk. The film had different possibilities and
a new generation of dancers fully exploited not only the medi
um, but also the changing ways of expressing the new image
of women.62

208

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

i
25) ?Ida Rubinstein?, c. 1911-1912. Photo: Romain Brooks.

A rather different and unusual version of the topic was theMore recent films explore different lines of interpretation
film Salome by William Dieterle of 1953 in which, without of Salome and the play by Oscar Wilde, such as Ken Russell's
refer
Salome's
ences to the play by Oscar Wilde, Salome is transformed into Last Dance of 1987. The film simulates a private per
formance of the play for Oscar Wilde in a male brothel. Salome
a devout Christian. Played by Rita Hayworth, her performance,
dances the Dance of the Seven Veils after Edvard Grieg's In
including the Dance of the Seven Veils, is in its complicated
motivation intended not to destroy but to save the life of the
St. Hall of the Mountain King only to reveal, after the fall of the
John the Baptist and to conceal the religious beliefs oflast herveil at the end, male genitals. As many other recent inter
pretations of the work the homosexual context is newly
lover Claudius. The film ended, unconvincingly, with Salome
and Claudius attending a Christian prayer assembly.63 emphasized.64

209

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, ffff on Thu, 01 Jan 1976 12:34:56 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN

26) Colette in the publicity still for ?Le R?ve d'Egypte?, Paris, 1907.

210

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900
27) Alla Nazimova in ?Salome?, 1922, dir. Natasha Rambova.
7. Unveiling Salome
Salome's Dance of the Seven Veils in the multitude of liter
ary, musical and visual representations over the centuries is
a revelation of something essential, something which obvious
ly is capable to lay bare an important element which specifical
ly concerned the role of women in society. Taking the veil is
commonly related to the preservation of virginity, as it also is
connected with the male acceptance of celibacy. It is signifi
cant that the process contains both positive and negative
parts, that especially the unveiling of the female psyche
results in the discovery of previously unknown elements which
have to do with power and freedom.
The Salome of the Bible is caught in the limitations of the
period and has to be punished for her ambitions. The active
new role of the 19th century for women caused a large part of
her negative defamation as the femme fatale which she was -
of course - only from the masculine perspective. What
Flaubert gave his Herodias and Beardsley and Wilde and
Strauss to Salome was the installation of a conscious and suc
cessful personality who no longer obeyed into the social
frame of subordination and passivity, it was the growing
awareness of specific powers which when used appropriately
could lead to the achievements of goals.
This content downloaded from
141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
The question of veils which are an oriental form of hiding
the face of women in traditional society, is also today part of the
liberation movement not only in Arab countries, but - as recent
ly - also in Turkey and France. The veil is a symbol and has
been considered as such, a demonstration of male power over
the female members of his household, of men over the women
in their society. Unveiling in the past, as today, thus contains
elements of demonstrating freedom, rejecting the male superi
ority of controlling women, and establishing a new and power
ful equality. For Sigmund Freud the erotic of women was still
"veiled in unpenetrable obscurity".65 But, as has been written,
unveiling is also an expression of homosexual desire, and
Elaine Showalter could ask the question: "Is Salome's love for
Jokanaan a veiled homosexual desire for the male body?"66
The Dance of the Seven Veils in this interpretation is thus
the complete expression of freedom from old and individual
limits to a scale, which extends into wider dimensions of soci
ety or the city as a symbol of the larger society or to the patri
archal society at that time in general. The seven veils are
equivalents of the seven gates of the city, the urban communi
ty, as in the old Babylonian legend of the goddess Ishtar. For
Oscar Wilde the underworld of Babylon has been replaced by
the unconscious world of modern times, as Toni Bentley rec
ognized: "Oscar Wilde assigned this symbolic descent to the
underworld to the Unconscious, a ceremony that equates
stripping naked to being in a state of truth, the ultimate unveil
ing, to Salome."67
It is significant that the role of women in the 20th century
continued in lines which were established earlier, and often
the image of Salome was accepted as the image of the New
Woman. Jane Markus identified Salome and her Dance of the
Seven Veils with the art form of the New Woman and pointed to
the interconnections with Nora's tarantella dance in A Doll's
House by Ibsen. Both heroines, she writes, "are reluctant to
perform their ritual obeisance to their masters, but in the end,
choose the degrading act rather than to find no means at all of
self-expression."68 Self-expression and complete freedom are
the basic elements of many contemporary female artists and
performers. Yayoi Kusama could arrange nude happenings in
which the participants were proud of the exposition of their
bodies, and men and women performed demonstratively in
full equality. In one of her statements it reads: "A New Way to
Be Nude. Down with Yin and Yang (male and female). Up with
unisex. Off with clothes. On with Yayoi Kusama's polka-dot
birthday suit."69 Consequences of these actions not only were
significant for the relationships between men and women but
also for new political beliefs, including anti-war demonstra
tions, gay weddings and transvestite performances, such as
the one by Lindsay Kemp's Salome of 1977 to an all-male audi
211
UDO KULTERMANN

F=

X.J y.

vv:_

28) Joe Nocastri, ?Study for Fragments: Salome?, 1978.

212

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900

ence.70 The French magazine LExpress entitled its cover of the
January 1969 issue with LArt Dans la Vie encompassing
a completely new and liberating attitude toward life in general
with dance as the central metaphor. There are astonishing
resemblances between the myth of fertility in old Babylon and
contemporary concepts of survival, interconnecting between
the millennia and the complexities of gender differences.
It appears sometimes as if the world is coming to a new
awakening. The German performance artist Ulrike Rosenbach
entitled one of her performances 10 000 Years I have Slept -
Now I am Awakening, demonstrating a new attitude of how as
a woman to perceive reality: "Sleeping woman here is in the
center of the action which again relates to Prehistoric ritual
[...]. Sleep and awakening are crucial in this context and both
are related to the contemporary position of women."71
The American artist Carolee Schneemann made and par
ticipated in the sexual act in her Fuses of 1964 as a legitimate
topic of performance.72 Transcending earlier limitations of
content matter it constituted a basic theme as a legitimate ele
ment in art, a new kind of sexuality is expressed an erotic ritu
al free from previous limitations in an orgiastic process of rela
tions between men and women. Gene Youngblood described
the 22 minute film as "the first elicit feminist erotic film con
fronting traditional sexual taboos [...]. A film which breaks the
barriers between the private and public subject matter".73
It is freedom which is at stake and was anticipated in
many of the Salome performances and productions before. To
take away veils was to bring out reality in a new openness and
truthfulness, even if in many cases this was rejected and con
sidered as unlawful.74
Dancing and unveiling - of course - has a long tradition in
many cultures, predating the Biblical periods. The Upanishads
in India considered even the number seven as a sacred num
ber in regarding to ritual dances: "The dancing flames of the
sacred fire are seven; the black, the terrific, that which is swift
as the mind, that which is dark with smoke, the deep red, the
spark-blazing and the luminous omniformed flame." Dance is
experienced as a cosmic force of universal significance.75
Dances and color and movement and the ritual content of
freedom have their own old traditions which transcend cul
tures and regions. It was reintegrated into a society in the 19th
and 20th centuries without the traditional values of a specific
religion but transformed nevertheless as a liberating element,
specifically regarding the liberation of women. The poet Shel
ley already asked in the early 19th century: "Can man be free
if woman be a slave?" Doris Lessing will take up the same
issue hundred years later: "What's the use of being free, if
they are not?"76 The mass society and the civilization in which
work ethics and power had entered a new relationship
required the establishment of values which had to be consti
tuted anew. The position of women in this culture was one of
the central topics for change and Salome with her Dance of
the Seven Veils one of the most attractive forms in which it
was manifested.

213

This content downloaded from

141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
UDO KULTERMANN_
1 W. Buonaventura, "Salome and the Seven Veils of Ishtar",
Arabesque, March-April 1984, p. 5. Fernand Khnopff made a litho in
1888 with the title Ishtar, which is proof that the Babylonian goddess
was known to artists in the time period. See: B. Dijkstra, Idols of
Perversity: Fantasies of Feminine Evil in Fin-de-Si?cle Culture, New
York, 1986, p. 309.
2 R. Girard, "Scandal and the Dance: Salome in the Gospel of
Mark", Ballet Review, Winter 1983, p. 67; E. Kuryluk, Salome and
Judas in the Cave of Sex. Origins, Iconography, Techniques, Evanston,
1987; R.-J. Fontain, ed., Reclaiming the Sacred: The Bible in Gay and
Lesbian Culture, New York, 1997.
3 F. Josephus, The Jewish War, New York, 1860, p. 648; H. Will
rich, Das Haus des Herodes zwischen Jerusalem und Rom, [n.p.]
1929. There is an earlier version of the story in Cicero's De Senectute
of about 44 BC about a Roman governor in Gaul by name Lucius
Flaminius, who supposedly beheaded a prisoner at the request of
a courtesan. It is possible that also similar happenings were part of the
gossip in Roman times.
4 E. W. Bredt, "Die Bilder der Salome", Die Kunst und das
sch?ne Heim, 7, 1903; R. Bizot, "Salome in Modern Dance", Israel
Dance 1980; R. Bizot, "The Turn-of-the-Century Salome Era: High and
Pop-Culture Variations on the Dance of the Seven Veils", Choreogra
phy and Dance, 1992, vol. 2, part 3. Basic for all investigations is still:
H. Daffner, Salome. Ihre Gestalt in Geschichte und Kunst. Dichtung -
Bildende Kunst - Musik, Munich, 1912. Daffner refers to even earlier
research, such as: R. Secundus, Geschichte der Salome von Cato bis
Oscar Wilde, Leipzig [n.d.]; and G. Bitaletti, Salome nella legenda
e nell'arte, Rome, 1908.
5 Bredt, p. 250.
6 Buonaventura, p. 5. It is significant that Flaubert might have
been familiar with the image. There are also numerous representa
tions of the theme in windows of Gothic cathedrals, see Daffner, p. 63.
7 Kuryluk, pp. 196-197. In the miniature of Herrad of Landsberg,
Salome dances on her hands, similar to the later sculpture at Rouen
Cathedral. A further representation from the 15th century is illustrated
in V Holland, Oscar Wilde, New York, 1988, p. 84.
8 A relief at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York depicts
Salome in a multi-figured courtly scene.
9 The two versions of Salome by Filippo Lippi and Bernardino
Luini (Uffizi) present the event in the context of Renaissance painting.
Luini's figuration is, as later the paintings by Caravaggio, of a non-vio
lent character, see Daffner, pp. 105 and 173.
10 Also the painting by Solario is uncharacteristic in its non-vio
lent mood. The versions by Titian are illustrated in Daffner, p. 190.
11 H. Langdon, Caravaggio. A Life, London, 1998; see also: M.
Gregori, ed., Come dipingere il Caravaggio, Milan, 1996, p. 251; J. T.
Spike, Caravaggio, New York, 2001, p. 222. Spike also discusses the
later versions by the artist in the Cathedral of San Giovanni in La Valet
ta of c. 1608 and Salome with the Head of Saint John the Baptist in the
Palacio Real in Madrid of c. 1608-1610.
12 J. Unglaub, "Poussin's Esther before Ahasuerus. Beauty,
Majesty, Bondage", Art Bulletin, vol. 85, no. 1, March 2003, pp.
114-136.
13 Influential was especially Vivant Denon's, Travels in Upper and
Lower Egypt, 2 vols., London, 1802. See also: J. Novinski, Baron
Dominique Vivant Denon. 1747-1825. Hedonist and Scholar in a Peri
od of Transition, Rutherford, 1970.
14 H. Heine, Atta Troll, [n.p.] 1841.
15 S. Martin, Wagner to "Waste Land". A Study of the Relationship
of Wagner to English Literature, Totowa, N. J., 1982.
16 G. Flaubert, Three Tales, Oxford, 1991, p. 101.
214
This content downloaded from
141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
17 Flaubert, p. 102. At one point Flaubert writes that "she sprang
up on her hands, heels in the air", resembling the medieval sculpture
at Rouen Cathedral. The quote from Flaubert is an important argument
in one of the early histories of dance: G. Vuillier, A History of Dancing,
New York, 1898, p. 39 as well as in E. Said, Orientalism, New York,
1978, pp. 186-187.
18 V. Brombert, The Novels of Flaubert. A Study of Themes and
Techniques, Princeton, 1966, p. 248. Details can be compared with
Flaubert's Notes de Voyages, published in 1850. See also: H. Kenner.
Flaubert, Joyce and Beckett. The Three Stoic Comedians, Boston,
1962 and F. Stegmuller, ed., Flaubert in Egypt, London, 1972.
19 S. Mallarm?, Herodias, Praerie City, Illinois, 1940, translation
by C. Mills; Dijkstra, p. 385. See also S. Huot, Le mythe d'H?rodiade
chez Mallarm?: Gen?se et ?volution, Paris, 1977; M. Robillard, Le
d?sir de la vierge: H?rodiade chez Mallarm?, Gen?ve 1993; D. Sweet
man, Explosive Acts. Toulouse-Lautrec, Oscar Wilde, Felix Feneon and
the Art and Anarchy of the Fin-de-Si?cle, New York, 1999, p. 236.
20 S. C. Ellis, The Plays of W. B. Yeats and the Dancer, New York,
1995, p. 9.
21 P.-L. Mathieu, The Symbolist Generation, Geneva, 1990, p. 25;
G. Lacambre, Gustave Moreau, Chicago, 1999.
22 J.-K. H uys mans, Against Na ture, Harmondsworth, 1975, p. 63.
23 Huysmans, p. 66; see also Dijkstra: Idols of Perversity. Fan
tasies of Feminine Evil in Fin-de-Si?cle Culture, New York, 1986; P.
Bade, Images of Evil and Fascinating Women, New York, 1988.
24 Later in the novel Huysmans goes in detail in his discussions
and interpretations of works by Flaubert, Baudelaire, the Goncourt
Brothers and Zola.
25 Huysmans, p. 68.
26 R. Ellmann, Oscar Wilde: A Collection of Critical Essays, New
York, 1969; V. Holland, Oscar Wilde, London, 1988; G. Willoughby, Art
and Christhood: The Aesthetics of Oscar Wilde, New Yersey, 1993; W.
Tydeman and S. Price, Oscar Wilde. Salome, Cambridge, 1996; J.
Donohue, Distance, death and Desire in Salome, in: P. Raby, ed., The
Cambridge Companion to Oscar Wilde, Cambridge, 1997; E. Hanson,
Oscar Wilde and the Scarlet Woman, in: Raymond-Jean Fontain, ed.,
Reclaiming the Sacred: The Bible in Gay and Lesbian Culture, New
York, 1997; B. Belford, Oscar Wilde. A Certain Genius, New York, 2000.
27 Ellis, op. cit.
28 Sweetman, pp. 415 ff.
29 T. Bentley, Sisters of Salome, Princeton, 2002, p. 28.
30 E. L. Gilbert, "Tumult of Images. Wilde, Beardsley and
Salome", Victorian Studies, 26, 1983; quoted after Donohue, p. 134;
see also: J. Fryer, Andre and Oscar: Gide, Wilde and Gay Art of Living,
London, 1997.
31 E. Showalter, Sexual Anarchy: Gender and Culture at the Fin
de-Si?cle, New York, 1990, p. 157.
32 The number seven had an old connection with the fortification
of cities and was used in terms of urban symbolism, such as "The
Seven Gates of Thebes". The symbolism of the number seven goes
much further, including the seven planets, the seven days of the week,
the seven sins and virtues etc. A dance by Pina Bausch of 1976 was
based on Brechts's and Weil's work of the title Die sieben Tods?nden
of 1933. It was called by one reviewer a "psychoanalytical striptease";
see: F. Quadri, "The Auto-Representation of Pina Bausch", Artforum,
February 1984, p. 68.
33 K. Frank, G-String and Sympathy: Strip Club Regulars and
Male Desire, Durham, 2002; Toni Bentley, herself performing both in
George Balanchine's dance group and in night clubs, went so far as
asking: "Can Oscar Wilde be considered the unlikely father of modern
striptease?", Sisters of Salome, p. 31.
 _THE DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS. SALOME AND EROTIC CULTURE AROUND 1900
34 M. Meyerfeld, M. Behmer, "Beardsley-Briefe", Kunst und K?n
stler^, 1909.
35 Letters of Oscar Wilde, ed. R. Hart-Davis, New York, 1962, note
348; see also: C. Snodgrass, Aubrey Beardsley: Dandy of the
Grotesque, New York, 1995; A. Lambirth, Aubrey Beardsley, London,
1998; S. Calloway, Aubrey Beardsley: A Biography, London, 1998.
36 Lambirth, p. 28; Holland, p. 86.
37 K. Wilhelm, Richard Strauss. An Intimate Portrait, New York, 1989;
D. Puffett, ed., R. Strauss: Salome, Cambridge, 1989; B. Gilliam, The Life
of Richard Strauss, Cambridge, 1999; A. Ross, "The Salome Summit.
Mahler and Strauss in Graz, 1906", The Berlin Journal, 8, Spring 2004.
38 Lovis Corinth painted Gertrud Eysoldt in his painting Gertrud
Eysoldt as Salome of 1903; see: H. Uhr, Low's Corinth, Berkeley, 1990,
p. 168.
39 M. Kennedy, Richard Strauss. Man, Musician, Enigma, Cam
bridge, 1999, pp. 141 and 145; Ross, op. cit., p. 52.
40 Dijkstra, p. 390; Showalter, p. 157.
41 Dijkstra, p. 389. Erler became later one of the famous artists in
Germany after 1933. See also: S. von Baranow, Franz von Lenbach,
Cologne, 1980, p. 45. Lenbach had a strong interest in the Orient and
traveled, as Flaubert before, to Egypt in 1875/1876.
42 Mathieu, p. 49.
43 Dijkstra, op. cit.; J. A. Schmoll gen. Eisenwerth, "Salome", Du,
8,1981.
44 H. Uhr, Low's Corinth, Berkeley, 1990, p. 119.
45 Klimt's painting is known and interpreted both as Judith ano
Salome.
46 Beardsley had a strong influence on the art situation in Vienna.
47 H. Hildebrandt, Alexander Archipenko, Berlin, 1923.
48 U. Kultermann, ed., Eisenstein, exh. cat., Leverkusen, 1964.
49 H. E. Coffin, "All Sorts and Kinds of Salome", Theatre
Magazine, April 1909; P. Bade, Femme fatale. Images of Evil and Fasci
nating Women, New York, 1988.
50 Bentley, p. 38.
51 Bentley, p. 41.
52 J. McCourt, James Joyce. A Passionate Exile, New York, 1999,
p. 60; F. Cherneavsky, The Salome Dancer. The Life and Times of
Maud Allen, Toronto, 1991.
53 Quoted after Bentley, pp. 61-62.
54 Bentley, p. 66.
This content downloaded from
141.136.227.2 on Sat, 26 Nov 2022 13:21:50 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
55 S. Waagenaar, The Murder of Mata Hari, London, 1964.
56 Showalter, p. 160; see also: M. de Gossart, Ida Rubinstein:
A Theatrical Life, Liverpool, 1987.
57 J. Thurman, Secrets of the Flesh. A Life of Colette, New York,
1999.
58 Bentley, p. 195.
59 H. Lottman, Colette: A Life, Boston, 1993.
60 W. Drew, D. W. Griffith's Intolerance. Its Genesis and Its Vision,
Jefferson, N. C, 1986.
61 Showalter, p.163; see also: E. Morrden, Mow'e Star: A Look at
Women Who Made Hollywood, New York, 1963.
62 Showalter, pp. 162ff.
63 There are nevertheless masterful performances by Charles
Laughton as Herod and Judith Anderson as Herodias.
64 K. Mille?, Sexual Politics, London, 1977; J. Markus, "Salome,
the Jewish Princess Was a New Woman", Bulletin of the New York
Public Library, 1974.
65 In: Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality, quoted after
Showalter, p. 144; see also: L. V. Gray, "The Mystique of the Veil",
Arabesque, Nov.-Dec. 1983.
66 Showalter, p. 151.
67 Bentley, p. 32; see also: A. Potts, "Dance, Politics and Sculp
ture", Art History, 10, March 1987; T. Laqueur, Making Sex: Body and
Gender. From the Greeks to Freud, Cambridge MA, 1990.
68 Showalter, p. 159; J. Markus, "Salome. The Jewish Princess
Was a New Woman", Bulletin of the New York Public Library, 1974.
69 Yayoi Kusama, exh. cat., Vienna, 2000, p. 219.
70 Showalter, p. 167.
71 Kultermann, "Female Pioneers of Performance Art", Kunst.EE,
2, 2003, p. 69.
72 C. Schneemann, More Than Meat Joy, New York 1979; Kulter
mann, "Carolee Schneemann", in: Contemporary Artists, 5th ed.,
Detroit, 2001.
73 G. Youngblood, Expanded Cinema, New York, 1970; Kulter
mann, 2003, p. 66.
74 A law in Des Moines, Iowa, was passed that rendered it illegal
for women to kick their legs higher than forty-five degrees off the floor.
Bentley, p. 39.
75 The Upanishads, ed. J. Mascaro, Harmondsworth, 1965, p. 76.
76 Brewster, Doris Lessing, New York, 1965, p. 142.
215