The article analyzes two dressmaking schools in Stockholm called The Birgitta Schools that operated from 1910-1935. The schools were originally founded as one institution by Emy Fick and Elisabeth Glantzberg in 1910 but split into two separate schools in 1914 when they had a rift. Emy Fick ran The Saint Birgitta School and Elisabeth Glantzberg ran The Birgitta School until the mid-1930s. Through analysis of artifacts, photographs, garments, and theories of gender, fashion, and modernity, the article seeks to understand how the schools related to contemporary discourses on femininity and fashion and the evolution of modernism during their operation.
1. The Journal of Dress History
Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
2. Front Cover Image:
Textile Detail of an Evening Dress, circa 1950s, Maker Unknown, Middlesex University Fashion
Collection, London, England, F2021AB.
The Middlesex University Fashion Collection comprises approximately 450 garments for women
and men, textiles, accessories including hats, shoes, gloves, and more, plus hundreds of
haberdashery items including buttons and trimmings, from the nineteenth century to the present
day. Browse the Middlesex University Fashion Collection at https://tinyurl.com/middlesex-fashion.
3. The Journal of Dress History
Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
Editor–in–Chief Jennifer Daley
Editor Scott Hughes Myerly
Proofreader Georgina Chappell
Published by
The Association of Dress Historians
journal@dresshistorians.org
www.dresshistorians.org
5. The Journal of Dress History
The Advisory Board
The Editorial Board of The Journal of Dress History gratefully acknowledges the
support and expertise of The Advisory Board, the membership of which is as follows,
in alphabetical order:
Sylvia Ayton, MBE, Independent Scholar, United Kingdom
Cally Blackman, MA, Central Saint Martins, United Kingdom
Penelope Byrde, MA, FMA, Independent Scholar, United Kingdom
Caroline de Guitaut, MVO, AMA, Royal Collection Trust, United Kingdom
Thomas P. Gates, MA, MSLS, MAEd, Kent State University, United States
Alex Kerr, PhD, FBS, The Burgon Society, United Kingdom
Jenny Lister, MA, The Victoria and Albert Museum, United Kingdom
Timothy Long, MA, Independent Scholar, United States
Jane Malcolm–Davies, PhD, The University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Susan North, PhD, The Victoria and Albert Museum, United Kingdom
Martin Pel, MA, Royal Pavilion and Brighton Museums, United Kingdom
Anna Reynolds, MA, Royal Collection Trust, United Kingdom
Aileen Ribeiro, PhD, The Courtauld Institute of Art, United Kingdom
Georgina Ripley, MA, National Museums Scotland, United Kingdom
Gary Watt, MA, NTF, The University of Warwick, United Kingdom
Rainer Wenrich, PhD, Catholic University, Eichstaett–Ingolstadt, Germany
6. Contents
Articles
The (Saint) Birgitta Schools:
Dressmaking and Fashion between Tradition and Renewal
in Stockholm, 1910–1935
Maria Carlgren 1
Paintings Undressed:
A Sartorial Investigation into the Art of Antoine Watteau,
1700–1720
Axel Moulinier 23
“It Is Not Impossible to Look Nice Sitting about on the Beach:”
The Influence of Magazines in the Making and Wearing of
Hand–Knitted Bathing Suits by Young Working Women
in England during the 1930s
Emmy Sale 47
Support and Uplift:
How Technology Defined the Bra during the Twentieth Century
Lorraine Hamilton Smith 73
The Norwegian Bunad:
Peasant Dress, Embroidered Costume, and National Symbol
Solveig Strand 100
Feminists in High Heels:
The Role of Femininity in Second–Wave Feminists’ Dress
in Finland, 1973–1990
Arja Turunen 122
7. Book Reviews
Jay McCauley Bowstead, Menswear Revolution: The
Transformation of Contemporary Men’s Fashion
Shaun Cole 144
Lesley Ellis Miller, Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion
Olga Dritsopoulou 147
Sarah Magill, Making Vintage 1940s Clothes for Women
Julie Eilber 150
Peter McNeil, Pretty Gentlemen: Macaroni Men and the
Eighteenth–Century Fashion World
Alison Fairhurst 153
Eleri Lynn, Tudor Fashion
Sidsel Frisch and Rosalind Mearns 156
Javier Irigoyen García, Moors Dressed as Moors: Clothing, Social
Distinction and Ethnicity in Early Modern Iberia
Laura Pérez Hernández 159
Edwina Ehrman, ed., Fashioned from Nature
Madeleine Luckel 162
Andrew Bolton, Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic
Imagination
Alice Mackrell 165
Clare Backhouse, Fashion and Popular Print in Early Modern
England: Depicting Dress in Black–Letter Ballads
Allison Pfingst 168
Recent PhD Theses in Dress History 171
A Guide to Online Sources for Dress History Research
Jennifer Daley 182
The Advisory Board 213
8. Welcome
Dear ADH Members and Friends,
I hope you enjoy reading this issue of The Journal of Dress History, Volume 2, Issue
3, Autumn 2018, which contains six academic articles and nine book reviews.
Included in this issue is a recurring guide, titled, A Guide to Online Sources for Dress
History Research. This guide documents online sources that play a role in furthering
the academic study of dress history. Additions and suggestions to this guide are
warmly encouraged as A Guide to Online Sources for Dress History Research is a
living document and will be updated and published in every issue of The Journal of
Dress History.
The Editorial Board of The Journal of Dress History encourages the unsolicited
submission of academic articles for publication consideration on any topic of dress
history, textiles, or accessories of any culture or region of the world. Articles can be
submitted any time during the year, except for special themed issues, which have a
specific deadline. Please note the following deadlines for, and titles of, the next two
special themed issues of The Journal of Dress History.
11:59pm GMT, Sunday, 1 December 2019:
The Victorian Age: A History of Dress, Textiles, and Accessories: 1819–1901
11:59pm GMT, Tuesday, 1 December 2020:
Costume Drama: A History of Clothes for Stage and Screen
As always, if you have comments on this issue or an interest in writing an academic
article or book review for future publication consideration, please contact me. I look
forward to hearing from you!
Best regards,
Jennifer Daley
Chairman and Trustee, The Association of Dress Historians
Editor–in–Chief, The Journal of Dress History
journal@dresshistorians.org
www.dresshistorians.org
9. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
1
The (Saint) Birgitta Schools:
Dressmaking and Fashion between Tradition and Renewal
in Stockholm, 1910–1935
Maria Carlgren
Abstract
The Birgitta Schools were two dressmaking schools, based in
Stockholm, Sweden, and operated from 1910 to the 1930s.
Because of a rift in 1914 between the two directors, Emy Fick and
Elisabeth Glantzberg, the original institution was divided into two
separate schools. Both retained the “Birgitta” name. This article
analyses the two schools, based on visual artefacts, including
trademarks, photographs, and garments, while utilising art history,
visual studies, gender theory, and cultural sociology
methodologies. The aim of this research is to interpret The
Birgitta Schools in light of the contemporary discourses of
femininity, fashion, and modernity, as a “whirlpool” of different
aspects and attitudes that emerged from their work in the contexts
of modernisation and the modern.
Introduction
The Birgitta School [Birgittaskolan], named after the Swedish Saint Birgitta [Bridget]
(1303–1373), was a combined dressmaking school and fashion studio that operated
in Stockholm, Sweden from 1910 to 1914, and was directed by Emy Fick (1876–
1959) and Elisabeth Glantzberg (1873–1951). Together, they founded and directed
the original, so–called “Birgittaskolan.” But a rift in 1914 caused them to separate the
business into two separate schools, yet both retained the original school’s name and
structure. From 1914 until the mid 1930s, Emy Fick ran The Saint Birgitta School
10. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
2
while Elisabeth Glantzberg ran The Birgitta School. They operated for 20 years in
Stockholm.
Utilising visual arts, cultural sociology, and gender theory, the work of The Birgitta
Schools is interpreted in the context of the socio–historical conditions of that era.1
The goal is to describe their work and how it related to the contemporary discourse
of fashion yet also address the wider relevance of the evolution of femininity and
modernism. This study is based on Emy Fick’s donation of clothes, photographs, and
documents to the Östergötland Museum, in Linköping,2
and documents left by
Elisabeth Glantzberg which her relatives provided. Archival corporate documents,
such as Annual Shareholder Meeting Minutes, have also been utilised.3
Additional material includes drawings by the fashion designers and artists, Siri Derkert
and Valle Rosenberg, while they worked at Glantzberg’s Birgitta School. Derkert’s
archival material at The National Library of Sweden in Stockholm is another
important source, including Rosenberg’s letters to Derkert, which includes much
about fashion and her fashion drawings.4
From 1916 to 1919, Derkert and Rosenberg
lived separately: Derkert remained in Sweden while Rosenberg lived in Paris and
Italy.5
These letters have been useful for tracing and analysing their work in designing
clothes, and for understanding the work of Glantzberg. Contemporary articles on Fick
and Glantzberg have also provided additional, important information.
1
Maria Carlgren, Birgittaskolorna. Modeateljéer och sömnadsskolor mellan tradition och förnyelse
[The Birgitta Schools: Fashion Studio and Dressmaking School between Tradition and Renewal]
PhD Thesis, The University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden, 2016.
2
Emy Fick Personal Archive, Östergötland Museum, Linköping, Sweden: 17 folders: Letters E.1,
Letters E.2, Certificates F.1, Lease Contracts, Wills, Insurances, Passports, Personal Data F.2,
Diplomas F.7, Diaries, Notebooks F.9, Almanacs, Folders F.10, Accounts G, Photographer’s K,
Newspaper Clips L, Patterns, Drawings, Posters N, Other Ö.1. Catalogue Emy Fick Collection:
“Fickska samlingen: A.18300–18403” Dress Catalogue A.18367: 1–53: a; A.20.309.
3
The National Archive, Stockholm, The Birgitta School (Elisabeth Glantzberg) Company Papers,
including Bankruptcy Proceedings, The Gothenburg Birgitta School Chairman’s Papers. Annual
General Meeting Minutes and Company Statutes, and Census and Church Records that concern
Elisabeth Glantzberg and Emy Fick.
4
The National Library, Stockholm, Department of Manuscripts, Maps and Images: Siri Derkert
Collection, Personal Archive, 31 volumes, HS signum: L.170: 1–14; Siri Derkert, Liv Derkert
Lybeck and Bertil Lybeck, including Letters, Press Clippings, Biographical Notes, other Notes and
Diaries. The Letters of Valle Rosenberg, Siri Derkert, and Elisabeth Glantzberg have been
especially relevant.
5
All letters from Siri Derkert to Valle Rosenberg were missing and were considered to be lost until
a few years ago, then five letters were rediscovered and are now housed in The National Library,
Stockholm, Sweden.
11. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
3
The social and cultural theories of Pierre Bourdieu are of particular relevance to this
study and his notions of capital, habitus, and social fields have been especially useful.6
Complementary to them are the cultural sociological views of Howard Saul Becker
with his notion of worlds, which generates a greater understanding of how individuals
act in a group.7
Together, he and Bourdieu provide perspectives with multiple
dimensions for understanding The Birgitta Schools.
These insights have enabled an interpretation of the schools’ work on a variety of
levels, including the personal interactions and the social networks formed by those
working there, together with their aesthetic expressions, ideas, perspectives, and
activities. Judith Butler’s performativity theory has also been useful with her concept
that identity and gender are constructed through a person’s actions,8
for which clothes
are significant. The “social body,” consisting of the physical body together with its
clothing and symbolic capital and habitus, is relevant as constructed social and
6
To study social space, Bourdieu uses the concept of capital, meaning a person’s symbolic, cultural,
and material assets. Symbolic capital encompasses the trust, respect, reputation, prestige, etc., that a
person receives from their group, but having a viable reputation in one group does not necessarily
mean that one has it with another. Symbolic capital is also generated by such sources as cultural
capital. This concept includes education, but material and economic assets are also capital for
Bourdieu and can contibute to symbolic capital. Social capital consists of one’s network of family
ties and friendships, and he emphasises that all actions should be regarded as “economic” in the
sense of being measures that aim at maximising gain. Bourdieu also developed the concept of
habitus to constitute the individual’s socialised and unconscious behavioral pattern. An individual’s
habitus is founded by the symbolic capital that is absorbed from one’s family life and experiences
in school, etc. In order to safeguard their capital, individuals (and groups and institutions) use
different strategies to defend or improve their position——but not always consciously. The concept
includes social space, capital, habitus, and strategy to constitute a field as an area of competition; a
social space where individuals with common interests struggle for power using different strategies
based upon their capital assets. See, for example, Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of
the Judgement of Taste, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, United States, 1984, p. 172; Pierre
Bourdieu, The Rules of Art: Genesis and Structure of the Literary Field, Stanford University Press,
Palo Alto, United States, 1996, pp. 182–183; Helena Webster, Bourdieu for Architects, Routledge,
London, England, 2011, p. 30.
7
The concept of an art world addresses all the relationships that build a group with a common goal,
without explicitly ranking them in value hierarchies. An art world consists of people, with different
functions, who do something together. Becker emphasises the individual’s scope for action in the
group. New constellations can occur when individuals want to do something else. In this way new
worlds arise. There is thus no natural limit for where the boundary between inside and outside an
art world goes. See: Howard Saul Becker, Art Worlds, Revised Edition, The University of California
Press, Berkeley, United States, 2008, pp. 378–385.
8
See Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, Routledge, New
York, United States, 1990.
12. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
4
symbolic forces. I have also applied Christer Ahlberger’s definition of the contrasts
between modern and traditional consumption, to show how, as consumer strategies,
they were both negotiated and simultaneously used at the two schools, yet also
contributed to the differences between them.9
The First Birgitta School, 1910–1914
Emy Fick and Elisabeth Glantzberg met in the spring of 1910 and together founded
The Birgitta School that autumn. In Figure 1, Fick stands on the left wearing a black
dress with a large lace collar, while Glantzberg stands on the right. As the first of its
kind in Sweden, The Birgitta School was a retail business that taught dressmaking and
had a fashion studio under the same roof and was situated in the fashionable centre
of Stockholm. It attracted interest early on with several complimentary articles written
by respected journalists, which helped to establish its reputation, which in
Bourdieuean terms means that it gained substantial symbolic capital with the public
and attracted customers from the upper classes and aristocracy.
Inspiration for the original school appears to have come from both founders. Fick
had studied for a year at the House of Worth fashion firm, founded by Charles
Frederick Worth (1825–1995) in Paris. In the United States, Glantzberg had run a
business similar to The Birgitta School in Boston, Massachusetts for several years at
the turn of the century. Hence, both brought practical experience and a foundation
of symbolic capital into their business. During this era many unmarried female
entrepreneurs were running businesses in Sweden. Figure 1 shows how they wished
to be depicted in their work, which was common at that time, by showing women
bending over their sewing with lowered gazes that visualises both industriousness and
virtue. This photograph appeared in various articles about the school and exemplifies
Rozsika Parker’s and Judith Butler’s concepts of the construction and “making” of
traditional feminine gender.10
This subservient, eager–to–please identity had emerged
over the course of the nineteenth century to become a dominant ideal around 1910.
Yet it was being increasingly challenged by new feminist views, which had emerged
with modernisation.
9
Ahlberger’s discussion of consumption history includes economic, ethnological, and
anthropological concepts to analyse the transformation from a traditional consumption pattern to
the modern one. See: Christer Ahlberger, Konsumtionsrevolutionen. Om det moderna
konsumtionssamhällets framväxt 1750–1900, Humanistiska fakulteten, Göteborgs universitet,
Göteborg, 1996 [Consumption Revolution: The Emergence of the Modern Consumer Society,
1750–1900, Faculty of Arts, The University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden, 1996].
10
See Rozsika Parker, The Subversive Stitch: Embroidery and the Making of the Feminine, LB
Tauris, London, England, 2013.
13. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
5
Figure 1:
The Birgitta School, 1910, Photographer, Almberg & Preinitz, Stockholm,
Emy Fick Personal Archive 4, Folder K,
Östergötlands Museum, Linköping, Sweden.
While Fick and Glantzberg had several interests and abilities in common, they had
different social backgrounds, which seems to have instilled in each a strong symbolic
capital, but with a different habitus.11
Fick came from an urban upper–class home in
the capital of Stockholm while Glantzberg grew up in a rural clergyman’s family in
remote Dalarna in central Sweden. These diverse social backgrounds are reflected by
their differing aesthetic preferences; Fick was particularly interested in lace, which she
both made and collected, being renowned in her early years for fine needlework and
embroidery. Fick’s aesthetic preferences were typical of an aristocratic, upper–class
femininity. Glantzberg was instead interested in developing and preserving Swedish
folk traditions, especially weaving. Glantzberg’s aesthetic preferences were not about
cultivating upper–class femininity but focused instead on the culture of the common
11
See Footnote 7 for the theories of Pierre Bourdieu.
14. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
6
people. With their differing social backgrounds and aesthetic preferences, they
probably had divergent aims and ambitions for the school from the start.
The Conflict
By 1914 there was a rupture in their collaboration and so each started their own
Birgitta School. Fick named hers The Saint Birgitta School. Glantzberg moved her
business a few hundred metres away and also maintained the original name, but as
The Birgitta School. This conflict continued throughout their lives and generated a
court case lasting until 1932 over the use of the name, Birgitta. After a verdict in the
Court of Appeals, Glantzberg had to change the name of her school and called it The
Elisabeth Glantzberg School. But their conflict was about more than just names, for
which their different backgrounds and divergent aesthetic preferences were relevant.
This exemplifies Bourdieu’s theory of a personal strategy of opposition, in which to
misrecognise one’s opponent is to denigrate all their assets and abilities and thus their
symbolic capital.12
So what were the major differences that caused them to become
lifelong antagonists? Their divergent ambitions can be seen in the clothing produced
in their respective fashion studios, their different social networks, and in the divergent
ways in which they related to modernity, femininity, and the emerging notion of the
modern woman.
Trademarks of The Saint Birgitta School and The Birgitta School, 1914–1930s
As Director of The Saint Birgitta School, Emy Fick’s source of inspiration came from
the fourteenth century Swedish Saint Birgitta, which Fick established as the school’s
trademark. The primary iconographic image of this trademark is the veil worn
traditionally by married women,13
which Fick retained as the primary image (Figure
2). Along with the trademark from the first Birgitta School, Emy Fick’s Saint Birgitta
School also had a new trademark in the form of a seal, coloured red with gold
lettering, embossed with an image of Saint Birgitta, and a wavy, gold border with the
inscription, “S:ta Birgitta – School – Stockholm” (Figure 3). The central motif is a
portrait of a veiled woman, indicating married status, her head surrounded by a halo,
which is a similar portrait image that appeared in the first brand (Figure 2). Fick was
not alone in using the image of Saint Birgitta. Since the turn of the century in Sweden,
Saint Birgitta became a focal point of public debates for many purposes, from
nationalism and essentialism——to women’s emancipation. The image of Saint Birgitta
was also used in the marketing of various products for women, including cosmetics
and perfumes.
12
Pierre Bourdieu, The Logic of Practice, Polityr Press, Cambridge, England, 1992, p. 118.
13
Birgitta married young and had eight children; she was a widow when she started her religious
journey.
15. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
7
Figure 2:
Print of the Original Birgitta School
Trademark, Ingrid Günther, Artist,
1910, Emy Fick Personal Archive 4,
Folder N, Östergötlands Museum,
Linköping, Sweden.
Figure 3:
The Saint Birgitta School
Trademark and Seal Stamp, 1914,
Emy Fick Personal Archive 4,
Folder N, Östergötlands Museum,
Linköping, Sweden.
While Fick utilised the image of Saint Birgitta in her business from 1914, Glantzberg
chose to reject all references to Saint Birgitta in choosing the trademark for her
Birgitta School. (Figure 4). Instead she selected a secular trademark consisting of a “B
and S” logo, the “S” standing for “school” rather than “saint.” This logo is similar to
the monograms that Swedish women traditionally embroidered on their linens upon
becoming engaged to be married. Fick’s trademark shaped like a stamped seal (Figure
3) and Glantzberg’s monogram style logo (Figure 4), both evoked their claims to be
the legitimate director of the authentic Birgitta School, and can thus be interpreted as
“weapons” in their protracted conflict.
The “Making” of Professionals and Housewives
Dressmaking education formed the core of both businesses but their curricula
diverged, aiming to form the pupils into either professionals or housewives, which
were then the two prominent ideals and major life choices for women. In addition to
these alternative vocational roles, the schools also catered to two different classes;
while middle–class women were often educated to take up a profession, upper–class
women undertook shorter courses in preparation to become housewives. In
Glantzberg’s school, pupils tended to pursue courses in preparation for future careers,
while Fick’s Saint Birgitta School “made” housewives.
16. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
8
Figure 4:
Advertisement for The Birgitta School with the “B and S” logo,
Published in the Fashion Magazine, Saisonen, Issue 24, 1920.
The Birgitta Schools as Rive Droite and Rive Gauche
In the years leading up to the 1920s coinciding with the First World War (1914–
1918), Elisabeth Glantzberg engaged the artists Siri Derkert and Valle Rosenberg to
create fashion collections for her school. At the time, Derkert lived in Stockholm
while Rosenberg stayed in Paris and Italy, and these different locations in a neutral
and a combatant country, respectively, can be discerned in the clothes they designed.
Derkert designed unique evening dresses for the privileged few in peacetime Sweden
(Figure 5 and Figure 6).
18. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
10
Figure 7:
A Fashion Drawing
by Valle Rosenberg, 1917,
Private Collection, Photography by
Borås Textilmuseum, Borås, Sweden.
Figure 8:
A Fashion Drawing
by Valle Rosenberg, 1917,
Private Collection, Photography by
Borås Textilmuseum, Borås, Sweden.
The fashion drawings of the artists Derkert and Rosenberg were based upon
contemporary modern aesthetics, which included influences from their own
respective painting styles. Rosenberg wanted The Birgitta School to open “their own
atelier”14
which was in keeping with Glantzberg’s ambition to create unique designs
rather than to buy patterns and fabrics from Paris fashion houses like many other
14
4 July 1917 letter from Valle Rosenberg to Siri Derkert, The National Library, Stockholm,
Sweden, Department of Manuscripts, Maps and Images: Siri Derkert Collection, Personal Archive,
HS signum: Folder L.170: 1.
19. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
11
contemporary fashion design studios did at the time. Derkert and Rosenberg thus
contributed to making it possible for Glantzberg to combine aesthetic modernism
with the modernisation of her business.15
By contrast, the qualities Fick appears to have valued highest in her Saint Birgitta
School were diligence, patience, and an insistence on spending ample time in making
the clothes, which were often very detailed (Figure 9 and Figure 10). She thus followed
the principle of sewing by hand to turn out high–quality work, believing that there was
a direct correlation between superior work and expending the amount of time that
she believed to be necessary for its creation. This appears to have been at least in part
a reaction against modern mass–produced methods and possibly the hurried pace of
modern life.
Figure 9:
Dress, circa 1925, Emy Fick Collection,
Östergötlands Museum, Linköping, Sweden,
A.18367:5.
15
“Fashion is also modern because it embodies within itself the two poles of modernity: aesthetic
modernism and industrial modernisation,” Ilja Parkins, Poiret, Dior, and Schiaparelli: Fashion,
Femininity and Modernity, Berg, Oxford, England, 2012, p. 2.
20. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
12
Figure 10:
Detail, Dress, circa 1925, Emy Fick Collection,
Östergötlands Museum, Linköping, Sweden, A.18367:5.
This approach to making exclusive clothing (Figure 11 and Figure 12) can be regarded
as an example of contemporary sociologist Thorstein Veblen’s concept of
conspicuous consumption.16
This approach is also an example of what Christer
Ahlberger argues to be a traditional pattern of consumption, i.e., the symbolic prestige
of fine craftwork.17
Accordingly, in Bourdieu’s terms, the garments produced at The
Saint Birgitta School embodied the wearer’s symbolic capital.
16
Thorstein Veblen, “Dress as an Expression of the Pecuniary Culture,” in Malcolm Barnard, ed.,
Fashion Theory: A Reader, Routledge, England, 2007, pp. 339–346.
17
Ahlberger, op cit. Ahlberger discusses the consumption history from three perspectives:
economically, ethnologically and anthropologically. Based on these perspectives and with the
concepts of modern and traditional consumption, he discusses the processes that led from a
traditional consumption pattern to a modern one.
21. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
13
Figure 11:
Dress, circa 1925, Emy Fick
Collection, Östergötlands Museum,
Linköping, Sweden, A.18367:37.
Figure 12:
Dress, circa 1922, Emy Fick Collection,
Östergötlands Museum, Linköping, Sweden,
A.18367:14.
22. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
14
From the point of view of Howard Becker, Elisabeth Glantzberg appears to have been
a more independent agent in the world of dressmaking and was also more innovative
with fashion, when compared with Fick’s more traditional approach.18
By contrast, the
time and diligence spent on the clothes created at The Saint Birgitta School reflected
Fick’s version of femininity, which advocated that women should spend their time at
home, doing handiwork. She expressed her aversion to “the modern woman” and
those who were interested in “jazz dances, car maintenance, sports and flirting,” stating
that, “Our girls have unfortunately become inspired by so–called “independence” and
prefer to seek places in the wider world instead of marrying young——and thus throw
themselves into office work, banking, school studies, etc.”19
On another occasion, Fick
asked, “And where are the formerly dignified housewives?...But perhaps one can
hope for a recovery when the men start to claim more from their wives than dancing
to jazz, taking care of a car, pursuing sports and flirting.20
Yet, the fashionable clothes created by The Saint Birgitta School during the 1920s
also included short, loose–fitting knee–length skirts, which made it possible for the
women wearing them to live more active, freer lives than they could have pursued just
ten years earlier. Fashion and modern aesthetics contributed to the social
transformations of the first decades of the twentieth century, and these contemporary
developments combined with women’s growing demands for emancipation, which
they expressed in their dress.
18
Howard Saul Becker, Art Worlds, Revised and Expanded Edition, The University of California
Press, Berkeley, United States, 2008, p. 375.
19
Quote translated from Swedish: “våra flickor ha tyvärr blivit så bitna av den s.k. självständigheten
att de hellre vilja söka sig platser än gifta sig unga och kasta sig därför in i kontorsarbete,
bankgöromål, studier etc,” in “Kvinnorna böra utbildas för sitt naturliga verksamhetsfält. Tävlan
inom yrkena med männen är av ondo. Beundransvärda uttalanden för Kvällstidningen av fru Emmy
Fick, S:ta Birgittaskolans chef,” [Our girls should be trained for their natural field of activity. Their
competing with men in the professions is evil. “Outlandish Statements in the Evening Newspaper
by Mrs Emy Fick, Director of Saint Birgitta School”], 9 January 1925, Author Unknown,
Kvällstidningen [The Evening Newspaper], Stockholm, Sweden, (Circulation 1925–1926).
20
“Och var finnas forna tiders dugliga husmödrar…Kanske kan man hoppas på en bättring
härutinnan, där männen fordra mer av sina hustrur än att dessa dansa jazz, sköta en bil, sporta och
flirta,” in “Flinka flickor och härliga handarbeten. Sancta Birgitta skolan——den kvinnliga hand–
slöjdens högskola” [“Nice Girls and Lovely Handcrafts. The Saint Birgitta School——the Female
Handcraft Institute”], 4 April 1925, Author Unknown, Nya Dagligt Allehanda [All Kinds of Daily
News], Stockholm, Sweden, (Circulation 1859–1944).
23. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
15
Bourdieu’s study of the structure of the Paris fashion industry points out that its
geographical positions on the Right Bank (Rive Droite) and Left Bank (Rive Gauche)
formed its ideological poles.21
Emy Fick’s Saint Birgitta School can be viewed as a
Swedish Rive Droite by its being a traditionalist fashion studio, for which conservative
prestige and exclusivity were important. By contrast, Elisabeth Glantzberg’s Birgitta
School is the equivalent of the Rive Gauche, since she employed avant–garde artists
who pursued an approach that was characterised by a creative, modern boldness.
These differences also appear in the different views that Fick and Glantzberg
espoused on artistry and craftsmanship: Fick’s school emphasised craft skills, which
is equivalent to the term, techne, in ancient Greek, while Glantzberg aimed for more
modern aesthetics, a modern idiom which is closer to the classical term, aesthesis,
signifying sensual perception.22
The Directors’ Social Networks
Other women who worked in the schools, and the clothes they wore, are also
significant for constituting the social networks of Fick and Glantzberg in their
respective schools. Fick established extensive connections with women from royalty
and aristocratic families, both as pupils and customers, and a strong affection for this
level of society runs like a thread throughout her life. In the vocabulary of the day,
young, aristocratic and upper–class women were called “girls from the better families”
or “educated girls;” they were expected to marry and The Saint Birgitta School
strongly encouraged them to act according to this norm.23
Fick apparently realised that
her views were questioned and challenged by the era’s ongoing demands for
democracy, the women’s liberation movement, and, not least, by the women’s suffrage
movement. Yet undoubtedly, many of the old ways of the aristocracy and upper class,
which she supported, were fading away during the 1910s and 1920s. She fought a
losing battle by struggling against the tide.
21
See Pierre Bourdieu and Yvette Delsaut, “The Couturier and His Label: A Contribution to a
Theory of Magic,” [Originally Published in 1975] in Pierre Bourdieu, Kultursociologiska texter,
[Cultural Sociology Texts], Fourth Edition, Brutis Östlings Bokförlag Symposium, Stehag,
Stockholm, Sweden, 1993.
22
For a discussion on these concepts, see “Episteme and Techne,” Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy, http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/episteme–techne, Accessed 9 September 2018; and
Paul Oskar Kristeller, “Konstarternas moderna system. En studie i estetikens historia,” Stockholm,
Sweden, 1996, translation into Swedish from “The Modern System of the Arts: A Study on Techne’s
History,” published in The Journal of the History of Ideas, Issue 12, 1951, pp. 496–527 and Issue
13, 1952, pp. 17–46.
23
Yvonne Hirdman, Det tänkande hjärtat. Boken om Alva Myrdal [The Thinking Heart: A Book
about Alva Myrdal], Ordfront, Stockholm, Sweden, 2006, p. 9.
24. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
16
Glantzberg’s social network instead consisted of a surprising number of women from
the legal profession, many of whom were engaged in the women’s suffrage movement.
In a 1921 photograph (Figure 13), Eva Andén, the first female lawyer in Sweden, and
colleagues from her law office, go to vote in the country’s first parliamentary election
that allowed women to vote. Andén (centre) is wearing a dark suit, which was the
preferred clothing for professional women and which was most likely made at The
Birgitta School.24
Figure 13:
The First Female Lawyer in Sweden, Eva Andén (Centre, Wearing a Dark Suit),
and her Colleagues, Walking towards the First Parliamentary Election
that Allowed Women to Vote, September 1921,
The University of Gothenburg Library, Gothenburg, Sweden.
24
Eva Andén was a Glantzberg Birgitta School customer from 1921, Birgitta School Bankruptcy
Papers, National Archives, Stockholm, Sweden.
25. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
17
Thus, the first decades of the twentieth century were a period when a considerable
number of women, particularly from the upper classes, chose their own alternative to
the traditional women’s role of marriage, raising a family, and looking after the
household. A remarkable number of the women linked to Glantzberg and her Birgitta
School did exactly that. They remained unmarried, pursued an education, and lived
quite independent lives. Many worked to achieve a more democratic society.25
By
earning their own living, they could afford to buy clothes from fashionable studios and
most likely dealt primarily with those of good repute which the upper classes
patronised. And, their educations tended to give them an upper–class habitus,
regardless of their political perspectives. These differing social connections and
networks of the two Birgitta Schools thus partly overlapped, which demonstrates that
the dressmaking and fashion studio world was an arena for negotiating femininity by
providing spaces for the emergence of these two differing alternatives. Different
femininities accordingly were fostered at the schools in parallel processes of
feminisation and constitute significant examples of how femininity was “made” and
negotiated in Swedish society.
Orthodoxy vis–à–vis Heterodoxy
A further understanding of the differences between the Birgitta Schools can be
obtained with the help of Bourdieu’s concepts of orthodoxy and heterodoxy.26
The
basic concept is the notion of doxa: what is commonly agreed upon, consciously and
unconsciously, as thoughts and habits that seem so natural that they are not even
realised by those who belong to that particular subculture. Consequently, a doxa is
difficult, if not impossible, for many people to actually comprehend and become
aware of their being influenced by it, when there are no conflicts in their social group.
The orthodox defend doxa, the heterodox question these beliefs. Doxa can thus be
seen as the traditional and conservative values on femininity in the two Birgitta
Schools.
25
Many Glantzberg customers were well–educated, famous suffragettes, including lawyers and
doctors. Among them were Eva Andén (1886–1970), Matilda Staël von Holstein (1876–1953)
Sweden’s second female lawyer, Ruth Stiernstedt (1879–1954), its fifth lawyer and a politician, and
Andrea Andreen (1888–1972), a doctor and politician.
26
Britt–Marie Thurén, “En läsning av Bourdieus viktigaste tankar och begrepp,” [“A Reading of
Bourdieu’s Most Important Thoughts and Concepts”] p. 9, http://docplayer.se/29968551-En-
lasning-av-bourdieus-viktigaste-tankar-och-begrepp-britt-marie-thuren.html, Accessed 1 May 2018.
26. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
18
Emy Fick’s conservative, (and for many people in that era) normal values with
complementary and essentialist views, had long predominated in Swedish society with
the belief that women were by nature subordinate to men and should remain so, and
thus Fick and The Saint Birgitta School upheld an orthodoxy. However, she appeared
to have been aware that her views were challenged and questioned amidst the
contemporary struggles for democracy, but she defended the traditional, conventional
way of life.
Glantzberg’s work, on the other hand, shows several examples of how The Birgitta
School fostered open–minded, radical, independent, and educated women, who
tended to act against the conventional norms and values of Swedish society.27
As such,
Glantzberg and The Birgitta School were heterodox by challenging and questioning
contemporary views about what women were, what they did, and of what they were
capable. Nonetheless, both Birgitta Schools expressed modernity——although in
different ways, and together illustrate the “whirlpool” of modernity——in which
different experiences and attitudes to modern life existed side by side. Through their
different approaches, Emy Fick and Elisabeth Glantzberg thus placed themselves and
their respective Birgitta Schools in different positions within modernity.
In the words of Marshall Berman, the two schools were an example of a “unity of
disunity.”28
Emy Fick’s Saint Birgitta School fostered the “normative” woman as
diligent, modest, and subordinate. At the same time, Elisabeth Glantzberg’s Birgitta
School clientele were emancipated and emancipating suffragettes who were working
for social justice. Consequently, the work of the two Birgitta Schools together manifest
the ongoing negotiation of femininities at the time, as well as the prevalent
ambivalence between tradition and renewal.
27
Hirdman, op cit., p. 9.
28
Marshall Berman, Allt som är fast förflyktigas. Modernism och modernitet [All That Is Solid Melts
into Air: The Experience of Modernity], Studentlitteratur, Lund, Sweden, 1995, p. 13.
27. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
19
Bibliography
Unpublished Sources
Emy Fick Personal Archive, Östergötland Museum, Linköping, Sweden: 17 folders:
Letters E.1, Letters E.2, Certificates F.1, Lease Contracts, Wills, Insurances,
Passports, Personal Data F.2, Diplomas F.7, Diaries, Notebooks F.9, Almanacs,
Folders F.10, Accounts G, Photographer’s K, Newspaper Clips L, Patterns, Drawings,
Posters N, Other Ö.1. Catalogue Emy Fick Collection: “Fickska samlingen: A.18300–
18403” Dress Catalogue A.18367: 1–53: a; A.20.309.
The National Archive, Stockholm, The Birgitta School (Elisabeth Glantzberg)
Company Papers, including Bankruptcy Proceedings, the Gothenburg Birgitta School
Chairman’s Papers. Annual General Meeting Minutes and Company Statutes, and
Census and Church Records that concern Elisabeth Glantzberg and Emy Fick.
The National Library, Stockholm, Department of Manuscripts, Maps and Images:
Siri Derkert Collection, Personal Archive, 31 volumes, HS signum: L.170: 1–14; Siri
Derkert, Liv Derkert Lybeck and Bertil Lybeck, including Letters, Press Clippings,
Biographical Notes, other Notes and Diaries. The Letters of Valle Rosenberg, Siri
Derkert, and Elisabeth Glantzberg have been especially relevant.
Published Sources
Ahlberger, Christer, Konsumtionsrevolutionen. Om det moderna
konsumtionssamhällets framväxt 1750–1900, Humanistiska fakulteten, Göteborgs
universitet, Göteborg, 1996 [Consumption Revolution: The Emergence of the
Modern Consumer Society, 1750–1900, Faculty of Arts, The University of
Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden, 1996].
Becker, Howard Saul, Art Worlds, Revised and Expanded Edition, The University
of California Press, Berkeley, United States, 2008.
Berman, Marshall, Allt som är fast förflyktigas. Modernism och modernitet [All That
Is Solid Melts into Air: The Experience of Modernity], Studentlitteratur, Lund,
Sweden, 1995.
28. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
20
Bourdieu, Pierre, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, Harvard
University Press, Cambridge, United States, 1984.
Bourdieu, Pierre, The Logic of Practice, Polityr Press, Cambridge, England, 1992.
Bourdieu, Pierre and Delsaut, Yvette, “The Couturier and His Label: A Contribution
to a Theory of Magic,” [Originally Published in 1975] in Pierre Bourdieu,
Kultursociologiska texter, [Cultural Sociology Texts], Fourth Edition, Brutis Östlings
Bokförlag Symposium, Stehag, Stockholm, Sweden, 1993.
Bourdieu, Pierre, The Rules of Art: Genesis and Structure of the Literary Field,
Stanford University Press, Palo Alto, United States, 1996.
Butler, Judith, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, Routledge,
New York, United States, 1990.
Carlgren, Maria, Birgittaskolorna. Modeateljéer och sömnadsskolor mellan tradition
och förnyelse [The Birgitta Schools: Fashion Studio and Dressmaking School
between Tradition and Renewal] PhD Thesis, The University of Gothenburg,
Gothenburg, Sweden, 2016.
Hirdman, Yvonne, Det tänkande hjärtat. Boken om Alva Myrdal [The Thinking
Heart: A Book about Alva Myrdal], Ordfront, Stockholm, Sweden, 2006.
Kristeller, Paul Oskar, “Konstarternas moderna system. En studie i estetikens
historia,” Stockholm, Sweden, 1996, translation into Swedish from “The Modern
System of the Arts: A Study on Techne’s History,” in The Journal of the History of
Ideas, Issue 12, 1951, pp. 496–527 and Issue 13, 1952, pp. 17–46.
Parker, Rozsika, The Subversive Stitch: Embroidery and the Making of the Feminine,
LB Tauris, London, England, 2013.
Parkins, Ilja, Poiret, Dior, and Schiaparelli: Fashion, Femininity and Modernity, Berg,
Oxford, England, 2012.
Veblen, Thorstein, “Dress as an Expression of the Pecuniary Culture,” in Malcolm
Barnard, ed., Fashion Theory: A Reader, Routledge, England, 2007, pp. 339–346.
Webster, Helena, Bourdieu for Architects, Routledge, London, England, 2011.
29. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
21
Newspaper Articles
[Our girls should be trained for their natural field of activity. Their competing with
men in the professions is evil. “Outlandish statements in the Evening Newspaper by
Mrs. Emy Fick, Director of Saint Birgitta School”], 9 January 1925, Author Unknown,
Kvällstidningen [The Evening Newspaper], Stockholm, Sweden, (Circulation 1925–
1926).
“Flinka flickor och härliga handarbeten. Sancta Birgitta skolan——den kvinnliga hand–
slöjdens högskola” [“Nice girls and lovely handcrafts. The Saint Birgitta School——the
female handcraft Institute”], 4 April 1925, Author Unknown, Nya Dagligt Allehanda
[All Kinds of Daily News], Stockholm, Sweden, (Circulation 1859–1944).
Internet Sources
“Episteme and Techne,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http://plato.stanford.
edu/entries/episteme–techne, Accessed 9 September 2018.
Thurén, Britt–Marie, “En läsning av Bourdieus viktigaste tankar och begrepp,” [“A
Reading of Bourdieu’s Most Important Thoughts and Concepts”] p. 9,
http://docplayer.se/29968551-En-lasning-av-bourdieus-viktigaste-tankar-och-begrepp-
britt-marie-thuren.html, Accessed 1 May 2018.
31. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
23
Paintings Undressed:
A Sartorial Investigation into the Art of Antoine Watteau,
1700–1720
Axel Moulinier
Abstract
Through drawings, paintings, and engravings, Antoine Watteau
(1684–1721) provides his own perspective on clothes in Paris,
during 1700–1720. His representations question the notion of
visual culture. By confronting Watteau’s approach to his
contemporaries, this research considers recreating an illustration
of fashion history during this period, which has not been
extensively studied. This study brings together a corpus of archives
(including the Archives Nationales in Paris) which expose insight
into second–hand shops, theatre costumes, merchants, and the
fashion sphere——and their link with Watteau.
Introduction
Our intuitions of affinity between the forms of pictures and forms
of thought can be quite pressing.…If one is not simply going to try
to suppress such intuitions, then the question is: can one move
from a vague sense of affinity towards something critically useful
and historically sustainable?1
1
Michael Baxandall, Patterns of Intention: On the Historical Explanation of Pictures, Yale
University Press, New Haven, United States, 1985, p. 75.
32. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
24
Carlo Ginzburg’s article, “Le peintre et le bouffon: le portrait de Gonella de Jean
Fouquet”2
concludes by stating that connoisseurship and art history should work hand
in hand, thus endorsing Aby Warburg’s stress on iconology and disagreeing with
Roberto Longhi’s emphasis on connoisseurship. Fashion historians have recently
drawn similar conclusions, that technical and historical approaches to dress should be
combined, yet very few studies take this combined approach in fashion history. Early
fashion studies by art historians focused on what they called “costume.” This weighty
legacy has been difficult to escape, but now “sartorial uses” is a more appropriate
approach.3
In France, Jules Quicherat (1814–1882), Auguste Racinet (1825–1893),
and Paul Lacroix (1806–1884) all addressed clothing, and during the twentieth
century, fashion as a scholarly historical subject emerged. Maurice Leloir’s (1853–
1940) Dictionnaire du costume et de ses accessoires4
was an early attempt to
systematise the analysis of clothing, and François Boucher (1885–1966) later on
published his compilation, Histoire du costume en occident.5
More recently, several works have changed the scope of fashion history. While
interpretive essays like Roland Barthes’ (1915–1980) Système de la mode6
have
appeared, British scholars have also become prominent in the field. Historical
costume designer Janet Arnold (1932–1998), whose background was more technical
than scholarly, produced the first study that blended analysis with material culture.
Her Patterns of Fashion7
included archival references, a rich graphic iconography,
and clothing patterns from artefacts worldwide, which she considered to be equally
valid evidence. More recently, Aileen Ribeiro, Professor Emerita at The Courtauld
2
Carlo Ginzburg, “Le peintre et le bouffon: le Portrait de Gonella de Jean Fouquet,” [“The Painter
and the Fool: The Portrait of Gonella by Jean Fouquet”], Revue de l’Art, Issue 111, 1996, pp. 25–
39.
3
Denis Bruna, Curator of Pre–1800 Fashion and Textiles, Le Musée de la Mode et du Textile of
the Le Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, France.
4
Maurice Leloir, Dictionnaire du costume et de ses accessoires, des armes et des étoffes, des
origines à nos jours, [Dictionary of the Costume and Its Accessories, Weapons and Fabrics, from
the Origins to the Present Day], Gründ, Paris, France, 1951.
5
François Boucher, Histoire du costume en Occident : des origines à nos jours, [A History of
Costume in the West, etc.], Fourth Edition, Originally Published in 1966, Republished by
Flammarion, Paris, France, 2008.
6
Roland Barthes, Système de la mode, [The Fashion System], Seuil, Paris, France, 1967.
7
Janet Arnold, Patterns of Fashion, Volume 1: Englishwomen’s Dresses and Their Construction,
circa 1660–1860, Wace, London, England, 1964; Patterns of Fashion, Volume 3: The Cut and
Construction of Clothes for Men and Women, 1560–1620, Macmillan, London, England, 1985;
Patterns of Fashion, Volume 4: The Cut and Construction of Linen Shirts, Smocks, Neckwear,
Headwear, and Accessories for Men and Women, circa 1540–1660, Macmillan, London, England,
2008.
33. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
25
Institute of Art, London, initiated a new analytical approach with Ingres in Fashion,8
which examines the treatment of clothing in Jean–Auguste Dominique Ingres’ (1780–
1867) prolific career from his letters, drawings, paintings, and the fashion press.
These studies have inspired a new approach to the clothing in the art of Antoine
Watteau (1684–1721). Almost all previous publications have emphasised Watteau as
a glorious, preeminent French painter, but ignored his use of clothing. This article
presents the first in–depth attempt to apply fashion history methodologies to his art.
The Fêtes galantes, with its fantasy costumes, made Watteau famous and influenced
a wide range of European arts. The Fêtes galantes production continued for two
generations, embodied by Jean–Baptiste Pater (1695–1736), Nicolas Lancret (1690–
1743), François Boucher (1703–1770), and Jean–Honoré Fragonard (1732–1806).
Yvonne Deslandres’ (1923–1986) article, “Watteau peintre du costume de son
temps”9
was the first analysis of Watteau’s use of clothing in his art. This present
article, though, asks: can dress provide new insights into art history?
From his death until the present, Watteau’s life and career have fascinated
connoiseurs, and art historians have often advanced differing interpretations of his
œuvre. A major work is Jean de Jullienne et les graveurs de Watteau au XVIIIe
siècle,10
which notes that according to the 1699 Census of Valenciennes (where Watteau was
born), his family lived at 48th
Place Saint–Jean. Neighbours included secondhand
clothes dealers and his two paternal uncles were textile weavers. 11
Thus, from
childhood Watteau was exposed to the milieu of clothing and textiles, which appears
to have been significant for his work. His earliest drawings show an interest in clothing,
textiles, and body posture, an absorption which is linked to the theatre. Watteau was
apprenticed, circa 1708–1710, to artist and stage designer Claude Gillot (1673–1722)
and was already developing a personal maniera for clothing and style. His drawing, A
Woman Kneeling, Wearing a Fontanges Headdress (Figure 1) shows his early interest
in the structure and depiction of clothing. The mass of fabric at the base of her back
and the minimal use of sharp, brisk lines which depict the profile are representative
of this and reveal the depth of his interest.
8
Aileen Ribeiro, Ingres in Fashion: Representations of Dress and Appearance in Ingres’s Images of
Women, Yale University Press, New Haven, United States, 1999.
9
Yvonne Deslandres, “Watteau peintre du costume de son temps,” [“Watteau, Painter of Costume
of His Time”] in François Moureau and Margaret Morgan Grasselli, Antoine Watteau (1684–1721):
le peintre, son temps et sa légende, [Antoine Watteau (1684-1721): The Painter, His Lifetime, and
His Legend], Champion–Slatkine, Paris, France, 1987, p. 250.
10
Émile Dacier, Albert Vuaflart, and Jacques Hérold, Jean de Jullienne et les graveurs de Watteau
au XVIIIe siècle, [Jean de Jullienne and Watteau’s Engravers in the Eighteenth Century], Rousseau,
Paris, France, 1922.
11
Ibid., pp. 4–5.
34. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
26
Figure 1:
A Woman
Kneeling,
Wearing a
Fontanges
Headdress,
Antoine Watteau,
circa 1708,
Red Chalk on
Paper,
3500 x 2350mm,
Sotheby’s,
London, England,
4 July 2012,
Lot 00063.
Watteau’s contemporaries noted this approach. Antoine de la Roque (1672–1744),
publisher and editor of the newspaper Le Mercure de France from June 1721, was
both a friend and Watteau collector, and published a short homage to Watteau after
his death in 1721:
The genius of this brilliant artist pushed him to compose small
elegant subjects, [including] countryside weddings, balls,
masquerades, feasts, seascapes, etc. The variety of draperies,
headdresses and clothing are the most delightful elements of his
35. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
27
paintings. One can see a pleasant mixture of seriousness and
grotesqueness in his dalliances with French fashion, ancient and
modern, especially in the precious gracefulness of the faces, but
mainly in the women and children, which can not be seen
anywhere else … the fabrics of his draperies are more simple than
rich, but are soft, with beautiful pleats and vivid, truthful colors.12
This implies several important points on Watteau’s work and de la Roque stresses its
variety and highlights his interest in women’s and children’s clothing. His comments
were later echoed by the Comte de Caylus’ (1692–1765) opinion about Watteau’s use
of clothing. As an amateur in the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, Caylus’
1748 lecture “Vie d’Antoine Watteau” on Watteau’s life declared:
He used both gallant and comical clothes to dress those who
posed for him regardless of their gender. He painted them in
natural postures, and preferred the simplest to the more
complex.13
While Caylus provides less information on Watteau’s link to clothes than does de la
Roque, their views are similar. For Watteau’s depictions of gender, Caylus explains
that he dressed both men and women in the other gender’s clothing. This cross–
gender dressing appears at the end of the conservative reign of Louis XIV, when the
court took advantage of the king’s decline to subvert Versailles’ strict étiquette; artists
produced images that reflected this. De la Roque and Caylus reflect contemporary
views of Watteau’s use of clothing; the former highlights his interest in the draperies
of ancient and contemporary French fashions and hairstyles, while Caylus addresses
12
Antoine de La Roque, “Les Beaux–Arts,” Mercure de France, August 1721, pp. 81–83, “Le génie
de cet habile artiste le portait à composer de petits sujets galants, noces champêtres, bals,
mascarades, fêtes, marines, etc. La variété des draperies, des ornements de têtes et des habillements
font surtout grand plaisir dans ses compositions. On y voit un agréable mélange du sérieux, du
grotesque, et des caprices de la mode française, ancienne et moderne, surtout le précieux talent de
la grâce dans les airs de têtes, principalement dans les femmes et les enfants, qui se fait sentir partout.
[…] les étoffes de ses draperies sont plus simples que riches, mais elles sont moelleuses, avec de
beaux plis et des couleurs vives et vraies.” Author’s translation.
13
Charles Henry, La Vie de Antoine Watteau par le Comte de Caylus, publiée pour la première
fois d’après l’autographe, [Life of Antoine Watteau by the Comte de Caylus, Published for the First
Time from the Manuscript], E. Dentu, Paris, France, 1887, pp. 39–40.
“Il avait des habits / galants quelques–uns de comiques, dont il revêtait les personnes de l'un et de
l'autre sexe, selon qu'il en trouvait qui voulait bien se tenir, et qu'il prenait dans les attitudes que la
nature lui présentait, en préférant volontiers les plus simples aux autres.” Author’s translation.
36. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
28
his cross–gendered clothing, which can be further analysed through Watteau’s link to
theatrical tailoring.
Guillaume Glorieux14
noted the likelihood of Watteau’s familiarity with theatrical
costumes, since many drawings depict entertainment costumes——including
Commedia dell’arte plays——and also appear on different canvases. For example,
Watteau often depicted a green doublet with tails, such as appears in the Morgan
Library and Museum drawing (Figure 2) depicting a man’s silhouetted back. To the
left of his body a fold appears in the velvet, and black chalk accents and white
highlights depict the materiality of the clothing. The sketchiness of the leg and hand
in this canvas further highlights Watteau’s emphasis on clothing over the body, and
he used such garments more than once.
Figure 2:
Study of a Young Man Seen from the Back and Another Study of His Right Arm,
Antoine Watteau, circa 1717, Three Chalks on Beige Paper, 2080 x 2270mm,
The Morgan Library and Museum, New York, United States, 2000.56.
14
Guillaume Glorieux, “Michel–Joseph Ducreux (1665–1715), marchand de masques de théâtre et
d’habits de carnaval au temps de Watteau,” [“Michel–Joseph Ducreux (1665–1715), Merchant of
Theatre and Carnival Masks and Costumes in Watteau’s Time”], Bulletin de la Société de l’Histoire
de l’Art Français de l’année 2006, 2007, pp. 119–129.
37. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
29
The same garments can be seen in several paintings, including Les Charmes de la Vie,
Voulez–vous Triompher des Belles? and in such drawings as the Studies of a Woman
Playing the Guitar in the Département des Arts Graphiques, Musée du Louvre, Paris
(Figure 3), where she wears this same doublet. But is this the exact same garment worn
by the previously mentioned man and woman? If so, then Caylus’ claim that Watteau
used clothing as cross–gender depictions is accurate, but this also poses questions: was
this doublet borrowed from a costume tailor, or did he have his models pose in a
tailor’s workshop? Or perhaps, as Caylus suggested, Watteau had his own costume
collection? Since Watteau never settled in a house of his own, and always lived at
friends’ places, it appears unlikely that Watteau owned a theatre costume collection
due to his repeated moving. Therefore, Glorieux’s argument that Watteau might have
known Michel–Joseph Ducreux, a theatrical costume and mask merchant on the Pont
Notre–Dame, appears convincing. The tailor Edouard–Louis Candanoine also
rented a room in the Pont Notre–Dame house where Ducreux worked and associated
with him,15
so it appears that Watteau and Candanoine might have met each other at
some point, which the use of the same theatre costumes in different drawings
supports.
Figure 3:
Studies of a
Woman Playing
the Guitar or
Holding a Score,
Antoine
Watteau, circa
1717–1718,
Red, Black, and
Graphite on
Cream Paper,
2250 x 2940mm,
Département
des Arts
Graphiques,
Musée du
Louvre,
Paris, France,
RF 774, Recto.
15
Ibid., p. 121.
38. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
30
Watteau’s Fêtes galantes illustrate four of his sartorial considerations, as follows.
1. Watteau subverts the social taxonomy of class, which reflects the early
eighteenth century theories of Scottish economist John Law de Lauriston
(1671–1729) who promoted an economic system that allowed the French
bourgeoisie to become even richer than the nobility, thus blurring the
traditional elite social distinctions. Fêtes galantes can be interpreted as the
epitome of this, and similar themes also appeared in the plays16
of Pierre de
Marivaux (1688–1763) where people wear clothes of other social classes, thus
subverting the social hierarchy.
2. Atemporality and Historicism: Watteau’s compositions never depict specific
moments of the day (except for a very few nocturnal works) or the year (other
than his seasons series). Clothes also are significant because their varied
chronological origins create the special atmosphere. A sixteenth century ruff, a
seventeenth century collar, and a medieval beret are depicted together on a
single canvas to create a mysterious and fantastic ambiance.
3. Material Culture: Watteau could be inspired by literally anything around him,
including engravings, books, clothes, animals, and people, as his enormous
catalogue raisonné of drawings shows.
4. Inventiveness: It has been argued that Watteau was not inventing anything new
but simply reworking old themes, like endlessly reshuffling a deck of cards.17
This seems incorrect. He drew inspiration from other artists but also invented
new compositions and garments, and reinvigorated painting as a genre with his
Fête galante.
These sartorial themes appear in various works, such as Watteau’s La Conversation
(Figure 4) which depicts a woman standing, wearing an outfit that seems unique in his
work; the bodice has ruffles that hang from the waistline, skirt, and sleeves. While the
canvas is damaged, a Jean Michel Liotard (1702–1796) engraving of it provides
additional information, showing her wearing a shawl and gloves, and the skirt——
probably worn over several petticoats and a hip pad——is brocaded silk satin adorned
with patterns that echo contemporary lace designs, and with a white fichu over her
chest. Such fichu were worn in that period yet also in an earlier era, as the Princess
16
See Amy Wyngaard, “Switching Codes: Class, Clothing, and Cultural Change in the Works of
Marivaux and Watteau,” Eighteenth–Century Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, Volume 33,
Issue 4, Summer 2000, pp. 523–541.
17
Hélène Adhémar, Watteau sa vie, son œuvre, [Watteau: His Life and Work], Tisné, Paris,
France, 1950, p. 31.
39. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
31
Palatine (1652–1722) reveals in a 12 December 1694 letter to her aunt, the Duchess
of Hanover (1630–1714):
I am sending you a fichu that is now fashionable which we wear
around the neck. It was embroidered in Tripoli, which makes it
rare…it cannot be worn with the grand habit, but can be with a
mantua and negligee, laced up in front with both ends put
underneath the lacing on the right and left.18
Figure 4:
Detail,
La Conversation,
Antoine Watteau,
circa 1712–1715,
Oil on Canvas,
5020 x 6100mm,
Toledo Museum of
Art, Toledo,
United States,
1971.152.
18
Élisabeth–Charlotte de Bavière, duchesse d’Orléans, Correspondance de Madame duchesse
d’Orléans, [Correspondence of Madame the Duchess of Orléans], É. Bouillon, Paris, France, 1890,
p. 106, “Il a été brodé à Tripoli, c’est donc quelque chose de rare...on ne le porte pas en grand
habit, mais en manteau et robe de chambre et quand on est lacée par devant on passe les deux bouts
du fichu sous le lacet, à droite et à gauche.” Author’s translation.
40. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
32
However, this look was not entirely Watteau’s invention since he took most features
from the engraving of Bernard Picart (1673–1733), Dame de Qualité en habit d’Este,
from the 1706 series, Six modes françaises (Figure 5). The only variation Watteau
incorporated was to update the ornaments and fabric, and replace the Fontanges
headdress with a more fashionable one. This coiffure is surrounded by myth, but is
claimed to have originated from Mademoiselle Marie Angélique de Scorraille de
Roussille (1661–1681), the Duchess de Fontanges, the then–favourite of Louis XIV.
While hunting in 1681, her hair became disheveled. To keep it out of the way, she
tied it with a ribbon on top of her head. According to Maurice Leloir, this originated
the Fontanges coiffure.19
Madame de Sévigné (1626–1696) in a 15 May 1691 letter
wrote, “The Fontanges has been mostly vanquished,” 20
but nevertheless, Picart
engravings of 1703 depict lofty Fontange coiffures and Saint–Simon’s Mémoires note
its disappearance once again in 1713 due to the Duke and Duchess of Shrewsbury’s
visit to Versailles, as illustrated in the following passage.
[The Duchess] considered these women’s headdresses to be
ridiculous, and so were they. They were made of a structure of
arched wires, ribbons, and many different ornaments, and could
be as tall as two feet high, making the head appear to be at the
center of their bodies …. The style was already more than ten years
old … What a monarch could not have achieved, the taste and
exemplum of a crazy old foreign woman had accomplished with
the most surprising rapidity.21
But the Fontanges still endured, yet took different forms, including caps with a
superstructure. Saint–Simon tells another anecdote from 1719 about a Fontanges cap
during an evening of gambling at the Princesse de Conti’s home:
Madame de Charlus was next to the Archbishop of Reims, Le
Tellier. She took an egg which she had opened, and leaning over
to get some salt, did not notice that her headdress came directly
over a burning candle. The Archbishop saw her catch fire and
threw the headdress on the floor.22
19
Leloir, op cit., p. 156.
20
Marquise Marie de Rabutin Chantal de Sévigné, Lettres de Madame de Sévigné: de sa famille et
de ses amis, [Letters from Madame de Sévigné: From her Family and Friends], Hachette, Paris,
France, 1862, p. 1691.
21
Louis de Rouvroy duc de Saint–Simon, Mémoires complets et authentiques du duc de Saint–
Simon sur le siècle de Louis XIV et la Régence, 1691–1723, [Authentic Memoirs of the Duke of
Saint–Simon on the Century of Louis XIV and the Regency, 1691–1723], Volume 20, Hachette,
Paris, France, 1857, pp. 316–317.
22
Ibid., pp. 132–133.
41. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
33
Figures 5:
Dame de qualité en
habit d’été in Six
modes françaises (…),
Bernard Picart, 1706,
Gaspard Duchange,
Paris, France,
111 x 710mm,
Bibliothèque
nationale de France,
Paris, France,
EST–368(376).
The Fontanges also had many names, including the Bourgognes, jardinières,
commodes, and palissades, making it difficult to identify due to vague dress
terminology and the terms used by Saint–Simon, especially making it problematic to
use for dating paintings. Thus, the dress in La Conversation would date between 1706
(the date of Picart’s engraving) and December 1713 at the earliest, if Saint–
Simon’s “elevated headdresses” statement is accurate. But his 1719 date is erroneous
because Watteau was then poised to leave for London and his style in that era also
42. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
34
excludes 1719, which caused Pierre Rosenberg to date it between 1712 and 1715.23
A
combined fashion and art history analysis makes this date tempting, yet in Watteau
studies one must avoid this type of analysis, so the traditional art history conclusion
of 1712–1715 seems prudent.
Another example concerns children’s clothing. Children are noteworthy in the art of
this era. Watteau’s Fêtes galantes include many children, and in 1699 Louis XIV
commissioned architect Jules Hardnouin–Mansart (1646–1708) to paint the
Ménagerie interior at Versailles with an array of children, “Il faut de l’enfance
répandue partout.”24
Several Watteau compositions include children, and they are
depicted as being equivalent in importance to adults, as in La Danse (Figure 6). Pierre
Rosenberg asserts that this canvas was painted between September 1719 and August
1720 during Watteau’s visit to London, and La Danse is thought to have been inspired
by a Le Nain Brothers drawing which was then in London.25
Figure 6:
Iris c’est de
bonne heure, also
known as, La
Danse
[The Dance],
Antoine Watteau,
circa 1718–1721,
Oil on Canvas,
9700 x 1160mm,
Staatliche
Museen,
Berlin, Germany,
Mü.3644.
23
Ettore Camesasca and Pierre Rosenberg, Tout l’œuvre peint de Watteau, [All the Painted Works
by Watteau], Flammarion, Paris, France, 1982, Catalogue #105.
24
Alexandre Maral, “Sculpture,” in Lucien Bély, Dictionnaire Louis XIV, [Louis XIV Dictionary],
Robert Laffont, Paris, France, 2015.
25
Pierre Rosenberg and Margaret Morgan Grasselli, Antoine Watteau (1684–1721), Exhibition
Catalogue, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, United States, 17 June 1984–23 September
1984; Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, France, 23 October 1984–28 January 1985;
Charlottenburg Palace, West Berlin, West Germany, 22 February 1985–26 May 1985; Réunion des
musées nationaux, Paris, France, 1984, pp. 444–447.
43. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
35
In La Danse, the girl wears a dress in two parts with a long coat that appears to have
a train worn over hoop petticoats, and an apron trimmed with yellow lace which from
the folds seems to indicate that it is taffeta. The sleeves have engageantes lace, and she
also wears white gloves. The dress fabric was analysed by Peter Thornton (1925–
2007), then–curator at The Victoria and Albert Museum, London, who concluded
that 1718 was its earliest date. He described the fabric:
By a coincidence Watteau himself provides us with a good
example of the international character of silk–design in the
eighteenth century. Plate 52B shows a detail from a well–known
painting by the master, and Plate 52A shows an English silk–
design from the year 1718. It will be seen that the little girl in the
painting wears a silk adorned with a pattern very like that of the
design — scallop–edged stripes with small sprays of semi–
naturalistic flowers. Stripes, incidentally were apparently quite
common during the second decade or so of the eighteenth
century.26
The 1984 Exhibition Catalogue is mistaken in stating that the canvas depicts printed
silk; printed cotton had existed since 1640–165027
but printed silk only appears later
in the eighteenth century. But as Thornton noted, this painting’s fabric is silk and
Deslandres agrees, describing it as “patterned brocaded satin,”28
which is shown by its
weaving, shimmer, draping, layout, and setting. But Thornton also notes that the
international character of early eighteenth century textiles is relevant, since such
patterns “can be found either way on the Continent or in Great Britain,”29
so it might
have been designed in England and woven in France, or vice versa (Figure 7 and
Figure 8). But if woven in London, the fabric could have been later sold and tailored
in France. Yet as with the Fontanges hairstyle, such attempts at dating may be
misleading since the patterns and fabrics were marketed in the established French
luxury trade, and identification, dating, and chronology for this period are normally
imprecise.
26
Peter Thornton, Baroque and Rococo Silks, Faber and Faber, London, England, 1965, p. 107.
27
Musée de l’impression sur étoffes de Mulhouse, Histoire singulière de l’impression textile,
[Unusual History of Printed Textiles], Edisud, Mulhouse, France, 2001, p. 4.
28
Deslandres, op cit., p. 250.
29
Thornton, op cit., p. 107.
44. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
36
Figure 7:
Textile Pattern,
Joseph Dandridge, 19 July 1718,
Pen, Ink, and Watercolour on Paper,
4570 x 2670mm,
The Victoria and Albert Museum,
London, England, E.4465–1909.
Figure 8:
Textile Pattern,
Joseph Dandridge, 22 May 1718,
Pen, Ink, and Watercolour on Paper,
4860 x 2800mm,
The Victoria and Albert Museum,
London, England, E.4466–1909.
Yvonne Deslandres has identified the La Danse dress shape as a robe à l’anglaise,30
which only became fashionable in France under Louis XVI (1774–1791),31
but it
appears to be closer to the robe à la française. The coat, stiff bodice over a whalebone
stay, which was not worn with the robe à l’anglaise, the skirt folds, the rounded, deep
30
Deslandres, op cit., pp. 247–248.
31
Boucher, op cit., p. 295.
45. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
37
décolletage, the three–quarter length tight sleeves, and the pagoda–shaped
engageantes all indicate a robe à la française. This garment also shows an interesting
turning point in Watteau’s work; between the 1718 fabric date and Watteau’s 1721
death, the robe à la française was already being worn, as François Boucher mentions
(1715–1720),32
and Deslandres dates it circa 1740.33
Moreover, Ribeiro argues the
same about English fashion, “At about this date [1712], the mantua lost its negligent
appearance, and the train became more elaborately fitted at the back.”34
There were thus similarities in the dress’ evolution in both countries and the robe à
la française must have emerged in the first quarter of the eighteenth century. Yet the
shape of the décolletage supports a later date; Anne–Cécile Moheng notes the
importance of the rounded, deep breast line, especially during the second half of the
century.35
Additionally, the hair style seems too early for 1715–1720, since it appears
in the 1760–1770 Duchesse de Polignac portrait by Madame Vigée–Lebrun, so the
La Danse dress is difficult to precisely date. Nevertheless, scientific analysis of French
paintings at Charlottenburg Palace, West Berlin, conducted by Professor Christoph
Martin Vogtherr and his team concluded that this painting:
…is generally dated from Watteau’s English trip of 1719–1720,
since Peter Thornton was able to link the fabric of the young girl’s
dress with an English pattern of 1718–1719. This was questioned
by Aileen Ribeiro who considered the similarity to be inadequate
evidence. According to her information (April 2008 letter) the
fabric is European and can be dated around 1716–1723, but
additionally the patterns might have been created in France, which
would make it post–1716. The style of the painting, especially the
children on the left, and the preparatory drawings which have been
convincingly dated as circa 1718 or later by Morgan Grasselli, both
suggest a later date but not necessarily during Watteau’s England
period. Thus a possible date might be 1718–1721.36
32
Ibid., p. 264.
33
Deslandres, op cit., p. 251.
34
Aileen Ribeiro, Dress in Eighteenth–Century Europe, 1715–1789, Yale University Press, New
Haven, United States, 2002, p. 35.
35
Anne Cécile Moheng, “Paniers, corps à baleines et silhouette féminine au XVIIIe siècle,” [“Hoop
Petticoat, Whalebone Stars, and Female Silhouette in the Eighteenth Century”], Master’s
Dissertation, École du Louvre, Paris, France, 2011, p. 11.
36
Christoph Martin Vogtherr, ed., Französische Gemälde, I: Watteau, Pater, Lancret, Lajoüe,
[French Paintings I: Watteau, Pater, Lancret, Lajoüe], Akademie Verlag, coll. Bestandskataloge der
Kunstsammlungen, [Inventory Catalogues of Art Collections], Berlin, Germany, 2011, p. 715, “Das
46. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
38
The ambiguous sartorial history of La Danse raises several questions: could it have
been painted by a skilled imitator before the 172637
publication of the Recueil
Jullienne engraving, and subsequently passed for a Watteau? Two other versions are
also known; Philip Mercier38
drew inspiration either from La Danse or the engraving
of it by Charles Cochin (1688–1754), circa July 1726–1729.39
While it may seem
presumptuous to question this authorship, one must consider the painting’s newness
around 1720. But Watteau’s work also raises another question: could he have
inspired subsequent fashions?
A breathtaking realisation about Watteau’s œuvre is the diffuse historicism of his
compositions. Even though this is anachronistic for the eighteenth century, Watteau
applied it exactly as it was in the late nineteenth century by blending different historical
styles. When La Roque wrote, “One can see a pleasant mixture of seriousness,
grotesque, and dalliances of French fashion, ancient and new,”40
this was probably
how he perceived Watteau’s mix of different eras. For example, one can discover the
clothing origins for some females in Fêtes galantes. Critics are often perplexed when
attempting to describe the clothing in the two L’Avanturière versions and the pendant
L’Enchanteur. Pendants exist in two Wateau works, one in Bordick Castle on Arran
Island, Scotland (Figure 9) and the other in the Musée des Beaux–Arts de Troyes
(Figure 10). According to the 1984 Exhibition Catalogue, the latter is dressed as a
horsewoman.
Gemälde wird gewöhnlich in die Zeit von Watteaus englischen Aufenthalt 1719/1720 datiert, da
Peter Thornton den Kleiderstoff des stehenden Mädchens mit einem englischen Muster von
1718/1719 verbinden konnte. Diese Identifizierung wurde jedoch durch Aileen Ribeiro relativiert,
die diese Ähnlichkeit für weit weniger spezifisch hält. Nach ihrer Auskunft (brieflich, April 2008)
handelt es sich um ein in europäischen Stoffen der Zeit von etwa 1716/1723 vorzufindendes Muster,
die Seide könnte ebenso gut in Frankreich entstanden sein. Der dargestellte Stoff hilft somit nur für
eine Datierung nach 1716. Der stilistischen Befund da Gemäldes (vor allem bei den Kindern links)
und der Vorzeichnungen, die von Morgan Grasselli überzeugend einer um 1718 oder später
entstandenen Gruppe zugeordnet werden, spricht allerdings für eine späte Datierung, wenn auch
nicht notwendig in die Zeit Von Watteaus Aufenthalt in England. Hier wird deshalb eine Datierung
1718/1721 vertreten. Wegen der ungewöhnlichen Funktion, dem Figurenmaßstab und der Motivik
des Gemäldes ist eine genauere zeitliche Einordnung derzeit nicht möglich.” Author’s translation.
37
Rosenberg and Grasselli, op cit., p. 447.
38
On Philip Mercier, see Martin Eidelberg, “Philippe Mercier, Watteau’s English Follower” in
Watteau Abecedario, http://208.106.158.90/Mercier.htm, Accessed 24 October 2013.
39
Rosenberg and Grasselli, op cit., p. 283.
40
de La Roque, op cit., pp. 81–83.
47. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
39
Her “tabard trimmed with fur and a big bow at the waist [as well as] her feathered
cockade are surprising.” 41
Her posture——far from the usual sophistication of
Watteau’s female figures——is that of a man leaning on a cane, thus making a cross–
gendered depiction. Additionally, L’Avanturière wears a medieval–like doublet
trimmed with fur. Under this sleeveless garment, she wears a jacket that echos
Watteau’s espagnolets figures.42
Most of these male figures wear the doublet, small
ruffs, and lace sleeves, which also appear on most of the male figures in Watteau’s
Fêtes galantes.
Figure 9:
L’Avanturière,
Antoine Watteau, circa 1700–1720,
Oil on Copper, 1770 x 2600mm,
Brodick Castle, Arran Island, Scotland,
No Accession Number.
Figure 10:
L’Avanturière,
Antoine Watteau, circa 1700–1720,
Oil on Copper, 1880 x 2550mm,
Musée de beaux–arts, Troyes, France,
inv.835.16.
L’Avanturière’s hat is strangely tilted on her head and its feather cockade is unusual.
Her skirt features trim at the bottom and is most likely worn over a large round hip
pad, or possibly a girdle. Altogether, this figure is particularly historicist in its mixed
and seemingly confused approach, and as such embodied Watteau’s latest style.
Drawing inspiration from Medieval dress, male Renaissance clothing, and mostly
41
Rosenberg and Grasselli, op cit., p. 283.
42
The espagnolet is a concept created by Axel Moulinier that departs from the vogue of the
espagnolette. The latter describes the fad for Spanish fashion during the early eighteenth century as
mentioned by such contemporary critics as the Chaulieu Abbot; See Guillaume Amfrye de
Chaulieu, Œuvres diverses de Monsieur l’abbé de Chaulieu, [Various Works of Monsieur l’abbé
de Chaulieu], Volume 1, Jean Nours, London, England, 1740, p. 217. Axel Moulinier rendered the
French word into masculine to describe male figures wearing sixteenth century outfits in Watteau’s
Fêtes galantes.
48. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
40
female contemporary fashion, different layers are depicted to create this peculiar mix
of clothing, which seems to have been pure invention since no direct inspiration for
it has been found.
Rosenberg believes that this second work is definitely a Watteau,43
but Professor
Martin Eidelberg made a full analysis of the clothing of L’Avanturière in Brodick
Castle and refutes this attribution.44
The costumes in the Scottish version have been modified as well.
In place of the Troyes adventuress’ distinctive hat with its pert
cockade (a type of accessory that Watteau favored in his early
career, as in les Jaloux), the painter of the Brodick Castle painting
has chosen a type of straw hat that Watteau used in his later career
(only occasionally for women, as in the pilgrim alighting into the
boat in the Berlin Embarquement). Even less typical of Watteau,
the adventuress has been given a white silk skirt that glistens with
undue brilliance, and her shoulders have been cloaked with a
small pink cape whose color is almost without parallel in
Watteau’s oeuvre for a principal figure (an exception would be
one of the pilgrims boarding the boat in the Ile de Cythère). Most
damning of all, her vest has been adorned with a design of dots
and large flowers. Except for the dress worn by the girl in Iris, c’est
de bonne heure, Watteau consistently eschewed all patterned
fabrics other than those with simple stripes.45
As Eidelberg noted, the figure in the Brodick Castle version of L’Avanturière wears a
long whalebone stay, elongated with sophisticated scaffold tails. If this argument seems
plausible, one must remember that Watteau used drawings from different periods in
his career to create his compositions. For a particular dress and hat to be in the same
composition could simply indicate that it is a later work that the artist had taken from
an older sketch and——why not——used a new technique to represent the peculiar
glistening of the silk satin, which can be that shiny.
43
Pierre Rosenberg, “Répétitions et répliques dans l’œuvre de Watteau,” in François Moureau and
Margaret Morgan Grasselli, eds., Antoine Watteau (1684–1721): le peintre, son temps et sa légende,
[Antoine Watteau (1684–1721): The Painter, His Lifetime, and His Legend], Champion–Slatkine,
Paris, France, 1987, p. 105.
44
Martin Eidelberg, “L’Avanturière, Copy 1,” A Watteau Abecedario, http://watteau-
abecedario.org/avanturierecopies.htm, Accessed 15 August 2018.
45
Ibid.
49. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
41
Two conclusions can therefore be drawn; the complexity of this outfit came late in
Watteau’s career, because as Eidelberg explained, this work represents a synthesis of
the different periods of Watteau’s career. But in terms of the style of the clothes,
bodies, and faces of the Brodick Castle version, it can be argued that this is simply a
later work done by Watteau himself. Could these be two separate series, one as the
early Musée des Beaux–Arts de Troyes version and the other as the latter Brodick
Castle version? New research supported by a material analysis of these four works,
which have not been seen together since 1984, is necessary to advance our
understanding of the dilemma of Watteau’s subtle use of a synthesis of dress from
different fashion periods, as well as to reveal a deeper understanding of the meanings
of his artistic career.
Louis–François Du Bois de Saint–Gelais, when commenting on Watteau’s works in
1727, declared, “He took such care with the clothing in his paintings that they can be
looked at as the history of his contemporary fashions.”46
But now, almost 300 years
later, this contemporary assessment can be called into question: was Watteau really
a “peintre du costume de son temps”?
46
Louis–François Dubois de Saint–Gelais, Descriptions des tableaux du Palais Royal, [Descriptions
of the Paintings in the Palais Royal], D’Houry, Paris, France, 1727, p. 75, “Il s’est attaché aux
habillement vrais, en sorte que ses Tableaux peuvent être regardés comme l’Histoire des Modes de
son temps.” Author’s translation.
50. The Journal of Dress History Volume 2, Issue 3, Autumn 2018
42
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“It Is Not Impossible to Look Nice Sitting about on the Beach:”
The Influence of Magazines in the Making and Wearing
of Hand–Knitted Bathing Suits by Young Working Women
in England during the 1930s
Emmy Sale
Abstract
This article analyses how the content of magazines influenced
young working women’s agency in the making and wearing of
hand–knitted bathing suits in England during the 1930s. This
article utilises the advertisements, images, and knitting patterns
that were published in magazines read by young women——and
compares these to the reality of making and wearing shown
through extant garments and photographs. It regards cost to be the
core factor of why bathing suits were made and not purchased by
working women. This article also explores how the magazine
communicated images of bodily perfection, subversion of the
bathing suit’s utility, promotion of the wool industry, and designs
for specific beach activities.
Introduction
During the 1930s, the outdoor movement emerged and revolutionised attitudes
towards suntans, sunbathing, and beachwear. The suntan, once an indication of
outdoor manual labour, became a “symbol of modern times,” and young women
