Research Catalog

Fleshing out surfaces skin in French art and medicine, 1650-1850

Title
Fleshing out surfaces [electronic resource] : skin in French art and medicine, 1650-1850 / Mechthild Fend.
Author
Fend, Mechthild.
Publication
Manchester : Manchester University Press, 2017.

Available Online

  • Available from home with a valid library card
  • Available onsite at NYPL

Details

Description
1 online resource (xvi, 314 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates) : illustrations (some color)
Summary
'Fleshing out surfaces' is the first English-language book on skin and flesh tones in art. It considers flesh and skin in art theory, image making and medical discourse in seventeenth to nineteenth-century France. Describing a gradual shift between the early modern and the modern period, it argues that what artists made when imitating human nakedness was not always the same. Initially understood in terms of the body's substance, of flesh tones and body colour, it became increasingly a matter of skin, skin colour and surfaces. Each chapter is dedicated to a different notion of skin and its colour, from flesh tones via a membrane imbued with nervous energy to hermetic borderline. Looking in particular at works by Fragonard, David, Girodet, Benoist and Ingres, the focus is on portraits, as facial skin is a special arena for testing painterly skills and a site where the body and the image become equally expressive.--
Series Statement
Rethinking art's histories
Uniform Title
  • Fleshing out surfaces (Online)
  • Rethinking art's histories.
Alternative Title
Fleshing out surfaces (Online)
Subject
  • Skin in art
  • Human skin color in art
  • Skin > Psychological aspects
  • Art, French > Themes, motives
  • Anatomy, Artistic
Bibliography (note)
  • Includes bibliographical references (pages 281-303) and index.
Access (note)
  • Access restricted to authorized users.
Contents
The surface's substance -- Nervous canvas -- Sensitive limit -- Skin colour -- Seeing through the skin -- Hermetic borderline -- Epilogue : segregagtion.
LCCN
2016499341
OCLC
ssj0001767609
Author
Fend, Mechthild.
Title
Fleshing out surfaces [electronic resource] : skin in French art and medicine, 1650-1850 / Mechthild Fend.
Imprint
Manchester : Manchester University Press, 2017.
Series
Rethinking art's histories
Rethinking art's histories.
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 281-303) and index.
Access
Access restricted to authorized users.
Connect to:
Available from home with a valid library card
Available onsite at NYPL
View in Legacy Catalog