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Challenging The Ideal: A Comparative Study Of Suzanne Valadon And William Bouguereau, Mary Sheehy

Honors Theses

The female nude has been represented in art for millennia. From the Paleolithic Woman of Willendorf fertility symbol (22,000 to 24,000 BCE, Fig. 1), to Titian's Venus of Urbino (1538 Fig. 2), women have frequently been depicted as sexualized creatures. Standard ideal body types have been established for each era through the thousands of pieces of art picturing nude women. Archaic women were expected to have large breasts and hips in order to show their fertility. Medieval representations of Mary Magdalene were usually nude and provocative. Women were supposed to see these images of Mary Magdalene and remember to keep …