Once More the Fallen Woman by Linda Nochlin free essay sample

Lost and Found: Once More the Fallen Woman By Linda Nochlin Linda Nochlin in â€Å"Lost and Found: Once More the Fallen Woman† points out how â€Å"fallen† in the male world means heroic inspiration for the most part but for women the term is applied to sexual activity out of wedlock, whether or not it is for her gain. It was often incorporated into writers and social critics’ work. This particular view was fascinating to nineteenth-century artists (in the middle years) especially in England. The theme was undertaken by Dante Gabriel Rossetti whose interest was so great almost to the point of obsession. He devoted a number of his poems and pictorial works to the subject. The painting, Found (unfinished), was devoted to the subject, occupied his time from 1853 until one year before he died. It was a work he could never put aside or resolve. Rossetti describes the picture to Holman Hunt on January 30, 1855 seemingly straight forward stating that it takes place in London at a street at dawn with lamps still lit. We will write a custom essay sample on Once More the Fallen Woman by Linda Nochlin or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page A driver left his cart in the middle of the street and goes after a girl who has passed him wondering the streets. When he comes up to her and he recognizes her she immediately sinks onto her knees in shame against the wall of a raised churchyard in the foreground. The male stands and holds her hands, which he had to take deliberately, which he holds in bewilderment and half guarding her from self-hurt. Rossetti states that these are the main things in the picture which are to be called â€Å"Found† and for which his sister Maria has found him a lovely motto from Jeremiah that states. â€Å"I remember Thee, the kindness of youth, the love of thine espousals. The complete implications and significance of the work and its relationships are â€Å"anything but straight forward†. This can be best understood best through examining 19th Century perspectives. Rossetti makes ideological assumptions in his attempt to invent the secular image of the fallen woman. He, and many others who were trying to depict this theme at this time, use the contemporary issues and pressing social moral as his background for the assumptions made about the female in his picture. This Pre-Raphaelite interpretation is examined by Nochlin against another work by Holman Hunt titled Awakening Conscience, which may be considered paradoxically contradictory. Nochlin believes this painting was inspired by another art work by Rossetti. The sources and the formulation of the work Found will be examined and the work will be considered in accordance to the artist’s personal history and relation to the meanings. Lastly, Nochlin states she is to demonstrate that Rossetti, being a poet and a painter, treats this theme of fallen women in his poems as well but in no way are relevant to the facial expressions and structure of the work. Nochlin believes that these two do not necessarily explain each other. She also says that Rossetti’s strategies were that of his time and did not look out of his period to draw the subject in this pictorial mode that often is called â€Å"literary† which is no more literary than film. For being a poet there is nothing particularly poetic or literary about this work of art or even any different from his contemporaries. First is the consideration of the fallen woman in imagery which is critical to read the painting. The visual precedent of Hogarth and Blake (poet and painter as well) were in the background of any Pre-Raphaelite who was conscious of being both English and moral at the same time in painting themes. Hogarth’s view was to punish folly and sexuality and Blake had an apocalyptic view of innocence as corrupted by the greed and the great city. Both had been softened by sentimentality and humanitarianism. If a woman was to fall from this, she could always redeem herself through repentance and subsequent integration into the family. The role of the family as a rehabilitation was highly important as it either the foil of rehabilitation or as the instrument of it in the imagery of women in the 19th century. George Morland in his Laetitia series of 1789 demonstrated the down fall of an innocent country girl. In the Fair Penitent