Routledge Problem Pictures: Women and Men in Victorian Painting (The Nineteenth Century Series)

Product Description During the Victorian period there developed a new anxiety about male-female relations and roles in modern society, as described by a member of the Athenaeum in 1858, ’the distinction of man and woman, their separate as well as their joint rights, begins to occupy the attention of our whole community, and with no small effect’. These essays examine Victorian painting in the light of this 'woman question' by analysing the change in representation of the family, romance, social issues such as emigration and colonialism, the use of the female nude and the traditions of portraiture, history-painting and still life. The art and artists are considered in a socio-political context, and the connections between Victorian sexism, racism and classism are examined. These essays bring to light much previously unknown work (especially by women) and reappraise many well-known paintings. Review ’Pamela Gerrish Nunn is to be praised for her examination of various types of problem pictures for Victorian women artists and general viewers’ Women Artist News Book Review ’Problem Pictures is wide-ranging in its scope, opening up a number of new areas while pursuing a consistent theme. Many ’lost’ paintings are brought into the scholarly arena...a pioneering study’ Apollo