The town square as a socio-political topos in works of Baudelaire and Degas

Authors

Abstract

The article aims to show that Charles Baudelaire and Edgar Degas were notably receptive to the square as a special urban space which tends to strengthen civic consciousness of individuals. Baudelaire and Degas treat a town square as a socio-political topos. But unlike Degas’s painting “Place de la Concorde” (to which a particular attention is paid in the article), motives of squares in Baudelaire’s poems and essays do not form a reflection of modernity’s collective historical consciousness. In other words, they are not associated with the concept of “place of memory (le lieu de mémoire)”. Using this notion Pierre Nora described the places (be it monuments, terrains, events, texts and ideas) that attract collective cultural memory of the nation and belong more to historical present then to historical past as “the points of managing the past in the present”. And we can say about Degas’s painting that it represents the square of Concorde not only as a socio-political topos but also as a place of memory.

Keywords:

Degas, Baudelaire, the town square, Place de la Concorde, socio-political topos, place of memory

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

Maria A. Chernysheva, Saint Petersburg State University

PhD, associate professor of the Department of Interdisciplinary studies and practices in the field of arts of the Faculty of Liberal arts and sciences

References

Литература

1. Бодлер Ш. Цветы зла / пер. с фр. М.: Наука, 1970. 480 с.

2. Baudelaire. Oeuvres completes. Paris: Gallimard, 1954.

3. Бодлер Ш. Об искусстве / пер. с фр. М.: Искусство, 1986. 422 с.

4. Беньямин В. Шарль Бодлер в эпоху зрелого капитализма // Беньямин В. Маски времени. Эссе о культуре и литературе / пер. с нем. и фр. СПб.: Симпозиум, 2004. C. 47–234.

5. Гофман Э. Т. А. Крейслериана. Новеллы / пер. с нем. М.: Музыка, 1990. 400 с.

6. Agulhon M. Paris, la traversée d’Est en Ouest // Les lieux de mémoire. 4 tomes / Dir. P. Nora. Paris: Gallimard, 1997. P. 4589–4624.

7. Meller M. K. Degas’s ‘Place de la Concorde: Vicomte Lepic and His Daughters’ // The Burlington Magazine. Vol. 145. No. 1201 (apr.). 2003. P. 273–281.

8. Tartakowsky D. La construction sociale de l’espace politique: Les usages politiques de la place de la Concorde des années 1880 à nos jours // French Historical Studies. Vol. 27. No. 1 (winter). 2004. P. 145–173.

9. Dombrowski A. History, memory, and instantaneity in Edgar Degas’s Place de la Concorde // Art Bulletin. Vol. 93 (2). 2011. P. 195–219.

10. Clark T. J. The Painting of Modern Life. Paris in the Art of Manet and his Followers. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984.

11. Varnedoe K. A Fine Disregard: What Makes Modern Art Modern. New York: Abrams, 1990.

12. Костеневич А. Г. Эдгар Дега. Площадь Согласия. Заметки о картине. СПб.: Издательство Государственного Эрмитажа, 2012. 152 с.

13. Boggs J. S. Portraits by Degas. Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1962.

14. Buchanan H. Edgar Degas and Ludovic Lepic: An Impressionist Friendship // Cleveland Studies in the History of Art. Vol. 2. 1997. P. 32–121.

15. Чернышева М. А. Историзм вне исторического жанра. Три примера из французской живописи 1870-х годов // Проблемы развития зарубежного искусства. Франция. Материалы научной конференции, посвященной памяти М. В. Доброклонского; под ред. Н. М. Леняшиной. СПб.: С.-Петербургский государственный институт живописи, скульптуры и архитектуры им. И. Е. Репина, 2011. С. 142–149.

16. Нора П., Озуф М., де Пюимеж Ж., Винок М. Франция-память / пер. с фр. СПб.: Издательство С.-Петербургского университета, 1999. 328 с.

References

1. Bodler Sh. Tsvety zla, per. s fr. M.: Nauka, 1970. 480 p.

2. Baudelaire. Oeuvres completes. Paris: Gallimard, 1954.

3. Bodler Sh. Ob iskusstve, per. s fr. M.: Iskusstvo, 1986. 422 p.

4. Ben'iamin V. Sharl' Bodler v epokhu zrelogo kapitalizma. Ben'iamin V. Maski vremeni. Esse o kul'ture i literature, per. s nem. i fr. SPb.: Simpozium, 2004. p. 47–234.

5. Gofman E. T. A. Kreisleriana. Novelly, per. s nem. M.: Muzyka, 1990. 400 p.

6. Agulhon M. Paris, la traversée d’Est en Ouest, Les lieux de mémoire. 4 tomes / Dir. P. Nora. Paris: Gallimard, 1997. P. 4589–4624.

7. Meller M. K. Degas’s ‘Place de la Concorde: Vicomte Lepic and His Daughters’, The Burlington Magazine. Vol. 145. No. 1201 (apr.). 2003. P. 273–281.

8. Tartakowsky D. La construction sociale de l’espace politique: Les usages politiques de la place de la Concorde des années 1880 à nos jours, French Historical Studies. Vol. 27. No. 1 (winter). 2004. P. 145–173.

9. Dombrowski A. History, memory, and instantaneity in Edgar Degas’s Place de la Concorde, Art Bulletin. Vol. 93 (2). 2011. P. 195–219.

10. Clark T. J. The Painting of Modern Life. Paris in the Art of Manet and his Followers. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984.

11. Varnedoe K. A Fine Disregard: What Makes Modern Art Modern. New York: Abrams, 1990.

12. Kostenevich A. G. Edgar Dega. Ploshchad' Soglasiia. Zametki o kartine. SPb.: Izdatel'stvo Gosudarstvennogo Ermitazha, 2012. 152 s.

13. Boggs J. S. Portraits by Degas. Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1962.

14. Buchanan H. Edgar Degas and Ludovic Lepic: An Impressionist Friendship, Cleveland Studies in the History of Art. Vol. 2. 1997. P. 32–121.

15. Chernysheva M. A. Istorizm vne istoricheskogo zhanra. Tri primera iz frantsuzskoi zhivopisi 1870-kh godov, Problemy razvitiia zarubezhnogo iskusstva. Frantsiia. Materialy nauchnoi konferentsii, posviashchennoi pamiati M. V. Dobroklonskogo; pod red. N. M. Leniashinoi. SPb.: S.-Peterburgskii gosudarstvennyi institut zhivopisi, skul'ptury i arkhitektury im. I. E. Repina, 2011. p. 142–149.

16. Nora P., Ozuf M., de Piuimezh Zh., Vinok M. Frantsiia-pamiat', per. s fr. SPb.: Izdatel'stvo S.-Peterburgskogo universiteta, 1999. 328 p.

Downloads

Published

2014-06-03

How to Cite

Chernysheva, M. A. . (2014). The town square as a socio-political topos in works of Baudelaire and Degas. Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. Arts, 4(2), 197–207. Retrieved from https://artsjournal.spbu.ru/article/view/4504

Issue

Vol. 4 No. 2 (2014)

Section

Interdisciplinary studies

License

Articles of "Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. Arts" are open access distributed under the terms of the License Agreement with Saint Petersburg State University, which permits to the authors unrestricted distribution and self-archiving free of charge.