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Women Throughout the Ages

Looking at the images in magazines today, it is easy to see what society wants in a woman: tall, thin, muscular—"perfect." But it's hard to know what people actually prefer. In some cultures "big is beautiful." In other cultures piercing or tattooing is considered beautiful. Yet in Western society, the image on the magazine cover seems to prevail, making it hard to imagine that we haven't always valued thinness as the aesthetic ideal. In fact, artists from prehistoric times to the present have represented and valued women of many different shapes and sizes.

The most famous woman of prehistoric Europe is the Venus of Willendorf. The limestone statuette, which dates back to 24,000-22,000 BCE, was discovered in 1908 in the town of Willendorf, Austria. The statue is small—only 11.1 centimeters high—but extremely curvy and voluptuous. The Venus has full breasts, a protruding fleshy stomach, and plump legs. Some think the name "Venus" may have been meant ironically, as Venus was the classical goddess of beauty and love and was traditionally tall and slender, modestly covering her breasts and pubic area. However, it is the Venus's corpulence (extreme heaviness) that might have made her special. Some scholars speculate that in the hunter-gatherer society of the Stone Age, most women would have been thin and nimble, eating only what they could hunt or gather. They say that the Venus of Willendorf's obesity would have implied that she led a life of leisure—that she didn't need to work to get her food. Other scholars believe that the Venus of Willendorf represents a Paleolithic deity: the Earth Mother or Mother Goddess. Still others take a middle ground, saying that the Venus is so lifelike that she was probably modeled after a very special woman but meant to represent a goddess. Either way, this ideal woman, a goddess who was admired and possibly worshipped by her creators, is a far cry from the classical ideal.

The seventeenth-century Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens is also famous for his buxom, curvaceous women. Rubens's nude female figures generally had plenty of flesh and cellulite (a type of fat that looks like dimples, or indentations, in the skin). Famous for his religious, allegorical, and historical artworks, as well as his portraits, he painted many famous women. For instance, his paintings "Venus at a Mirror" and "Andromeda" depict the rear and front view of large, fleshy women. The Virgin Mary, although usually shown clothed, is often large, with her heaving bosom escaping from her dress. His portrait of his wife, Helene Fourment, depicts her with a protruding tummy and dimpled cellulite around her knees. In seventeenth-century Europe, a woman's large tummy was considered one of her most erotic features. And Rubens was not alone in his ideas about the female body. An extremely talented and prolific painter, he influenced many future generations of painters with his approach to the female nude, such as Watteau, Fragonard, and Renoir. His style even coined a new adjective to describe women: Rubenesque, meaning plump, fleshy, and voluptuous.

The twentieth-century photographer Irving Penn is most famous for his Vogue photos of fashion models. In his professional life, the models he photographed tended to be, as most fashion models are, extremely thin. However, in his private artistic life, Penn spent the summer of 1949 producing a series of nude photographs which featured only the curves, soft flesh, and bulbous tummies of large women. When he showed these photos to his Vogue editor, Alexander Liberman, and to the famous photographer Edward Steichen, neither saw the beauty in them, and Penn stored them away. Fifty years later, however, Penn's forgotten nudes are resurfacing at an exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, one of the most important museums in the world. The photographs have caused controversy and negative and positive criticism. In all of the photos the woman's face is cut off, and her body is presented more as a landscape than as a portrait. Although Liberman and Steichen rejected the photos at the time, something in these large women attracted Penn, and something attracted the Metropolitan Museum. Whether it be erotic or purely aesthetic, the models’ curves grabbed the eye of this famous photographer.

In conclusion, we can see that in the history of Western art, large women were often considered more attractive than slimmer ones. So why then, does Western society seem to value thin women so much today? Why are women made to feel that skinny is ideal? The truth is that ideal images change. In the 1960s Twiggy, the super-thin model, was "in," but in the 80s the ideal was a bit heavier. Perhaps the future will return us to an age when robust women are considered sexy. Doubtful, but possible.

Getting the Main Ideas

Answer True or False for the statements below.


1		In Western society today, "big is beautiful."


2		The Venus of Willendorf is from Africa.


3		The Venus of Willendorf is an example of Paleolithic (Stone Age) art.


4		The Venus of Willendorf was probably admired by her creators.


5		Rubens was a famous sculptor.


6		Rubens was an influential painter.


7		Although Rubens painted large fleshy women, his wife was actually very thin.


8		Irving Penn is famous for photographing thin women (fashion models).


9		Penn's large nudes were an immediate success.


10		The author thinks that big bodies will come back in fashion.

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