Episode #53: Shock Art: Courbet's The Origin of the World (Season 5, Episode 7)

ArtCurious Podcast

ArtCurious

Arts, History, Visual Arts

4.8 • 847 Ratings

🗓️ 24 June 2019

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Works that we take for granted today as masterpieces, or as epitomes of the finest of fine art, could also have been considered ugly, of poor quality, or just bad when they were first made. With the passage of time comes a calm and an acceptance. But that doesn’t change the fact that there are many works peppered throughout art history that were straight-up shocking to the public when they were first presented decades, or even hundreds of years ago. Today's work of "shock art:" Courbet’s The Origin of the World. Please SUBSCRIBE and REVIEW our show on Apple Podcasts! Twitter / Facebook/ Instagram SPONSORS The Great Courses (85% off digital course Leonardo da Vinci and the Italian High Renaissance, and more) Skillshare (get two months of unlimited courses FREE with our link) ThirdLove (get 15% off your first order with our link) The Citizenry (get a $50 gift voucher for any purchase of $200 or more with promo code ARTCURIOUS) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:31.5	The Art Curious podcast is sponsored by Anchorlight. For more information about all of Anchorlight's artistic and creative endeavors,
0:39.7	please visit Anchorlightrolly.com. Just to note that this episode contains adult content. Really,
0:47.8	really adult content. So please take care when listening. There are just a slew of questions that I get asked over and over again
0:56.7	as an art historian, because there are things that people are always interested in. What's so great
1:02.1	about the Mona Lisa? And why is she smiling like that? How come so many ancient sculptures are
1:07.0	missing limbs? And why are there so many old-looking babies in medieval and early Renaissance
1:12.1	paintings? Good question, by the way. But there's one that I get asked by art lovers who have
1:17.2	traveled to Paris or who are a little more familiar with 19th century painting than most.
1:22.0	Because at the Musei d'Orsay, there is a painting on display that's just flat out shocking
1:26.8	to see on a wall, where anyone
1:29.0	can walk by it. And those who have seen it frequently come back to me and say, why? How is this
1:36.1	allowed? So, what is this work of art? It's a full-on close-up view of a woman's genitalia.
1:47.0	Nothing more, and certainly nothing less.
1:57.0	Some people think that visual art is dry, boring, lifeless. But the stories behind those paintings, sculptures, drawings, and photographs are
2:02.6	weirder, crazier, or more fun than you can imagine.
2:06.6	In this episode, the last in our two-season deep dive into shock art, we're covering one of the most shocking paintings of all.
2:13.6	Gustav Courbet's The Origin of the World.
	...

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