Date of Submission
Spring 2013
Academic Program
Art History
Project Advisor 1
Laurie Dahlberg
Abstract/Artist's Statement
"From Muse to Musician: Portraits of Women and Music at the Turn of the 20th Century" discusses the transformation of the woman in portraiture from the allegorical muse to the female professional through the presence of music. The project highlights the works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John White Alexander, Thomas Wilmer Dewing, John Singer Sargent, and Augustus John as evidence to this transformation in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It discusses how music and musical iconography was used in their portraits to describe both the women they were painting and illustrate the changing roles of women in society, as well as how painting music influenced their relationships with the women they painted.
Distribution Options
Access restricted to On-Campus only
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Schmiedecke, Emma Cristine, "From Muse to Musician: Portraits of Women and Music at the Turn of the 20th Century" (2013). Senior Projects Spring 2013. 187.
https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_s2013/187
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