Art has always held an ambiguous position in human society: on the one hand it has been exploited for promotional use and revered as a stand-in for the entity it represents; on the other hand, its ability to question dogmatic authorities by appealing to an individual's innermost instincts and thoughts has made it a threatening and seditious force to be reckoned with. As a confirmation of this, the subversive power of art, in the form of suppressed colours and controversial portraits, is at the heart of Tracy Chevalier's novel The Virgin Blue (1997). In Chevalier's novels in fact art is perceived as a powerful source both of instability and stability, for it can and often does subvert or otherwise alter our commitments, and with it, our deeply entrenched ways of seeing and organizing the world. The purpose of the present essay therefore is to demonstrate how art becomes the force that leads the female protagonists of her novel to leave the paths that had been assigned to them by custom and seek out their own future.
La Rousse and the Artist: Tracy Chevalier’s Liberation through Images and Colours
DOERR R
2012-01-01
Abstract
Art has always held an ambiguous position in human society: on the one hand it has been exploited for promotional use and revered as a stand-in for the entity it represents; on the other hand, its ability to question dogmatic authorities by appealing to an individual's innermost instincts and thoughts has made it a threatening and seditious force to be reckoned with. As a confirmation of this, the subversive power of art, in the form of suppressed colours and controversial portraits, is at the heart of Tracy Chevalier's novel The Virgin Blue (1997). In Chevalier's novels in fact art is perceived as a powerful source both of instability and stability, for it can and often does subvert or otherwise alter our commitments, and with it, our deeply entrenched ways of seeing and organizing the world. The purpose of the present essay therefore is to demonstrate how art becomes the force that leads the female protagonists of her novel to leave the paths that had been assigned to them by custom and seek out their own future.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
