Naked Nymphs and Horny Satyrs

I popped into the Wallace Collection yesterday, after having lunch with my brother near Oxford Street, and found myself entranced by the erotic miniatures in the Boudoir Cabinet. Nestled between the Study and the Boudoir on the first floor of Hertford House is a windowless, murky room where paintings small enough to hold in your hand and gold boxes are on display in beautifully lit cabinets. There are two cases dedicated to intricately carved 18th century snuff boxes and lots of tiny and meticulous portraits of Royalty and other members of the beau monde, scratched onto ivory discs. And then, in three slender cabinets next to the doors and another couple buried amongst the classic portraits are the Marquess’ secret collection of sexual and arousing scenes.

Miniatures were the only pictorial form that could be carried around on a person before the invention of photography – indeed they were made obsolete by the new medium. They were often detailed reproductions of larger portraits or paintings. They were for private rather than public display; the secret passions and devotions of the wealthy; a cherished souvenir. A beloved’s face could be slipped secretly into a pocket to be carried around close to the skin. It was noted by the courtesan, Harriette Wilson, in her Memoirs, that the notoriously licentious 3rd Marquess had miniatures of at least “half a hundred lovely women, black, brown, fair, and even carrotty” in his private apartments. Would he spread the tiny paintings around himself, floating in a collective sea of beauty? Or gaze at them one by one, uninterrupted? And what of the erotic scenes? They could be easily disseminated and shared or would he rather guzzle them down in private?

It’s hard not to lean close when studying these small paintings on ivory or vellum, your breath misting up the glass. There are a scattering of more classic female portraits with a breast or two exposed – as with the direct gaze of the Unknown woman 1840-1870. But the majority of erotic miniatures in the Wallace Collection fall into two broad themes. They are either contemporary scenes of women at their toilette or lying ready to be ravished on a bed hung with heavy curtains or they are scenes of cavorting nymphs and satiated goddesses taken from Antiquity. I was captivated by the toilette scenes. The intimate moments from daily life, or rather, the artist’s imagined daily life of women in their private apartments. In Nude woman on her bed, by Jacques Charlier, a brown-haired woman sits chatting to a friend or servant mostly hidden behind a green curtain. One bare leg bent up and the other on the ground; her shift gaping open and her most intimate place completely exposed. In Woman Washing in a Stream, the woman is without petticoats or slip, her body turned away from the artist’s gaze as she concentrates on splashing water between her legs. Only her round bottom exposed. And the Morning Conversation (1780) by Niclas Lafrensen where two women in various states of undress chat intimately in a boudoir. One lying on her bed on her belly, with her chin in her hand, her entire bottom half exposed and the other woman sitting on a low stool next to the fire with her shift open.

The miniatures depicting scenes from classical myth and legend give the titillating scenes a high-brow legitimacy. They made me think of Rowlandson’s huddle of connoisseurs bending over a painting, monocles squeezed in eyes and faces bursting red. There are nymphs bathing naked in streams, like the three copies of Jacques Charlier’s Diana and Nymphs Bathing (1760-80). Three women in various states of undress wash in a forest and in the right hand corner, a couple of men peer at them through the reeds. There are a few of the ubiquitous Venus after making love with Mars or just lolling on a cloud with a plump cherub scrabbling over her like a loyal pet. There is one of Leda talking to a woman, seemingly unaware that she is about to be raped by a large swan. There is Bacchante, drunk and exposing her breasts. Danae and Pan and Syrinx and cupids darting around the corners. But perhaps the most sinister and overt is Satyrs and Nymphs by Franz Joseph Kisling, painted in the early 18th century. I think it is the satyr in the left hand corner, looking back over his shoulder at the artist, his eyes hard and aroused and his hairy hoofed legs curled beneath him, that I found most disturbing. The young, naked woman lies pale and exposed beneath his dark arm and two other satyrs are tempting her by whispering in her ears and proffering gifts. In a time when we can access any form of pornographic image or video online, I was shocked by the hungry look of a well-hung, half goat-man in an 18th century painting. The girl looks so innocent.

The Wallace Collection’s erotic art in miniature tells us more than merely the predilections of the men who bought them. The voyeuristic element of women dressing or the bathing nymphs or the Classical scenes of love were, it seems to me, the most common outlet for erotic fantasies in the 18th century. But also, the paintings made me curious about the tenderness between the semi-naked women as they bathed or chatted or dressed. Was sexual intimacy between women celebrated? And where are the paintings of naked men who don’t have tails or horns or hooves?