I didn't watch the Oscars last night, but I'm quite bemused about all the hoopla over Angelina Jolie's Right Leg. Apparently it's set off a rash of badly-photoshopped images of her leg invading various situations, my favorite being this one:
I guess it's a bit scandalous, though I hardly see how a high-slit dress could qualify as "scandalous" here in the second decade of the 21st century. But it reminded me of something else once deemed rather scandalous, I'm sure: in the transition between Archaic and Classical sculpture, draped females started to exhibit drapery that was rather...clingy. And over time, more and more of the underlying surface was revealed. Take, for example, one of the Caryatids from the Erechtheion:
This here is a copy from Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli, but you get the idea. The left leg is more traditionally Archaic, shrouded entirely by the drapery. The maidens from the porch were, after all, rather Archaistic in form - look at their solid poses (since they functioned like columns) and their hairstyles. But right there, oh-so-inconspicuously, the kore's right leg is readily visible under the diaphanous drapery. The drapery is so thin, it's as if it isn't even there. Scandalous in the 5th century BCE? I wouldn't be at all surprised.
Image of the Caryatid from Tivoli is scanned from A. Scholl. 1995. “Χοηφοροι: Zur Deutung der Korenhalle des Erechtheion.” JdI 110: 179-212.
I guess it's a bit scandalous, though I hardly see how a high-slit dress could qualify as "scandalous" here in the second decade of the 21st century. But it reminded me of something else once deemed rather scandalous, I'm sure: in the transition between Archaic and Classical sculpture, draped females started to exhibit drapery that was rather...clingy. And over time, more and more of the underlying surface was revealed. Take, for example, one of the Caryatids from the Erechtheion:
This here is a copy from Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli, but you get the idea. The left leg is more traditionally Archaic, shrouded entirely by the drapery. The maidens from the porch were, after all, rather Archaistic in form - look at their solid poses (since they functioned like columns) and their hairstyles. But right there, oh-so-inconspicuously, the kore's right leg is readily visible under the diaphanous drapery. The drapery is so thin, it's as if it isn't even there. Scandalous in the 5th century BCE? I wouldn't be at all surprised.
Image of the Caryatid from Tivoli is scanned from A. Scholl. 1995. “Χοηφοροι: Zur Deutung der Korenhalle des Erechtheion.” JdI 110: 179-212.
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