Medical Discourse & Avant-Garde Art:
The Intersection between Science and Art, History and Practice in Early Twentieth Century Paris.
Abstract: This paper seeks to demonstrate that the relationship between medical science and the visual arts in the early twentieth century was more closely integrated than has hitherto been thought. Interest in the sciences, medical discoveries and innovations marked this period and the inter-related aspects of the two discourses of art and science can be demonstrated by closer examination of key protagonists, such as the poet-writer Guillaume Apollinaire and his relationship with certain avant-garde artists of the period.
It could be argued that Apollinaire and his personal interests in medico-scientific discourse and related scientific innovations acted as a catalyst for the development of certain ground breaking aesthetic approaches and novel iconographic references as demonstrated in the work of Picasso and Chagall respectively. Indeed other authors have demonstrated that Apollinaire’s legacy had a part in shaping the ideas and concepts of a more medico-scientific nature developed by artists and writers as disparate as Duchamp, André Breton and Georgio de Chirico.
This paper focuses on the earlier integration of novel medico-scientific ideas into an aggressively avant-garde set of visual practices starting with a brief examination of the Cubist fragmented surface and the material evidence that links part of the development of Cubist techniques with medical discourse. It then moves on to examine in detail key works by Marc Chagall from the period in which he was in close contact with Apollinaire in Paris; 1911-1914. The iconography of the works relate to contemporary medical innovations and practices as well as to more ancient and esoteric medico-scientific constructs informed by alchemical texts and imagery.(1)
It has become an art historical truism to state that Paris, at the start of the twentieth century, was the artistic and intellectual capital of Europe. The quasi-linear, Hegelian, narrative of art history that dominated Western art historical discourse over the last century has, however, often overlooked the more complex relationships and counter discourses that have shaped and informed avant-garde art history. Revisionist historical analyses that dominated the 1960s and 70s (Marxist, Feminist, Racial considerations and so on) made some inroads into the project of reclaiming the past to give a voice to those artists, practices and accents within art history that had long been silenced by the weight of a narrow and hegemonic discipline. However, even then there were omissions, silences and skewed representations in the narrative of avant-garde art practice, its history and debates. This could be argued to be inevitable since all writing of history is partial. However the focus on artists and their practice as a discreet entity, as autonomous and something set apart from everyday life is another reason why the more complex relationship between art history and art practice has been presented as a more reductionist, causal or biographical account at the expense of more complex, interesting and interwoven discursive constructs of the practices and debates that constituted avant-garde art in the early twentieth century.
The standard art historical reconstruction of the discursive intersections at play within a self consciously constructed ‘avant-garde’ of the period tend to focus on the forward looking, emphatically ‘modern’ and ground breaking iconography and innovative formal practices of a select group of practitioners operating within Europe. It has variously been dominated by a formalist/Modernist set of interests and concerns. This often overlooks the contribution of seemingly contradictory discourses, interests and material that in fact were crucial to the development of this avowedly forward looking, set of ground breaking practices.
Medical discourse is a case in point and although there has been some considerable discussion of psychological aspects of medical discourse and its interconnection with avant-garde art practices, less has been said about more material examples of medical discourse and its impact upon the development of avant-garde art practice in the early twentieth century. Anatomy, as an obvious example of medical discourse, frequently connected to art practice, is something that has more often been associated with academic or classical practice; not the radical work of the avant-garde. However evidence shows that both considerations of anatomy and more overt references of a medical nature appear to have been made by critics and supporters of Cubism than to any other artistic movement in the pre-1914 period.
Apollinaire's reference and analogy to Picasso's art practice in early 1912 being akin to that of a surgeon dissecting a cadaver and producing an artistic transformation 'with the science and method of a great surgeon', was just one such medical analogy made, in this case, in support of the artist and his stylistic modus operandi.(2) For example in 1912, Picasso's drawings and paintings can be seen to render the anatomy of the human body as a dissected, cubistically schematised set of lines and forms(3).
This stylistic process was begun some years earlier as a more defined characteristic formal quality of Cubism seen in drawings and paintings from 1909-1910 for example Picasso’s Girl with Madolin (Fanny Tellier) Paris 1910(4).
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Indeed the association of Cubism with anatomical dissection was made as early as 1911, in a comparison of Cubism with an anatomical atlas by the celebrated surgeon Dr Doyen.(5) The atlas showed dissected cadavers using Doyen’s new method of freezing the cadaver, slicing it lengthways and then photographing the cross sections. Soffici, friend of Apollinaire, and long time acquaintance of Picasso, commented on this in 1913, asserting that the Cubists were studying Dr Doyen’s ‘new anatomy’.(6)
It would seem more than coincidental then that more than one of Picasso’s 1913 works included a medical reference.
Picasso’s Cubist collage, Guitar. El Diluvo (1913) reveals newspaper cuttings that include an advertisement for ‘Dr Cassa’, a specialist in venereal disease, and for Dr Dolcet an oculist. The hidden encoded pun has been suggested by Francis Frascina in reference to the title; DILUV working as a synecdoche could suggest ‘she-wolf’ (Louve) signifying the female’s dangerous sexuality in conjunction with the signifier of the guitar shape as female body and the references to venereal disease. The reference to the oculist could also signify both as a pun concerning eyesight being no guarantee of safe sexual encounter, but could also be a reference to the common association of blindness and problems with eyesight engendered by syphilis.(7) Of course the theme was not without precedent within Picasso’s work. His early paintings from 1902-4 included reference to prostitution and congenital syphilis and its complications (8) and the interconnection of these themes found new expression in the well documented 1907 painting Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.(9) Another Cubist collage of 1913, Picasso’s Bottle and Wine glass, also contained a medical reference to Dr Doyen and some of his medical products.(10) Such medical references may at first seem incongruous, particularly the reference to anatomical surgery and the Cubist fractured surface. However, the discussion of anatomy and proportions of the body, particularly in relation to artists such as Albrecht Dürer and Leonardo da Vinci, had informed some of the Cubist discussions of aesthetics at Puteaux, in Villon's studio and at Gleizes' studio in Courbevoie.(11) Apollinaire's own fascination with a renewal of the classical ideal of a rational conception of harmony could well have had an impact on such Cubist discussions in which he participated. The poet's interest in the work of Agrippa von Nettesheim would have led him to an awareness of Alberti's Exempeda system of proportion, mentioned by Agrippa who drew upon Francesco Giorgi's Harmonia mundi totius which has been suggested as one of Dürer's likely sources for his theory of proportions.(12) It is familiarity with such Renaissance traditions that provided the framework for Apollinaire's defence of Cubism in April 1912, when he talks about geometric figures being the essence of draughtsmanship and geometry being the most basic rule of painting.(13)
Contemporary developments in anatomy and medicine, such as those commented upon above comparing Dr Doyen's anatomical and surgical work with Cubist aesthetics and formal composition is yet another indication of how the avant-garde artists and their allies, such as Apollinaire, used both classical and Renaissance models, as well as current developments and topical examples from medical discourse in their pursuit of novelty and difference.
The use of 'dissection' as a metaphor of the Cubist aesthetic also contributed to the role that 'médecine et les médecins' played in the critical reception of Cubism by commentators who saw it as 'scientific' and saw the artists who practised Cubism as abandoning their studios for 'laboratories'.(14) There were also frequent humorous connections being made between the avant-garde and medical discourse, for example the satirical illustrations by André Warnod found in journals such as Le Sourire, 4th April 1912 where reference was made to a 'Dr Radinsky' and his search for the microbes of the 'terrible maladie' that drives the young avant-garde painters. This more routine lampooning of avant-garde art ran as a counterpoint to the more serious critical reception of Cubism by some critics who considered its formal properties as a symptom of the artist's pathology.(15)
Within such a climate, the discussion of Dr Eugène Doyen and his work being considered in connection to Cubist formal principles and their painting practices was not as gratuitous as it may at first appear. Doyen was widely known to the Parisian public because of a number of scandals reported in the press and through satirical illustrations that further disseminated knowledge of this infamous, almost mythical medical figure. He had been associated with early innovations for cancer treatment and was celebrated for innovative techniques in abdominal and vaginal surgery as well as for the adaptation of many surgical instruments. Known as the 'Barnum of surgery', Doyen received much publicity for his involvement in the attempt to surgically separate 'Siamese twins' the Orissa sisters, in Paris. The operation was photographed; each stage was also recorded on film. Unfortunately the twins died, but the resulting publicity added to Doyen's somewhat ambiguous reputation. He wrote many surgical manuals that were richly illustrated but by the early twentieth century was associated with medical cinematography. Public screenings of his films started in the late nineteenth century and by the early twentieth century these medical films were widely shown in commercial theatres across Europe.(16) Such films were of interest to the public, and arguably to the artists under consideration. The public reception and interest in Doyen and his work was fuelled by frequent references in newspapers and images in satirical illustrated journals including La Chronique Médicale and Fantasio. Such periodicals were familiar to Apollinaire, who had copies of these periodicals in his collection as well as other medico-artistic journals.(17) However, it was for a scandal involving a false cure for cancer that Doyen became more publicly renowned in 1908. The newspapers reported the court case that followed. After his premature death on 2nd December 1916, Dr Doyen was celebrated in a poem published by the magazine Sic, edited by the Cubist sympathiser Pierre Albert Birot.(18) Apollinaire also specifically mentioned Doyen in 1914, and may well have been aware of a work by Alberto Savinio published in La Voce in 1916 that invokes Doyen and medico-surgical procedures.(19) Apollinaire also commented upon Doyen in a brief article he wrote for Paris-Journal on 1st August 1914 concerning Doyen’s appearance as medical expert in a murder trial. It is not surprising then, given the notoriety of Doyen, that Picasso should include a newspaper clipping in his Cubist collage of early 1913 Bottle and wine glass that includes a reference to Doyen and his medical products mycolysine and phymalose.(20)
Picasso's works from this period do appear, as Apollinaire suggested, to dissect the human body in the way a surgeon may dissect a cadaver during an autopsy. In fact images of corpses, autopsies and surgery abounded in contemporary satirical publications such as L'Assiette au Beurre and Fantasio.
The focus for Picasso on death and images of the dying was, however, often far from humorous. From his early paintings connected to the suicide of his close friend Carles Casagemas, and his 1902 paintings of Dead Man and Head of a Dead Woman, inspired by a visit to the morgue at the Hospital de Santa Creu I Sant Pau, (to which he gained access through his friend Dr Jacint Reventós, a medical intern at the hospital) Picasso's images of the dead and dying have a sense of his purported Spanish morbidity and interest in 'misère humane'.
However, death became even more closely associated with personal tragedy in 1915 when Picasso's then mistress, Eva Gouel died of cancer. Her illness began some years before; as early as June 1913 Max Jacob had commented upon Eva's deterioration in a letter to Apollinaire. Fabre has indicated his assumption that the painting Woman in Shirt sitting in an armchair, Paris, (Autumn 1913) is of Eva, and the pointed breasts indicate the 'exact nature of Eva's illness'.(21) Presumably he means breast cancer, although he does not state this explicitly. Eva was the subject of three of Picasso's drawings: Eva Dying, Eva on Her Deathbed and Eva Dead all produced in Paris, 1915. These more serious and morbid images run counter to the proliferation of humorous illustrations on the topic that appeared in newspapers and periodicals of the time. Apollinaire's own interest in medico-scientific discourse, scientists and doctors can be seen as early as 1900 in his work when he ghosted part of a novel concerning a scientist- superman. Apollinaire also made scientists and doctors his 'Antichrists' in The Glory of the Olive and The Poet Assassinated and Other Stories. His interest in medical science seems to also be dualistic; at once both serious and iconoclastic. The cross fertilisation of ideas and interests between artists and medical practitioners is an undeniable feature of the particular socio-cultural milieu under investigation here. However, there were in fact older more esoteric interconnections between art practice and art theory at this time, as revealed in the iconography of Chagall's 1913-14 paintings Hommage à Apollinaire and Paris Through The Window.
Much of the early avant-garde’s representation of medical iconography and metaphor was derived from a fusion of classical, Renaissance models with reference to contemporary medical discourse. Apollinaire's interest in Rosicrucian mysticism, alchemy and hermetic, emblematic sixteenth century literature has been established for some time now.(22) However, the poet's interest in contemporary medical themes and iconography has only recently been tentatively addressed, and more in connection to metaphors for Cubist formal aesthetics than any specific medical iconography. As will be demonstrated below, it was in fact a fusion of the older, more occult/alchemical interests with contemporary iconographic evidence of a medical nature that informed both Apollinaire's interest in such themes as the androgyn and hermaphrodite as well as informing the paintings of certain artists acquainted with the poet. The polyvalent nature of many of the avant-garde works under investigation here reveals the dualistic interests of Apollinaire in both the past and the modern in terms of occultist, mythological or medical themes. The alchemical construct of the androgyn has been examined in relation to certain avant-garde works, but until now the contemporary medical aspect of interest in the hermaphrodite/androgyn has not been commented upon.
Apollinaire's interest in medical discourse, as evidenced by his collection of medical related literature in his library is further evidenced by examination of his art criticism and writings particularly from 1912 on when more references and allusions of a medical kind can be found.
Two authors have noted this interest, Samaltanos (1981) and Rousseau (2001), but their investigations limited the context of Apollinaire's interest to, on the one hand, more psychological references, and on the other, to specific comments concerning medical metaphors in relation to Cubist formal aesthetics.(23) My argument here, is that the poet's interest in such themes extended beyond those perimeters and, through interaction with his wider circle of friends and associates of both an artistic and medical kind, we can trace the interest in medico-scientific discourse through to its inclusion in and articulation by certain avant-garde art works of the period, produced by those artists with whom Apollianire was closely associated.
The fact that some of these artists, Picasso and Chagall for example, quite openly declared little interest in 'theories' or by extension, carefully conceived/contrived strategies of hermetic symbolism and signification is, in fact, partially undermined by synchronic examination of key works and their content and meanings. Rather than having to 'consult' specific texts, the climate was such that certain interests and iconography of a medical kind were readily available, either in the popular press, or through intermediaries and figures such as Apollinaire, or perhaps a combination.
Interest in alchemical and hermetic tradition has been identified in Apollinaire's writing from as early as 1901. In part a legacy of Symbolist revival of interest in hermetic confraternities and alchemical symbolism and allegory, the articulation of such themes by Apollinaire and his circle of painter friends was, however, far from the serious and ritualistic attitude to such ideas practised by the Symbolists. Apollinaire's evocation of such themes was almost ironic, half serious and half playful. This Rabalaisian quality to the interpretation and articulation of hermetic themes is one that extended to the artist's who took up those ideas in their paintings.
Chagall's Hommage à Apollinaire 1913-14 contains overtly Apollinairean iconography, particularly in the alchemical and cabbalistic image of the androgyne. As has been established, the segmented, circular, configuration of Chagall's image alludes to the Grande Roue (the large ferris wheel erected for the Paris 1900 World’s Fair) and the circle of the Zodiac as well as to a fragmented face of a clock. The 'simultaneous disc' relates to Orphic iconography found in Delaunay's paintings, where the disc could be seen to signify a variety of meanings and references relating to such motifs; Leonardo's illustration of transverse light waves, the neo-impressionist colour wheel, and La Grand Rue de Paris for example.
It also relates to the structural representation of the cosmos and the representation of 'divine human form' in Renaissance imagery, for example Robert Fludd’s diagrammes of the macrocosm and microcosm (Frankfurt 1621) [left]. The androgyne figure at the centre of Chagall's circle acts as the Orphic symbol of perfect man, the hermaphrodite of alchemy; a hermetic symbol of simultaneous allusions, it also relates to the image of Adam and Eve, a theme explored by Chagall in his earlier painting of 1912. The heart motif which also appears in Paris Through The Window, 1913-14 , and in an earlier work Half Past Three Or The Poet, 1911 appears to link these works primarily to Apollinaire, although reference to other poets such as Chagall's friend Blaise Cendrars can also be seen in certain aspects of these works. The cat and heart shape near the right arm/sleeve of the The Poet are motifs that appear again in Paris Through The Window. The sketched 'A' and the drunken poet with the bottle of eau de vie appears to signify Apollinaire, author of Alcools.
In Hommage à Apollinaire the androgyne represents spiritual harmony. The androgyne was a frequent theme in Symbolist art, particularly in works presented through the Salon de la Rose + Croix, where the application of religious and occult ideas to art was a particular motivation. The androgyne related not only to Platonic ideals, and alchemical thought, but was also related to Jewish religious narratives. The original Adam of Genesis was an androgynous being, a composite of heart and soul. The creation of Eve from Adam resulted in a divisive universe. In Hommage à Apollinaire Chagall has made reference to this theme in both the hermaphrodite /Adam and Eve figure holding the apple and in the four names inscribed around the heart motif. These represent the poets and critics who had encouraged and supported Chagall; Guillaume Apollinaire, Herwarth Walden, Blaise Cendrars and Canudo.
It also represents the unification of the four elements, which in Jewish narratives were originally united. Parts of the names of the four men act as a synecdoches for aire (air), Wald (German for wood/earth), cenrdres (fire), and eau (water) respectively. This word play by Chagall is something found in Apollianire's own writings and posturing and also relates to the hermetic language of alchemy. Chagall is also alluding to Cabbalistic doctrines which take reunification of diverse elements into a single form as a goal of mankind. The alchemically created hermaphrodite, hermetic androgyne or rebis 'trampled the four elements under foot to impose order on material chaos' and the union of these elements and the masculine and feminine principles into a holy alchemical hermaphrodite represented 'the completion of matter with spirit'.
The union of masculine and feminine principles found in alchemical writings was often represented by the union of the sun and moon, and the representation of the hermaphrodite as being born from Mercury (Hermes) and Venus (Aphrodite). The personal associations of the figure of Mercury and the Sun (Apollo) with Apollinaire would have been known to Chagall. The androgyne can therefore be seen as partially alluding to Apollinaire and his interests. It can also represent Chagall as the unifying principle between the various personalities referenced around the heart motif and the painter’s name appearing above the two-headed hermaphrodite has been argued by Hicken to associate the painter with the mystic signification of the androgyne and Orphic art. Chagall and Apollinaire knew of the cabbalistic sources for the androgyne, and Apollinaire was familiar with the Hermetic tradition found in the writings of Péladan, for which he expressed admiration. Péladan, who was associated with the Salon de la Rose + Croix, advocated the idea of platonic love as the ideal and ultimate form of spiritual expression. In his novel L'Androgyne he writes;
[the androgyne] represents the initial state of man, which is identical
to his final state. He assigns to him the principle of evolution and the
secret of success...and this secret decodes itself easily through the
word 'love' which, heraldically,consists in the rapprochement of the beard
and the breast of androgynous passions. The sphinx incarnates the complete
theology with the solution of origins and finalities...'(25)
Such imagery and concepts of the androgyne also has implications for Chagall's other work of the period, Paris Through The Window.
In this source Péladan's conception of the androgyne is emblematically represented by the Sphinx, but is also identified as male by the masculine pronoun (Hermaphroditus was, of course, the son of Aphrodite and Hermes / Venus and Hermes). The reason for this is to differentiate between the androgyne and the gynander.
In his book Le Gynandre (Paris:1891) the essential masculinity of the androgyne is made clear:
The androgyne is the virginal adolescent male, still somewhat feminine,
while the gynander can only be the woman who strives for male
characteristics, the sexual usurper: the feminine aping the masculine...
The first originates from the Bible and designates the initial stage of
human development; the Graeco-Catholic tradition has consecrated its use,
whereas I have taken the other from botany,and with it I baptise not the
sodomite but any tendency on the part of woman to take on the role of man.
Thus the gynander is associated with women and they are seen as a hindrance to the spiritual advancement of mankind. Recalling the Hebrew legend of Adam as original androgyne, the return to androgyny is achieved through purity and spirituality of male chastity. However, it was a decidedly modern interpretation of these themes in which Chagall engaged, with the various references to the poets and critics he was in contact with and the iconographic motif of the Grand Roue, seen not only in Delaunay's paintings and Chagall's other work Paris Through The Window, but also in popular postcards of the period, that served to highlight the modernité of Chagall's painting. This modern conception of more ancient and esoteric symbolism can also be extended to the image of the androgyne/ hermaphrodite itself. The hermaphrodite was a popular topic to be found in the journals and periodicals of arts and sciences that Apollinaire collected and owned. As the physical embodiment of the mystical androgyne it would have held double fascination for Apollinaire and his circle. Journals from Apollinaire’s own collection such as Aesculape, La Chronique Médicale and La France Médical, covered many diverse and extraordinary topics of a medical, artistic and literary nature. Articles on hermaphrodites, conjoined twins, deformed foetuses and degenerative complications of syphilis are some of the subjects focused on in such publications.
The medical category of hermaphrodite was seen as the antithesis of the ideal union embodied in the alchemical androgyne. It was a pathology that included a blurring of the distinctions between a single body that carried both male and female sexual organs and genitalia and the various forms of conjoined-twins, some with one body and two heads, some with two bodies joined at either head or body level. Since antiquity such beings have been of fascination either presented as 'monsters' for example in Ambroise Paré's Des Monstres et Prodiges (1634) [below] or medical curiosities in need of surgical intervention. The transgression of sexual boundaries signified by the hermaphrodite raised fears of homosexuality and sexual excess. This was something that was prevalent in texts concerning the hermaphrodite as early as the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Sexuality was still part of the discussion concerning hermaphrodites in the late nineteenth century.
Dr. Henry Meige, (1866-1940) was a prolific writer for many journals and periodicals including those owned by Apollinaire mentioned above. Meige also worked at the Ecole des Beaux Arts and the Salpêtrière hospital in Paris. In 1895 he wrote an article on 'Infantilism, Feminism and the Classical Hermaphrodite' which addressed his two main interests, Art and Medicine.
In discussing the hermaphrodite found in art, Meige asserts that these had, in part, a basis in reality. He declares that the Greeks, whilst generally reluctant to portray the ugliness of sickness and disease, were not deterred by representing deformities or strange body shapes, and that whilst most human deformities are unattractive, there is still an element of beauty in the subject which attracts the attention of the artist.(26) However Meige goes on to note that the true hermaphrodites in life, those people with both male and female genitalia, are 'monstruosités inesthétiques' which although they may have some curiosity value for artists, were in fact only 'inspirations for licentious images'. It is what Meige terms 'féminisme' and 'infantilisme' of the human body that he sees as inspiring the classical hermaphrodite. These cases in medicine relate to what we think of as 'hermaphrodism', cases of sexual diamorphism, but also to the under-development of sexual organs, these aspects Meige sees as closer to the harmonious fusion of male and female attributes by the artists in creating the sacred androgyne image. Meige also acknowledges the work of Dr. Paul Richer in ' Les Hermaphrodites dans L'Art.' where Richer makes the connection between living pathologies of hermaphrodism and those representations found in art.(27) This fascination continued well into the twentieth century. In 1908 La Chronique Médicale had a series of short articles relating to hermaphrodism and 'personnage bicéphale'.
The bicéphale, literally 'two headed' being, had a history within medical discourse that was bound up with the display and 'spectacle' of freak shows and museums of montrocities and human deformities. It was frequent, and often horrific, image in such periodicals dealing with the arts and medical science and is related to the hermaphrodite in that the two heads could often be of different sex. Historical anecdotes concerning such beings were reproduced in Aesculape. In the copies owned by Apollinaire, particularly 1912, there are numerous articles specifically relating to the androgyne and hermaphrodites as well as others dealing with 'les monstres'. From Seventeenth century narratives, to nineteenth and twentieth century medical articles, the bicéphale (also known as 'dicephalus' in medical terms) has been a focus for diverse authors. We know that the medical interest of Apollinaire and certain art critics in 1911/12 was being articulated in reference to Cubist aesthetics and more specifically with the evocation of Dr. Doyen's name. It was noted above that a high profile case concerning Doyen's attempt to separate conjoined twins had been reported in the press. It seems plausible then to suggest that more material sources of a medical kind may well have informed Chagall's image of the androgyne in Hommage operating as it does within the realms of multiple signification, qua hermetic coding. Such ideas engendered by the discursive accounts concerning art and medicine permeated beyond the specialist periodicals to the more popular press and so to wider dissemination of such themes among a non-specialist audience.
Chagall's other painting of this period Orphée 1913-14 makes overt and obvious reference to Orpheus and the physical bisexuality that Orphism in classical mythology helped to popularise.
However, the body type as represented by Chagall is morphologically similar to the images of young men 'suffering' from infantilisme and féminisme that were reproduced in Meige's article on Hermaphrodites. Such images were also to be found in the more popularist medical journals owned by Apollinaire.
Chagall's Orphée has a body type of the 'ideal' androgyne in Péladan's terms, the 'virginal adolescent male, still somewhat feminine' which corresponds directly with the contemporary medical descriptions of infantilisme and féminisme. Given the obvious references and links to Apollinaire and Apollinarean iconography it is possible to suggest that again, more contemporary medical iconography may well have informed Chagall's image of Orphée in a similar way to that of the androgyne/bicéphale as a more material medical iconographic source for his painting Hommage à Apollinaire.
This becomes even more convincing when the term bicéphale is examined in its socio-cultural context. By the early twentieth century the common term, the 'argot', used to describe medical men with other interests, usually in the arts was 'bicéphale'. These bicéphales included eminent doctors and surgeons who also pursued literary or painting careers. Dr. Witkowski was one such literary bicéphale, producing diverse works of a medico-artistic kind. His collections of poetry, prose, anecdote and puns appeared in Apollinaire's own library.
A regular feature of Parisian cultural life during this period was the ‘dîner des bicéphales’ held twice a year. A report in La Chronique Médicale (1906) described how initially Dr. Paul Richer (who was nominated by the members of the Académie des Beaux-Arts and the Académie de Médecine) proposed to call this 'réunion gastronomique' the 'Dîner des Hermaphrodites'. This was overturned in favour of the 'Dîner des Bicéphales' but shows that even at the time there was slippage of meaning between the idea of the hermaphrodite as two headed being and the Doctor/bicéphale as a professional man having two interests or pursuits.
As an evocation of Apollianirean iconography, the bicéphale image appears again in Chagall's Paris Through The Window, 1913-14. This worked, (singled out for praise by Apollinaire in his review of the exhibition at Der Sturm gallery in Berlin in June 1914) embraces the bicéphale themes that simultaneously represents both past and present; the alchemical, Orphic and hermetic symbolism fused with contemporary iconographic motifs of modernity. The sphinx like cat could be seen as a reinforcing signifier of the androgyne, represented implicitly in the Janus head in the painting's lower right hand corner. We need only recall Péladan's conception of the androgyne as emblematically represented by the Sphinx, and the ideal androgyne as adolescent male, beardless but still feminine. The Janus head has been noted as corresponding to an unusual beardless representation of Janus on a rare Roman coin in the Bibliothèque Nationale. The blue flower in the mouth of the Janus figure also can be seen as an allusion to the androgyne since the Golden flower of alchemy can sometimes be a blue flower, the 'blue flower of the hermaphrodite'.(28) This combined with a priori knowledge of Apollinaire's dual interests in the Arts and Sciences makes a convincing case for seeing the Janus head as yet another 'hommage' to Apollinaire. It has been noted that the profile of the head corresponds with Apollinaire's own 'Roman profile'. The position of the head and hand of the Janus in Chagall's painting has also been compared with 'The mystery of the Human Head' from Robert Fludd's Ultriusque cosmi majoris et minoris historia of 1619 by Nozslopy and Hicken.(29) The dualism represented in the double nature of the head, the dark blue, melancholic, night side and the lighter, golden, side could represent the rapprochement of sun and moon in alchemical union, the past and present, and the two sides of the poet's own nature. The Egyptian reference to Horapollo signified by the obelisk-like Eiffel Tower and the sphinx-like cat has been established for some time as yet another Apollinairean reference. This Egyptian reference is sometimes extended to include the figure in the top right of the painting apparently holding a pyramid shape. Little seems to have been said about this motif, but it corresponds to sketch made by Leonardo (c.1500) of a parachute. Given the climate of interest in Leonardo in Paris during the pre- First world war period, and Apollinaire's interest in Renaissance texts and images, it is possible that such an image would have been known to Apollinaire if not Chagall. Such iconographic motifs would seem to further establish the dualism of Apollinaire's interests, the bicéphale reference and by extension the reference to the ‘two headed being’, the androgyne.
Thus 'specialist' knowledge of medical phenomena such as hermaphrodites and bicéphales was unnecessary for artists like Chagall, since such beings, their images and attendant symbolism were available through a variety of sources, not least the poet with whom he was closely associated in this period.
Two further works within this period by Chagall also offer the possibility of an iconography that has more medico-scientific sources. The idea of X-rays had gripped the public imagination since Wilhelm Conrad Röentgen had produced the first X-ray of his wife's hand in 1895 and circulated reports of his new discovery throughout Europe and America. Caricatures, advertisements and newspaper reports all reflected the popular interest in the 'new light'. Contemporary scandals, like the Doyen case, further added to the public fascination with the new technology. The impact of such interests on the wider circle of avant-garde painters working in Paris at this time has included discussions on Picabia and even Picasso but usually overlook what may at first be seen as an incongruous addition to the discussion. Chagall's work of 1912-13, The Pregnant Woman is variously interpreted as a reference to the pregnant girlfriend of his friend, the poet, Blaise Cendrars. It is also a reworking of the androgyne image with the head as both male profile and female frontal composition.
However, it could be argued that Chagall was also aware of X-rays and those scientific innovations that dominated the discussions of his contemporaries. Whilst it is possible to argue the image of the infant in a stylized womb-like oval disk could also be relating to anatomical and alchemical discourses it is also possible that through contemporaries and the wider dissemination of knowledge concerning such innovations, he had awareness of X-rays and their ability to represent the unseen. The revealing of the 'interior' in this painting could therefore allude not just to those more material practices of dissection and anatomy, or to esoteric alchemical or occultist themes, but could also be engaging with contemporary fascination of the representational potential of X-rays. In The Cattle Dealer (1912) the pregnant Ox reveals the unborn offspring in a similar way. It is tempting to suggest some affinity between the two, at least on this level, and further, as was suggested in above, Chagall's paintings from this period appear to owe much to his close contact with Apollinaire and those artists with whom the poet was associated. The prismatic representation of light in Paris Through The Window also offers the possibility of seeing it as not just a representation of a literal kind (the lights from the Eiffel Tower) but also as something that was tentatively exploring the possibilities of representing that which is 'unseen'; the penetrating rays of the 'new light'. These works could also be said to engage in representing the various planes of light and form that X-rays, in conjunction with contemporary discussion concerning theosophy and
Neo-Platonic ideas, represented. The interdiscursive exchange of ideas within the avant-garde circle of artists, poets and writers centred, at this time, on those elements that were beyond the known material world. It is not surprising therefore, that there is a possibility of seeing such allusions and references in the work of artists associated with that group. The possibility is perhaps less remote than it may at first seem in the case of Chagall, when the impact that figures such as Apollinaire and his interests had on those artists is taken into consideration. The fusion of alchemical, occultist themes and interest with that of scientific and medical innovation was very much a product of the period before the outbreak of war and particularly associated with Apollinaire and his circle of friends and colleagues. It is not surprising then, that these ideas permeated beyond that period and informed the next generation of artists, most of whom had been in contact with Apollinaire shortly before his death from the influenza pandemic in 1918.
NOTES:
NB: for images relating to this paper please see separate post 'Conference paper Images'
1. This paper has been developed from research for my PhD thesis (2004) ‘Medical Discourse and Avant-Garde Art in France, 1905- 1925.’ University of the West of England, in association with Bath Spa University.
2. Apollinaire stated in Les Soirees de Paris No.1. Fev. 1912 that Picasso studies an object “comme un chirurgien dissèque un cadavre”. This was reprinted with slight variation in reference to a grand surgeon in Montjoie! 14 Mars, 1913. Both comments appear in G. Apollinaire (1913) Les Peintres Cubistes, p.14 and 37 respectively.
3. See also: Project for Human Structure, Sorgues, 1912 ; L'Arlesienne, Sorgues, 1912; Woman sitting in a Wheeled armchair, Paris, Autumn 1912; Singer, Paris 1912 and Nude woman 'J'aime Eva' , Paris, Autumn 1912.
4. See also works such as Woman standing, from the Back, Paris, Winter 1909/1910 or Mademoiselle Léonie Standing, Paris or Cadaqués spring 1910.
5.The comparison was first made by Scapini in the review Les Marches du Sud-Ouest, Sept. 1911. This was subsequently referenced by Picasso’s friend Junoy in his book; J. Junyo (1912) Arte e Artistas. Barcelona, p.57, note 1.
6. Soffici, A. (1913) ‘Cubismo e Oltre’ in Lacerba. Anno.I, No.3, 1st Feb. p.18.
7. Frascina discusses this pun in Frascina, F. et al (1993) Primitivism, Cubism, Abstraction. New Haven & London : Yale University Press in association with The Open University. p.159
8. See for example Picasso (1904) Celestina. The procuress. Barcelona, Oil on canvass. The blindness represented in this work was a complication of congenital syphilis. Picasso’s works from 1902 frequently depicted prostitutes and related iconography. See Josep Palau I Fabre (1981) Picasso 1881-1907. Life and work of the early years. Oxford: Phaidon.
9. The discussion of medical discourse and Picasso’s infamous painting has occupied many authors and informed part of my own MA thesis and was returned to again within my PhD thesis, op.cit. The discussions relate to the topic of this paper but are too lengthy to address fully here.
10. The newspaper clipping reads ‘La mycolysine et la phymalose du Docteur Doyen’ as cited by Kachur, L. (1988) ‘Themes in Picasso’s Cubism 1907- 1918’ PhD Thesis, Columbia University; facsimile published Kachur, L. (1990) Themes in Picasso’s Cubism 1907- 1918’ PhD Thesis, Columbia University, Ann Arbor, Michegan: UMI press, p.200. Another medical reference can be found in Picasso’s 1913 collage Man with a hat. Paris, reproduced in Fabre, J.(1996) Picasso Cubism 1907- 1917. Konemann. p.307.
11. As acknowledged in Noszlopy, George T. (1973) 'Apollinaire, Allegorical Imagery and The Visual Arts', in Forum for Modern Language Studies, IX, No.1, pp 49-73, reprinted in Higgins, I. (ed)(1974) Literature and the plastic Arts 1880-1930, Edinburgh.; Spate, V. (1979) Orphism. The evolution of Non-figurative painting in Paris 1910- 1914. Oxford: Clarendon Press; Hicken, A (1987) Simultanism and Surnaturalisme: Chagall, De Chirico, Apollinaire and Cubist Paris. 1910- 1914. PhD Thesis, Birmingham Polytechnic in association with The Courtauld Institute, University of London; Noszlopy, G.T. (1994) Robert Delauney’s La Ville de Paris: a temporary revival of the humanistic practice of joint authorship. In The Article Press, University of Central England; Hicken, A.(2002) Apollinaire, Cubism and Orphism. Aldershot: Ashgate Press.
12. Panofsky, E.(1993; 1955) Meaning in The Visual Arts. London: Penguin Books, p.121, note 65 and p. 131, note 92.
13. Apollinaire, G. (1912) ‘The New Painting: Art Notes’ in Les Soirées de Paris cited in Breunig, L.C. (trans. Suleiman, S.) (1972) Apollinaire on Art. Essays and Reviews, 1902-1918. London: Thames & Hudson. p.222.
14. For example in 1911 the critic Michel Puy insisted on the ‘base scientifique du cubisme qui étudie plus sévèrement la part constructive du modèle, abandonne les ateliers pour aller dans le laboratoires’ ; Puy, M. (1911) ‘Les Indépendants’, in Les Marges, pp.26-29.
15. A Dr Pamphylla writes concerning the artist’s pathology in (1911) ‘La Médicine au Salon d’Automne’ in Le Journal No.6962, 19th Octobre, p.6.
16. Lawder- Standish, D (1975) The Cubist Cinema. New York: New York University Press, p. 14 & 15.
17. The list is extensive, see Boudar, G & Caizergues, P (eds) (1983) & Gilbert Boudar & Michel Décaudin (1987) Vol I and II ; Catalogue de la Bibliothèque de Guillaume Apollinaire. Paris : CNRS
18. Bierot, P. (ed) (1916) ‘Salut Au Docteur Doyen’ in SIC No.12, Dec.
19. Savinio, A. (1916) ‘Canti della mezza-morte. Dramma della citta meridianna.’ Part of the verse drama Hermaphrodito serialised in La Voce; this first part appears in the 31 March 1916 edition, and further references follow in 13th May 1916.
20. Dr Doyen and ‘Mycolysine’ are mentioned again in an article by Jolivet Castelot’s Les Nouveaux Horizons No.11, November 1910, p.329. Apollinaire owned a copy of this edition.
21. Josep Palau I Fabre (1996) Picasso Cubism 1907- 1917. Konemann, p.349
22. Prof. George T. Noszlopy established the link between Apollinaire's interest in such themes and avant-garde artists work such as Raoul Dufy, Robert Delaunay, Marie Laurencin, and Marc Chagall, see: George T. Noszlopy (op.cit) and Noszlopy, Prof. G.T. ( 1994) Robert Delaunay's La Ville de Paris: a Temporary revival of the humanistic practice of joint authorship. The Article Press, University of Central England, Birmingham Institute of Art & Design. M.Poupon mentions Apollianire's interest in folklore and occult-religious philosophies in 'L'Année allemande d'Apollinaire', La Revue des lettres Modernes, Nos. 183-188, 1968, p.9. Dr. Adrian Hicken has also explored the theme in his publications (op.cit) Examination of Apollinaire's own library, as catalogued in Gilbert Boudar & Michel Décaudin (eds) (op.cit). reveals many texts and periodicals with such themes. One periodical particularly, Les Nouveaux Horizons. de la Science et de la Pensée. L'Hyperchimie-Rosa Alchemica, directed and founded by Jollivet Castelot of which Apollinaire had four copies from 1910, included articles on hermetic symbolism, heraldic art, alchemy, theosophy and occultism as well as reports on more scientific discoveries and medical 'cures' such as '606', Ehrlich's treatment for syphilis. This text included contributions from authors such as Dr. Marc Haven ( an author whom Apollinaire reviewed in 1914, 'Hermetic Emblems', Paris Journal July 17, 1914) and references to contemporary Doctors such as Dr Doyen.
23. Samaltanos, K (1984) Apolliniare. Catalyst for Primitivism, Picabia and Duchamp. Ann Arbor, Michigan: UMI Research Press. Rousseau, P. (2001) Le Portrait d’Apollinaire par Robert Delaunay. La dissection Cubiste et l’esthétique de la Fragmentation’ in La Revue des Lettres Modernes. Guillaume Apollinaire. No.21, Paris.
24. Hicken, A (2002) op.cit, p.134.
25. Péladan, J. (1910) Les Idées et les formes de L’Androgyne. Théorie Plastique. Paris : Sansot, pp.16-17.
26. Meige, H.(1895) ‘L’Infantilisme, Le Féminisme et les Hermaphrodites Antiques’ in L’Anthropologie, Paris, No. 6, pp.257-275.
27. Richer, Dr P. (1892) ' Les Hermaphrodites dans L'Art.' in Nouvelle Iconographie de la Salpêtrière, Paris, No.6.n.p.
28. As cited in (1622) Theatrum Chemicum,praecipuous selectorum auctorum tractus[…]continens. Vol.V. p.899. See also Jung, C. (1944, 1993) Psychology and Alchemy. London: Routledge. (trans) R.Hull.)
29. Nozslopy ( 1973 & 1994) and Hicken, (2002) op.cit.
Dr Anna Middleton,
The Arts Institute, Bournemouth,
March 2009.
Copyright remains with the author Dr Anna Middleton. For citation of any part of this paper please use the following format:
Middleton,A. (2009) 'Medical Discourse & Avant-Garde Art: The Intersection between Science and Art, History and Practice in Early Twentieth Century Paris', Conference paper for AAH09; http://artandmedicaldiscourse.blogspot.com
If you would like to contact me in connection with my research:
Email: amiddleton@aucb.ac.uk
