Fotis Kalivas
In the July 11, 1857, issue of Harper’s Weekly (published in New York), an illustration depicts two middle-class young women, Arabella-Maria, and Julia, talking to each other. They are wearing bonnets, coats, and gowns, under which the crinoline—a cage-like undergarment made of flexible steel that provides the fashionable silhouette of the period and supports the many layers of skirts—is noticeable. These two women, who represent the majority of the 1850s fashion-forward ladies, are viewing the portrait of a woman styled to encapsulate the early 1800s Grecian dress. Naturally, both Arabella-Maria and Julia look down upon the past Greek influences in fashion, identifying them as “ridiculous” in their dialogue. Their comment of ridicule could be interpreted both in a moral and a colonial backdrop.
From a mid-Victorian moral perspective, the vulgar exposure of the body through the Grecian Regency dress is the subject of ridicule, or rather the comic relief of the sketch. In contrast, the present ladies, who are covered showing only their faces and hands, are granted a higher ground thanks to their assumed propriety and modesty. From a colonial standpoint, the illustration mirrors the opposition between the civilized and the uncivilized. The Grecian dress here is lost in time, metaphorically and literally (20 years after the end of the Regency era), and therefore is examined with a sense of historical superiority by the knowledgeable American or British individual.
A case can be made not only about how the two women look upon the Regency female figure but also how the artist perceives them as well as the Greek past. As Alicia Quinn explains in her video essay, “The Victorian Smear Campaign on Regency Fashion,” the illustrator aims, through a heavily misogynistic and patriarchal eye, to mock women like Arabella-Maria and Julia by exaggerating their figures and sketching them as if they are drowning in the sea of their petticoats and ruffles, almost reminiscent of two giant spheres. The joke works on a second level by both portraying two indulgent, frivolous and foolish girls of today and a sexualized version of the Grecian dress, highlighting the area of the bust. To the artist, the first party is simply idiotic since their dress is ridiculous even in the present – embodying the irony of ignorance – while the second is of lesser moral value and is perceived more like a femme fatal, a sexually promiscuous female figure.
From an imperialistic perspective, the Regency woman, who is closely tied to Ancient Greece and Ancient Greek aesthetics, becomes a symbol of fallen virtue, missing structure and the feeling of shame. It is at that moment that the Victorian individual comes to police, shame, and reform Greek culture.
Another element suggesting that all three female characters are considered hilarious by the artist is the indoor–outdoor background. Arabella-Maria and Julia are placed in a domestic setting, yet they do not exemplify the virtues of the Angel of the House (the Victorian stereotype of the married woman being domestic, caring, pure, economically dependent, uneducated, and leaning for support onto her husband); vanity and their materialist needs are seen as threats to the maternal image. On the opposite side of the sketch, the focal point of the painting is the woman’s breast, which will allow her to fulfill her role as a mother figure. The Grecian past is interlinked with a divine fertility and is surrounded by nature, the foliage in the background. It is almost as if the artist accuses the women of 1857 for their presumed failure as mothers when the Victorian capitalist and patriarchal society itself censors and enforces specific identities of what it means to be or act like a proper woman.
It is not a coincidence that this illustration is published in the second year in which crinolines are introduced and adapted in the world of fashion. The satirical depiction at hand is in the form of a reaction to the evolution of women’s fashion. The backlash on women’s freedom of expression and potential liberation is apparent, hence the creation of the sketch.
References
“File:1857-regency-fashion-crinoline-comparison-joke.png.” Wikimedia Commons, 8 January 2023, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:1857-regency-fashion-crinoline-comparison-joke.png&oldid=464832074.
Franklin, Harper. “1850-1859” Fashion History Timeline, 19 Feb 2020, https://fashionhistory.fitnyc.edu/1850-1859/.
Quinn, Alicia. “The Victorian Smear Campaign on Regency Fashion.” YouTube, 8 January 2023, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjk1Oq0pAFM&list=WL&index=2&t=1486s.
