Poses, plastiques: the art and style of 'statuary' in Victorian visual theatre
Article
Article Title | Poses, plastiques: the art and style of 'statuary' in Victorian visual theatre |
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ERA Journal ID | 9869 |
Article Category | Article |
Authors | |
Author | Anae, Nicole |
Journal Title | Australasian Drama Studies |
Number of Pages | 19 |
Year | 2008 |
Place of Publication | Australia |
ISSN | 0810-4123 |
Web Address (URL) | https://search.informit.org/doi/10.3316/ielapa.791839100117095 |
Abstract | Sometimes dismissed as practitioners of a humble variant of pornography, specialists of a Victorian performance style known as 'poses plastiques' mastered the art of manipulating the body into highly stylised and apparently motionless 'attitudes' to resemble so-called 'living statues'. Most favoured adopting 'Classical' stances in the garb of Greek and Roman deities, and a number of its female technicians titillated audiences with costumes giving the appearance of almost complete nudity. Poses plastiques were, for a time, a remarkably popular 'sensation' in Australia, as elsewhere, and this article argues two main points: firstly, that the appeal of poses plastiques during the Victorian era characterised a broader social 'blurring' of the boundaries between titillating visual theatre and pornographic displays and secondly, that this genre of visual theatre later developed to eroticise and personify a burgeoning sense of early twentieth-century Australian nationalism. |
Keywords | theatre, poses plastiques |
ANZSRC Field of Research 2020 | 360403. Drama, theatre and performance studies |
430302. Australian history | |
Public Notes | File reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher/author. |
Byline Affiliations | Faculty of Education |
https://research.usq.edu.au/item/9z8y9/poses-plastiques-the-art-and-style-of-statuary-in-victorian-visual-theatre
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