Facebook’s banning of the posting of this painting and the subsequent legal wrangle in the French courts got me thinking about where I first saw this painting and the impact it had on me, on my understanding of myself as female, and the strange social aversion we seem to have to our genitals.
I don’t really want to get into an anti-Facebook rant. I had a fight with them about five years ago over a Modigliani painting. I want to prompt a dialogue about our strange ambivalence over our bodies.
The first time I saw Courbet’s L’Origine du Monde (The origin of the world), I was 13. I honestly cannot remember where I saw it, which is odd. It would have been 1975, so I would have been in London, and as far as I know, the original painting was in the private collection of – you’re going to laugh, I certainly did – Jacques Lacan. He bought it at auction in 1955. It wasn’t installed at the Musée d’Orsay until 1995, but it was ‘toured’ on a few occasions between those dates. So perhaps I saw a reproduction. All I know was that my mother took me, and it was in a public space, because I remember feeling embarrassed to be looking at a cunt with a whole load of strangers.
But I have a very precise memory of what that picture did to my psyche. It didn’t look like my barely pubescent cunt at all. I told my mother and she said: “That’s because you’re not a fully grown woman yet. This is it. This is where you came from and it is going to be part of you. You can choose to hate it, or you can decide to love it. And how you feel about yourself as a woman is going to depend on the choice you make. So look again.”
And I did. I looked again. Moreover, my mother’s words did sink in. And I decided this was something I would decide to love. How can you fear or hate or find ugly something you’re born with? How can you make something that is such a fundamental part of your body into a problem? Cunts go beyond beauty – which is the assessment of the other. It’s not right, or logical, or sane to ‘other’ a part of your own body. But as I grew up, I noticed pretty much the entire world was hell bent on trying to make me see it as something apart from me. Since viewing that picture, I’ve been exposed to more than 30 years of images that pornographized cunts, that put them to purposes that were not mine. Shamed, hidden, mystified, medicalized, brutalized, venerealized, powdered, sprayed, shaved, waxed, pierced, idolized, worshiped, classified, mutilated.
Now I look at this cunt and I think… it’s beautiful. I can smell it. I can taste it. I know it in all its physicality. I’ve lived with this cunt a long time and, recently, in a very odd way, I’ve moved past it. I remember the first time I found a grey pubic hair and cried for a day. But that, it transpired, was nothing. It’s only when you begin to hit menopause that you get the scary news about what happens to your cunt once you stop producing female hormones. The skin grows thinner, you tear more easily. It isn’t as robust anymore. You’re faced with the spectre of letting nature take its course, or using hormones to artificially keep it in stasis. There’s tremendous implicit social pressure to maintain your cunt in ‘working order.’ But working for who? It’s perfectly happy as long as someone doesn’t plan on treating it like a battleground. Apparently your clit never stops working, which is good to know.
But what I’ve found more curious is that these encroaching realities have forced me to realize that, although I’ve always been on very good terms with my cunt, it never was the place my sexuality or my eroticism resided anyway. And I really don’t need it to be an erotic being, or express my sexuality.
All I can say is, bless your wonderful mother for educating her daughter to love herself and to feel good about her body. Thank you RG for a thoughtful and beautifully written piece.
1. I wish my mother had been like yours. I remember clearly, just after the Lady Chatterly trial being in a bookshop with her. There was a pile of the book on a table; I touched one, and got screamed at, as if a dangerous emanation would permanently turn me into a pervert. I’m quite certain that she would never have taken me to see L’Origine or anything similar, at least not in N Ireland. (She was English, and often behaved quite differently on trips there.)
2. I seem to remember that L’Origine was condemned when first seen. It’s clear, to me why. It encompasses all male failures, reminds them why, despite the greater strength, logical ability etc of the male, that women actually have the upper hand. Firstly, only women can give birth to the next generation, the inheritors; and secondly, a woman is always sure that the child is hers, but a man can never have this absolute certainty. (Well, not in 1866; DNA testing has changed that a bit.)
Hmmm Now there’s a good example of the gender gulf. There IS no offspring without sperm. So there’s no giving birth to the next generation without it. Secondly, who is the father is a very socially constructed obsession. There are cultures for whom this is not much of an issue.
I always thought the most problematic thing about pussy was projections of desire and just how much someone might compromise, to get some or, in some instances, a particular one.
Always good to remind oneself of the physics of it. Cunts, no matter how much they seem to, have no gravitational force.
Indeed, we now know how fertilisation of the ovum happens. Yet, while human sperm and ova had been identified before 1866, it was another 10 years before ‘fusion’ of sperm and ovum was observed. Previously, Aristotle’s view had long prevailed, that the womb was an ‘incubator’—and hence the idea of a ‘blood-line’, for sperm (ejaculate) was believed to be ‘purified blood’.
There are soi disant primitive cultures that believe that the woman is an ‘incubator’, and that the more sperm from the most men, the better. Who the biological father is remains unknown, all the men are the ‘father’; the kids are free to roam throughout the village without the fear of ‘abuse’. Sounds a much more healthy attitude to that in the west; we can blame the agricultural revolution for our beliefs about paternity and inheritance today. And this revolution has been described, accurately, as both the best and the worst of human revolutions (likewise the industrial revolution).
I really like that your posts come early enough that i can read them over coffee and have the rest of the day for my mind churn.
This one certainly got my juices flowing.
My first thought was as “Di” said earlier that you were fortunate to have the kind of guidance that your mother provided. Funny how one simple piece of advice can affect so much.
My next thought was about how my ideas about cunts have changed over the years . As a child there was a lack of discussion about genitalia ,so i was left to form my own ideas. Like anything taboo I became curious which grew into an obsession. So from early adolescence on a great deal of time was devoted to anything related to cunts. Looking back I can see how my view of the feminine became warped. I wanted “cunt” and the women who possessed them had become the barrier . I am ashamed to admit that but it’s true.
This is the reason i see you’re mother’s guidance as critical.
A combination of great women and introspection have completely changed my views. I love the feminine . I love cunts, not for any other reason than they are a part of women.
Finally, i thought about my own genitals . How for so long this piece of me defined my sexuality and masculinity, or so I thought. These days it’s not as reliable as it once was and I’ve come to realize just as you say:
“it never was the place my sexuality or my eroticism resided anyway. And I really don’t need it to be an erotic being, or express my sexuality.”
I think it’s much, much harder for me. The moment that their cocks stops working with mindless efficiency, I know a lot of men go through tremendous struggles with how to frame their sense of masculinity. So strange to think that these relatively small parts of our bodies have such a disproportionately large effect on our sense of self
Refreshingly honest.
Empowerment is borne of self-knowledge and acceptance, giving us the power to determine our path.
I salute you.
x
I have known this work in books for most of my life, but only viewed it in the flesh so to speak, in the Musee d’Orsay , where it has always been easy to spend time with as it is off to one side of the main gallery and from my experience not overly popular. What shocks me is that anyone could find it offensive in any way. It is absolutely beautiful, gentle, natural and mildly erotic, but above all a great work of Art by a wonderful talent. The thought that always passes through my mind is that whilst the creation of life, the start of life, is something infinitely beautiful, man’s seemingly learnt inhumanities and selfish and endless greed are the real obscenities that need banning; the so-called moralists are always looking the wrong way.
Your mother’s words are so wise! What a beautiful and empowering thing to say to a daughter. Thank you for your reflection on this.
…it was never the place my sexuality or eroticism resided anyway.
That really resonated with me. I’m 30, and I think even a few years ago this picture would have made me cringe with discomfort. I did not have anyone tell me that I had a choice about whether to love my cunt or hate it. It’s inspirational to read that your mother said that to you – I hope that someday I can empower a daughter to own every aspect of herself, in whatever part of herself it resides. That’s the same thing I hope for myself, too, and your blog and stories help with that. Thanks for this.