L'origine du monde, Gustave Courbet's 1866 work, has been subject to numerous obscenity controversies, most recently Meta's protracted 8 year lawsuit arguing it violated their community standards.
But a more interesting question is this: who is the model?
There's four possible candidates, so we'll discuss one each day...
Image courtesy of Musée d'Orsay.
The first possible model for L'origine du monde is muse, model and later, antiques dealer, Joanna Hiffernan (1843-1886).
Image: Jo, The Beautiful Irishwoman by Gustave Courbet, circa 1865-1866. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Jo Hiffernan was a mistress of artist James Abbott McNeill Whistler (of Whistler's Mother fame; Whistler's mother herself reputedly despised Hiffernan). She modelled for Whistler on many occasions, and he trusted her with looking after his business arrangements when he was away.
Here's one of Whistler's paintings of Hiffernan, which is a colossal mood. Wapping by James Whistler, 1861. National Gallery of Arts, USA.
Hiffernan likely met Courbet visiting Paris with Whistler in 1864. In 1866, Whistler went away on a long trip, and Hiffernan visited Paris that year, posing for several paintings for Courbet.
We'll remind you L'origine du monde was painted in 1866.
In further evidence towards the model being Hiffernan, shortly after this, two things happened: Hiffernan and Whistler broke up, and Whistler and Courbet fell out. It's strongly speculated that Courbet and Hiffernan had an affair.
So in 1866, Jo Hiffernan was in Paris, posing for paintings with Courbet - some of them nude - and whatever went down during that time was intimate enough to cause ripples with her partner. Surely it's conclusive that it was Hiffernan's vulva in the painting?
Not quite. One of the key things which could rule Hiffernan out is right there in L'origine du monde, in plain sight: Hiffernan was a redhead. The pubic hair in the painting is black.
The red-headed model in The Sleepers is Jo Hiffernan, while the dark-haired model's name is not known.
Now, we don't mean to be creepy, but in The Sleepers, you get a look at Hiffernan's vulva and... it's not got black hair. Again, this doesn't entirely rule her out, as she might have shaved for this painting. However, the dark-haired model's colouring matches L'origine du monde better.
Since we don't have much to say about the dark-haired model, let's round off today with a little more about Jo Hiffernan, and what happened after she broke up with Whistler. She remained close enough to assist in raising Whistler's son. She later became an antiques and art dealer, selling among other things, paintings made by Courbet.
That's all for today. Tomorrow we'll look at another theorised model for L'origine du monde...
We've looked at Courbet's models, and perhaps one of them modelled for L'origine du monde. But let's pause to ask *why* the painting was made in the first place? To answer this, we're briefly going to have to talk about a man...
Meet Khalil Sherif Pasha, usually known as Khalil Bey in 19th century Paris. A diplomat and art collector, he two commissioned works from Courbet: The Sleepers, and L'origine du monde.
Born in Cairo, Kalil spent his career as an Ottoman diplomat, before retiring to Paris in the mid 1860s to live his best life as a gambler, art collector and playboy. He entertained mistresses - one of them may have been the L'origine du monde model, per his commission.
One of Kalil Bey's lovers was Marie-Anne Detourbay, a courtesan and literary salon host.
Portrait by Amaury Duval, 1862. Musée d'Orsay
Detourbay was born poor, and grew up washing champagne bottles before moving to Paris, where she worked in a brothel. She was discovered there by Alexandre Dumas fils, and catapulted into the demimonde. This enabled her to get a nice flat (courtesy of a prince!) and host literary salons with Paris's finest intellectuals.
Kalil Bey wasn't the only man besotted with Detourbay. Gustave Flaubert was wildly in love with her, and wrote very florid letters to her.
Detourbay's story has a very happy ending for her. She eventually went on to marry a Count, who disappeared shortly after their marriage. With the title Countess de Loynes, she maintained her salon, entertaining artists including Dumas, Proust and Bizet!
Join us tomorrow, and we'll explore another of Kalil Bey's mistresses and *her* claim on being the model for L'origine du monde.
Our final candidate for the L'origine du monde model is Constance Quéniaux, dancer, courtesan and lover of Kalil Bey.
Like Detourbay, Quéniaux grew up poor and moved to Paris at a young age. There, she became a ballet dancer, supplementing with a side hustle in sex work.
In her later life, Quéniaux, having made her money, took up a life of philanthropy, and supported abandoned and orphaned children of artists. At her death, age 75, she left a rather interesting gift in her will: a painting by Gustave Courbet depicting camellias.
Now, a little context on the camellia thing in 19th century France: owing to a book by Alexandre Dumas fils, camellias were associated with courtesans signalling availability. And also, they look fairly suggestive of a vulva.
So was Alexandre Dumas fils the key to blowing the whole thing wide open? [editor's note: maybe rewrite this bit since you're talking about a painting of a vulva. It sounds like you mean the vulva]
Well, maybe. But tomorrow, we'll explore one last clue which could be relevant...
In 2010, an art collector bought a painting in an antique shop for less than 2000 euros. Following a two-year long authentication process, Courbet expert Jean-Jacques Fernier announced that this painting was the upper section of L'origine du monde, which had been separated from the section with the vulva.
The painting reveals a face. And that face is Jo Hiffernan's.
There's reasons to believe that the upper section of the painting, somehow severed is real. The canvas and pigments used in the painting were of the era, and the painting is somewhat similar to Courbet's 1866 Woman With A Parrot (also depicting Hiffernan).
Courtesy of Metropolitan Museum of Art.
There's no explanation for why the head was severed from L'origine du monde, and moreover, why the vulva was kept while the upper section was left to rot in obscurity for a century and a half.
It's also worth noting that the upper section surfaced several years before the Dumas letter linking Quéniaux to the painting was unearthed - at this time, the dominant consensus among art historians was that Hiffernan was the model.
Was it Jo Hiffernan, the favourite model and lover of Courbet? Or his dark-haired model? Could it be Marie-Anne Detourbay, who inspired such passion in men? Or was it Constance Quéniaux, who Courbet's contemporaries identified?
It's not known with any certainty. Who do you think most likely?
Vagina Museum