"Everything has beauty but not everyone sees it"-- Confucius
Beauty as an expression through the female nude. In whatever setting or time period. Deep breath! This is not a montage of naked ladies. (Nude vs. Naked!!)
Maria Candelaria was ultimately killed by her own people because they could not see the art and beauty behind the idea of the traditional female nude. Even though it was not her own body shown the idea that she would pose was enough for the brutal conviction. As she continued to repeat "I never did anything bad" to Lorenzo Raphael there is a total sense of empathy and despair as they stone her. Because of her mother's reputation nothing could save Maria Candelaria.
The artist's role in her death is likewise pitiful because he felt responsible. He just wanted to capture her beauty and show it in the best way he knew how. He did not see the social ramifications of showing her nude.
Why is it so difficult for the Mexican people of Xochimilco to accept the art historical traditions? Is it because they are still in the stage where they want to be isolated and removed from the colonized/conquered world? Do they relate their cultural disintegration with the influence of the outside foreign arts? It seems as though these people were rejecting the giants that came before them in order to preserve what was left of their primitive natural culture.
Before the Mexican Revolution there was a surge of folk traditions. This is the same attitude that the Xochimilco people show in relation to the modern world and the art traditions that come with. "The extension and intensity that folk-loric life exhibits in the great majority of the population eloquently demonstrates the cultural backwardness in which that population vegetates" (Ades 200). Perhaps this is why Maria Candelaria is set to take place just before the Mexican Revolution- to show this backwardness to modern progress/art/definition of beauty.
So does Maria Candelaria represent real beauty? Can the female nude in art be considered true beauty?
Before the Mexican Revolution there was a surge of folk traditions. This is the same attitude that the Xochimilco people show in relation to the modern world and the art traditions that come with. "The extension and intensity that folk-loric life exhibits in the great majority of the population eloquently demonstrates the cultural backwardness in which that population vegetates" (Ades 200). Perhaps this is why Maria Candelaria is set to take place just before the Mexican Revolution- to show this backwardness to modern progress/art/definition of beauty.
I wonder how the Xochimilco people would react to this statement: “She's beautiful, and therefore to be woo'd She is a woman, therefore to be won” Shakespeare King Henry VI (I.V.iii) As if the nude represented this objectification or whether the beauty and idealism of the nude woman can transcend the base chauvinistic and conquering ideas in Shakespeare.
So does Maria Candelaria represent real beauty? Can the female nude in art be considered true beauty?
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