I was shown this painting a few weeks ago in an art class, more specifically I was shown the white table in the top right hand corner, and asked what I thought was going on. As the topic this term was food and feasting in art, I said “a feast?” One other student noticed the women around the table were younger than the men, and this got an approving nod from the lecturer.
Let me explain further, as we were then shown the full painting, and were none the wiser as to what was going on. It looks sort of biblical, it looks like it could maybe be a frivolous scene at the pool with some lovely nudity. What is going on here? This is a 1546 painting by Lucas Cranach, called the “Fountain of Youth.” That’s right, look closer at the left hand side of the painting and behold the hideous old women, making their own way, or being wheeled in by what I assume to be husbands or some other male relative, towards the rejuvenating waters. They are deposited at the edge of the pool, to creak down into the water, and as they swim across to the right, they become younger. They emerge lithely from the water resplendent in their youth. a quick visit to the tent, pop on a posh frock, and they are whisked off to a meal, with some very happy looking older men, no doubt delighted with the youthful beauty at the table.
This image made me cross. The broken pseudo-torso in the craggy rocks in the top left, the leafy saplings in the right of the painting. The delivery and dumping of old women into the fountain and the fact it is only women. You could argue only women want to visit the pool as they’re the only one concerned with being youthful. I feel it’s impossible to separate what is important to women, from what women have been constantly told is important. This painting is 450 yrs+ old, and I think women have been told far longer than that, that youth is valuable and that aging depletes their value. I dislike that men deliver them to the pool, then reap the benefits that emerge from the waters. It’s like these men are fixing a problem, or washing something that is old and dirty, that they will ultimately consume. I stewed on this throughout the lesson and tried to think of a legitimate reason why only women were depicted. My lecturer also added that this is an extraordinarily rare example of the depiction of older, naked, female bodies in art. You got the occasional Saint undergoing some trial or ordeal, but naked women were usually young and idealised, because art was for the male gaze. Those dudes definitely didn’t want to look at a disgusting old crone did they, right? I’ve heard comments before about how if you wanted to get into an art gallery, as a women, throughout most of history, your best bet was as a naked model for the painters.
What is our problem with aging women? I can only draw the conclusion that women are only valued for youth and beauty, and that only youth is beauty. So an older women, who is visibly aging, becomes worthless (read: becomes worthless to men). As a lover of both children’s films and anything gothic, my Venn diagram of happy has Hocus Pocus nestled in the overlap. The original film was released in 1993, and featured Bette Midler, Kathy Najimy and Sarah Jessica Parker as three witches executed for sucking the life force out of children to stay young and beautiful. Sounds horrific but it was done in a child-friendly way! There is going to be a sequel and to my everlasting joy, they’ve got the original cast back. I saw the first photo of this, this week and of course it looks amazing, and of course the girls have visibly aged. I haven’t seen the inevitable comments on this for myself, but I can guarantee they are out there. One of the cast, Sarah Jessica Parker, had defended herself from comments about her other reboot, Sex and the City. It’s been years, so of course the women are older, and the cacophony of criticism levelled at the women for being older was deafening. My heart went out to SJP when she responded “what do you want me to do? Stop aging?”
I wouldn’t mind as much (but I’d still be pretty pissed) if the horror at aging was felt for both sexes, but it isn’t. Older men are grey foxes, when did you last hear of a silver vixen? Helen Mirren’s still alright, I hear the men cry, great boobs for an old woman!! So you can still sexualise her, so that’s ok? There is such a double standard that I can’t blame women for turning to products (usually useless anyway) and procedures to look young. They are quite literally desperately clinging to the only thing they are told they are valuable for. I am starting to inch past my youthful horror at my body for its size, to be met by the next horror at my body for it’s age. It never ends.
I see a vicious cycle, where a patriarchal society teaches women that youth is value, women strive for a youthful appearance and do some free PR for the patriarchs as other women believe the myth and perpetuate it. I’ve seen some celebrities post online, quite candidly, at their moral struggle to post real photos of their aging faces and bodies, and using filters to avoid the trolls. There’s no space in the wheel to get in and break it. There is shame around taking measures to look younger and shame around aging naturally – which way can us girls actually go? We’re wrong either way, because aging is natural, inevitable and we cannot escape it. I wish there was more we could do to believe and teach women that they are more than their youth, more than their appearance and staying “fuckable”. I want to applaud and celebrate the recognition of an aged female face as a repository of experience, wisdom and a life lived. We are worth so much more than our youth, and worth so much more than bodies to satisfy the male gaze.
The beauty of a woman, with passing years only grows
Audrey Hepburn
What's Love Goth to do with it? 