Asked to design a billboard for the Public Art Fund in New York, the political, feminist art-activist group Guerilla Girls set out to critique museums that display paintings of nude women to the exclusion of artby women. They conducted a “weenie count” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, comparing the number of nude males to nude females in the artworks on display. Although its image was based on Ingres’ famous Grande Odalisque, the PAF rejected the work because it was too provocative. The MTA, however, agreed to run the billboards for a limited time.
The original image by Ingres without the addition of the gorilla head represents the kind of art that the Guerrilla Girls take issue with. The odalique, a harem woman, lies naked on a bed and looks seductively out from the canvas. Orientalist touches (fan, head wrap, fabrics and pipe) add a degree of exoticism to the image. In the feminist and post-colonial context an image like Ingres' is therefore highly problematic.
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