Sultry Summer Dresses

For the new magazine of See All This, poet/writer/artist Maria Barnas wrote an essay about flowers in art. She used to think that flowers were ‘hopelessly passive’, but later on she discovered that they can also be something else: obscure and uncomfortable, erotic and perverse.

‘My mother had made me a dress. She was so pleased with it that I didn’t dare to tell her how I’d rather die than be seen in that dress. I was supposed to wear the dress for my First Communion. […] It was not just a dress. It was a dress with flowers.‘

Marieke Barnas wearing her flower dress for her First Communion.

Not only flowers, but also flower dresses are recurrent themes in Fine Art. From innocent and sweet to erotic and provocative. See All This selected the seven most beautiful flower dresses.

1. Sandro Botticelli, La Primavera (1477-1482)

Botticelli, La Primavera

2. Gustav Klimt, The Kiss, 1907-1908

Not the Kiss, but another work by Klimt is now on display at the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag.

Gustav Klimt, The Kiss, 1907-1908

3. Walter Vaes, Child portrait of damsel Louise-Félicité de Stuers , 1919

In the collection of, and currently on view at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen.

Walter Vaes, Child portrait of damsel Louise-Félicité de Stuers, 1919

4. Alexander McQueen, Sarabande, 2007

Alexander McQueen, Sarabande, 2007

5. Bettina Rheims, Claire Stansfield crying in the Formosa cafe, 1994

Bettina Rheims, Claire Stansfield crying in the Formosa cafe, 1994

6. George Hendrik Breitner, Girl in red kimono (Geesje Kwak), 1895−1896

In the collection of the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag.

George Hendrik Breitner, Girl in red kimono (Geesje Kwak), 1895−1896

7.  Breitner’s girls

Unfortunately, the exhibition Breitner: Girls in Kimono in the Rijksmuseum is already over. But you can also see the girls in kimono online – ánd put them on your wall: since 2011, the RKD – Netherlands Institute for Art History has published a digital overview of Breitner’s photos online. With as many as 2.300 original photographs from its own collection.

George Hendrik Breitner, Girl in kimono (Geesje Kwak), 1893, foto collectie RKD

They are also for sale: the RKD holds the original negatives of Breitner’s photographs, of which high quality prints can be ordered online via the website. Price € 49,- each.

Read the essay by Maria Barnas in #2 of See All This.