In Which the Link Between a Luscious Nude and a Factory for War Machines is Pointed Out.

So here is a question for you:  What could possibly be the link between this:

Cabanel's Birth of Venus, sometimes referred to simply as "The painting of the woman with the boobs and the water".

And this?

Newport News Shipbuilding, sometimes referred to as the place where they build the things that launch the things that deliver things that make other things go boom in the name of Freedom.  

The answer is this:

An unlikely link between the two, though if you are smart you can probably guess what is going on here.

So what is all this then?

The first picture is The Birth of Venus, by Alexandre Cabanel, a huge hit at the Paris Salon of 1863.  Napoleon III, upon seeing the painting, purchased it immediately; probably not because of its artistic value but rather because in addition to some highly polished brushwork and a rather realistic depiction of an ocean wave it features - rather prominently - a very naked woman.  Perfect for adorning the study of the man who has everything and is worried that his adventures in Mexico are beginning to flounder. 

All joking aside, though, the painting really was very much adored.  It was just within the bounds of propriety of the time, where painting nudes was okay if it fell into the historic/mythological schools of French painting, featuring seamless brush strokes, accurate depictions, and a purpose of either imparting a moral lesson, exemplifying beauty, or telling a story from France's glorious past.  We might look at this Cabanel and see it as something not much better than soft core pornography, laden with all the chauvenistic baggage that western culture has loaded on to itself.  But for the Parisian of 1863 it checked the boxes.  The most scandalous aspect of the painting, the thing that was up for debate at the time, was the look that Cabanel's Venus is giving as she peeks out from under her arm.  Is she actually in repose, or do her eyes suggest a sort of post-coital contended grogginess?  The critics in Paris battled it out, could not agree on any kind of consensus, and the mild whiff of controversy only added to the overall warm reception to Cabanel's work.

I'm getting a bit off track here, but it should be noted that the adoration of Cabanel's nude was in direct contrast to the derision hefted almost joyfully against Manet's Le déjeuner sur l'herbe, exhibited at the 1863 Salon des Refuses (a special sort of extra Salon held featuring paintings rejected by the Paris Salon jury of 1863, after there were objections that the jury was too harsh).  One of the problems with the painting, as the Parisians saw it, was that the men were wearing contemporary clothes and were in a contemporary setting.  In 1863 this just wasn't normally done.  Pictures of everyday life took a back seat to stunning histories or mythological settings, usually featuring men wearing nothing but plummed trojan helmets and women in various stages of undress, modesty sometimes preserved by the fortuitous fold of a toga.

Manet was one of the first to paint the modern people of Paris with all their glory and grit going about their everyday lives, doing things like going to horse races, listening to music, drinking absinthe, and having lunch with naked women in the city parks, because that is apparently what normal French people do.  Anyhow, the idea that painting contemporary people going about their ordinary lives could actually be meaningful required the artistic mores of the day to undergo a pretty significant adjustment.

Secondly, the painting depicts the woman as a likely prostitute; the everyday clothing of the men, the casual discarding of her clothes, and the frog placed towards the right side of the painting all suggest that this woman was being paid to be there, and though prostitution was rife in Paris in the 1860s it was not kosher to depict the workers who plied their trade.

Third and final:  critics found the woman in Manet's painting to be ugly, and painted without technique or depth, the uniform pallor of her skin akin to a photograph.  People didn't like that.  Though somewhat risque, Cabanel's Venus by comparison was seen as a charming painting of a beautiful naked goddess as opposed to a rather brash work depicting a scene of questionable morality that did nothing to further the study of the beautiful. 

Manet's controversial Le déjeuner sur l'herbe.  I have no idea what the bather in the background is there for.  Don't ask.  

So now to Newport News Shipbuilding.  The Shipyard was founded in 1886 as the Chesapeake Dry Dock and Construction Company by Collis P. Huntington. Long before that, he made a ridiculous amount of money building railroads (he was heavily involved in building the transcontinental railroad), and was known for being fairly unethical, which in the world of 19th century business and politics is really saying something.   Still, he is known for saying the words that are inscribed onto every shipbuilder's heart:  "We shall build good ships here;  at a profit if we can, at a loss if we must, but always good ships".  Later, when he found out the rum runner he was building for Johnny K. Chesterton & Sons was going to be behind schedule because the paint had failed due to the high levels of humidty present during the summer in Hampton Roads (something he clearly did not think hard enough about), he uttered the immortal shipyard motto:  "It is what it is."

When his first wife died of cancer in 1883 he married Arabella Yarrington Worsham, a Richmond courtesan who somehow struck up a liason with Collis P. Huntington after the Civil War, perhaps thanks to Huntington's love of cards and gambling and her presence at a popular Richmond faro house doing...stuff?  Not sure, really.  The details are vague.  But she became his mistress at the age of 19 and was moved to New York City with her entire family where she and Collis carried on for 14 years until finally getting married in 1884.

Even before their marriage, Arabella was one of the richest women in America.  And when you are filthy rich, with all the power and status that that entails, you need a painting of yourself, a portrait, that shows to everyone else how fucking filthy rich you are, yes?

And here is where we come full circle back to Cabanel.  In addition to being a very gifted painter of T&A, he was a renowned portrait painter.  Portrait painting was the bread and butter of the many less successful artists of the time and Cabanel was so wealthy and famous he really didn't need the money - but he apparently enjoyed it, and many of his portraits of fully clothed and very wealthy men and women (even one of Napoleon III himself in 1865) would receive acclaim in Paris Salons well beyond that of 1863. He gained international fame and during the Gilded Age was the best known French painter in America, aside from maybe Messionier; many Americans - especially women - desperately wanted to have Cabanel paint them.  It was a fairly meaningless status symbol, the tricked out SUV of the day.   

Cabanel never came to America, so in 1881 or 1882 Araballa Worsham arranged through an agent to sit for Cabanel and she made the trip over to his Paris studio to sit - or rather stand - for her portrait, which is the third picture shown above, entitled "Mrs. Collis P. Huntington", completed in 1882.  I would note it is unusual, in that most Cabanel portraits of the time were 3/4 length, but here we have Bella Huntington in full length glory, perhaps showing the stature she commanded at the time.  It is also noted that the title of the painting seems like a reverse anachronism, as Arabella was not married to Huntington at the time; though perhaps in 1882, with his first wife (Elizabeth Stoddard)* dying and Arabella well established in society, she may as well have been. 

So there you have it.  The future wife of the founder of Newport News Shipbuilding had her portrait painted by the very same man that wowed all the men of Paris with a painting that they could study with great intent in the name of the artistic beauty that it inherently stood for, examining some parts perhaps more closely than others.

It is amazing, sometimes, how such things are connected to each other.

The portrait was donated to a museum in California by her son Archer Huntington, who incidentally founded the Mariner's Museum.  But that, to use one of the cheapest endings of all time, is another story.

If you want to learn more, I recommend the book "The Judgment of Paris" by Ross King and a couple of articles online; one about Arabelle Huntington and the other about Cabanel and his portrait painting.  A lot of the facts I allude to, but perhaps don't quite set correctly, come from these sources.

NOTE:

*Aside from the fact that she was Huntington's childhood sweetheart, little is known of Elizabeth Stoddard.  She apparently lived a rather quiet life in her New York City mansion as her husband criss-crossed the country.  It is possible that Elizabeth knew of and accepted Arabella, as documentation shows that Arabella and her mother helped during Elizaebth's illness.  One wonders what kind of woman she was, and what kind of life she lead.