The chastity of marble: Zorobabel Rodríguez and Benjamín Vicuña Mackenna's debates on sculpture, nude bodies and female sexuality at the 1872 Exposition of Arts and Industries (Chile, 1872-1884)

Abstract

At the Exposition of Arts and Industries held in Santiago in 1872, three sculptures of nude women, Bacchante, Susana and Eva, made in Carrara marble by the artist Nicanor Plaza, were exhibited, which caused a stir among the general public and diverse reactions among intellectual groups. Among the latter, two of its leading figures, Zorobabel Rodríguez, of Catholic-conservative tendency, and Benjamín Vicuña Mackenna, of liberal-positivist tendency, expressed their opinions about these works in press articles. Within a context of neoclassical inspiration, one of the points of discussion centered on the issue known as the “chastity of marble”, a topic in vogue at the time, which put in tension not only the nature and effects that works of art can cause in viewers, but also the relevance of the representation of the naked body, the sexuality of women and their public exhibition, evidencing not only the existence of divergent aesthetic and ideological positions in Chilean society, but also the power of the androcentric voice in relation to female behavior, where it was envisioned that the Chilean woman should be white, beautiful and chaste as a marble sculpture, but dressed.