Surprise! We’re re-introducing our short-form series, “A Little Curious,” which will give you sweet snippets of bonus content on the “off” weeks between our normal episodes. In today’s episode, we’re going deep into sculpture. More specifically, ancient figurines of women--nice, rounded ladies-- and why they are so voluptuous. It’s time to get a little curious about body positivity, ice ages, making babies, and ancient sculpture.

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Production and Editing by Kaboonki.

ArtCurious is sponsored by Anchorlight, an interdisciplinary creative space, founded with the intent of fostering artists, designers, and craftspeople at varying stages of their development. Home to artist studios, residency opportunities, and exhibition space Anchorlight encourages mentorship and the cross-pollination of skills among creatives in the Triangle.

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Links and further resources

Artnet: This Newly Discovered 23,000-Year-Old Statue Has a Kim Kardashian-Worthy Booty

Artnet: Rare 8,000-Year-Old Neolithic Fertility Figurine Discovered in Turkey

McDermott, LeRoy. "Self-Representation in Upper Paleolithic Female Figurines." Current Anthropology 37, no. 2 (1996): 227-75. Accessible here: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2744349

Artnet: The Venus of Willendorf and Other Voluptuous Ancient Figures May Have Been ‘Ideological Tools’ to Shape Body-Image Norms

Quartz: Paleolithic women likely knew a lot more about loving their bodies than we do

Episode Transcript

I’m not a huge fan of the phrase “bucket list,” but I’ve gotta admit that I have one. A physical one, written in a notebook just steps away from where I am narrating this episode. It contains not a list of adventurous activities like bungee jumping or skydiving, but instead is kind of a nerdy one. It’s a cultural bucket list that’s all about art history, so on my checklist are works of art, museums, or buildings that I haven’t yet visited and that I’d love to see with my own eyes, if possible, before I kick the bucket someday (hopefully far in the future). Every year it seems to grow a little longer. I haven’t seen Bramante’s “Tempietto” in Rome, nor have I visited Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul. Those are some biggies. But I am also desperate someday to visit the Natural History Museum in Vienna, Austria, to see something tiny: a figurine 4 ½ inch tall-- or about 11 centimeters-- a woman made of limestone and carved with large, bulbous breasts, a big ol’ backside, and curled or plaited hair. This is the so-called Venus of Willendorf, discovered in 1908 by a team of archaeologists near the town of Willendorf, in lower Austria. And she’s a small wonder. Venus here has no face or individually-identifying features: she is her body, and a large one at that, with an ample tummy and belly button, large thighs, and those breasts---such serious breasts. She’s all woman, all curves. And that’s part of the reason why archaeologists gave her the name of “Venus,”  because of those superbly exaggerated female and sexual features-- that she’s a figure whose purpose, perhaps, was as a fertility figurine or perhaps a mother goddess, and so could be linked--if not in actuality, but perhaps just in a historian’s mind-- to the Roman goddess of love and fertility, Venus. Chances are really good that when this figure was made--at least 25,000 years ago, according to radiocarbon dating-- that there wasn’t any thought or belief in ancient Greco-Roman mythology, which most likely developed thousands of years later,  so the terminology is definitely a bit of a misnomer. And while some people refer to this sculpture as the “Woman of Willendorf,” it’s still most likely that you’ll hear her referred to as “Venus.” 

The Venus of Willendorf isn’t alone in its exaggeration of the feminine body. Lots of these little zaftig figures have been discovered across the world, but particularly in Europe, over the past century. In 2016 and 2017, similar figures were found in Turkey and Russia, and the Russian one even caused a social media stir after being compared to Kim Kardashian--tiny in stature but rather bootylicious. Do people still say bootylicious? Ugh, you guys. Moving on. 

What’s really curious about these rounded ladies is that in the past few years, their interpretations have changed-- or at least there have been alternate usages and meanings lobbed at them. The idea of these objects as fertility fetish figurines--try saying that one five times fast--does make some sense, especially considering the small size of these sculptures. They’re so tiny that you could carry them around with you, made to fit in the palm of one’s hand. But some archaeologists have even considered these as potential self-portraits of ancient women. In 1996, professors Catherine Hodge McCoid and LeRoy McDermott, both from Central Missouri State University, posited that these may have been super-early renditions of womens’ own bodies, as seen from above and with their own skewed perspective. So, recall that this was a time without mirrors, a paleolithic period where seeing one’s own face was really rare, perhaps furnished only by a convenient puddle or still pond. But a woman could look down upon herself… and would have her own self-image distorted by her close proximity to her own body. Her breasts might look bigger, her tummy bulging out, not flattened by the perspective of distance. On my website I’ve linked to the original article, which has some awesome comparative photos and diagrams that really explain the thought processes here-- and they are really fascinating, so go to artcuriouspodcast.com to check that out in the blog post for today’s show. Think of this. Think of how revolutionary this theory may have been at the time, when artists have long-been considered to be men, when the sheer exaggeration of the female sex organs on the Venus of Willendorf and others were long viewed as totems of female desire and beauty, and their purposes as lovers and mothers. How much more interesting to think that these may have been little self-representations by some of the earliest women artists? If this is the case, it’s not terribly surprising given what other recent research has posited about the world’s first artists, as I mentioned in my book. The length of fingers on the hand sometimes correlates with gender, and so archaeologists believe that some of the earliest cave paintings we see may have been completed by women. So in this case, some of the world’s oldest sculptures could have been made by women, too. 

But art history doesn’t stop for anyone! New interpretations and evidence, new modes of thinking about even the oldest works of art keep bubbling up. And just last year, in December 2020, the journal Obesity carried an article suggesting that there is a link between these robust European statuettes and the Ice Age. Authors Richard J. Johnson, Miguel A. Lanaspa, and John W. Fox noted the importance of body fat in basically staying alive in a time of frigid temperatures and glacial advance. As Europe in particular grew colder, people needed to grow larger to survive potential famines and to stay warm. Such so-called “Venus” figures, then, may have had two purposes: first as a plain old representation of the appearance of women during this age, and second, and even more important: they may have been used as what the authors called, quote, “ideological tools,” unique, which they note, quote, “conveyed ideals in body size for young women.” We see hundreds of images on practically a daily basis showing us--but women and female-identifying people--how we should look, how our bodies should be carried, how much weight we should lose, how imperfect our dimples are. This, in some ways, is an ancient example of that same kind of propaganda, of policing the quote-unquote “best” or “right” way for a woman to look. But instead of trying to sell us products, the intention here is a much nobler one: to encourage survival in the face of one of the harshest meteorological periods ever experienced by humankind. “The aesthetics of art thus had a significant function in emphasizing health and survival to accommodate increasingly austere climatic conditions,” these authors suggest. It was perhaps body positivity for the best possible means. To paraphrase our great modern prophet, Freddie Mercury, it truly was fat-bottomed girls who made the paleolithic world go round. (ugh, sorry.) 

For more stories of the unexpected, the slightly odd, and the strangely wonderful in art history, subscribe now to the ArtCurious Podcast on the podcatcher of your choice, follow on Spotify, or download and listen in on our website, artcuriouspodcast.com. And a reminder that I will read your name and thank you in these episodes if you support our show tax-free by donating to us via our website: artcuriouspodcast.com.  I’ll catch you back here next week for our continuing series on “Cursed Art,” and again in two weeks for another little look at ancient art with A Little Curious.