Face and Image. Cosmetics and Art, 1500–1800

The English word painting had been literally associated with makeup since the 14th century: It meant equally the painting of canvas and face with color. Writings on cosmetics equated makeup with painting. Art literature sometimes treated makeup as well. For example, we know that painters such Velzquez (in the 17th century) and Goya (in the 18th century), both from Spain, were also paid to put makeup on women. In such cases, painting and makeup merge. In the project, I investigate the meaning of cosmetics as an art of beautification. To do this, I study images of the face (portraits) and writings about the face and makeup. I analyze the role of cosmetics in writings about the human face as well as pictures of the face: In the arts, in philosophy, in medicine, in science. The project explores how these different fields are connected through cosmetics. Especially in the period from the 16th to the 18th century this question was important: It was then that the modern natural sciences came into being. The modern concepts of the artist and the physician were developed. Because both, women and men used makeup, there was also the question of which profession should be responsible for cosmetics and the beautification of the human face: (male) doctors, female artists or artists. Connected with this was always the question of who can be the author or creator of a painted face: nature, the person who applies makeup on to the face, or the artist who paints a picture of it? In this way, the project also deals with the history of the creation of the modern artwork in the period before 1800.