Portrait

Portrait (pronounced pawr-trit, pawr-treyt, pohr-trit or pohr-treyt)

(1) A likeness of a person, especially of the face, as a painting, drawing, or photograph (when used as a modifier: a portrait gallery).

(2) A verbal description of someone or something, especially if pertaining to an individual’s character.

(3) Relating to or producing vertical, upright orientation of computer or other digital output, with lines of data parallel to the two shorter sides of a page or screen (as opposed “landscape” in which the relationship is inverted).  The use was formalized in digital technology as applied to aspect ratios (page layouts, images, monitors etc).

(4) In printing (of a publication or an illustration in a publication), being of greater height than width.

1560–1570: From the Middle English portrait (a figure, drawn or painted), either a back formation from portraiture or directly from the French portrait, from the Middle French portraict & pourtraict (a drawing, image, etc), the noun use of the past participle of portraire (to portray), from the thirteenth century Old French portret, from the Latin prōtrahō.  Wherever used, the various forms were always applied especially to pictures or representation of the head and face of a person drawn from life.  The spelling pourtraict is obsolete.  Portrait is a noun, verb & adjective, portraitist & portraiture are nouns and portraiting & portraited are verbs and portraitlike & portraitesque are adjectives; the noun plural is portraits.

An image of Lindsay Lohan, digitally rendered in the style of an oil on canvas portrait.

Artists painting their own image had been a part of art for centuries but the term “self-portrait” entered English in 1821, a direct translation of the German Selbstbildnis (the construct being selbst +‎ Bildnis).  The portraiture (the art of making portraits; a painting, picture, or drawing) emerged in the late fourteenth century and was from the twelfth century Old French portraiture (portrait, image, portrayal, resemblance).  The term Fayum (a city in Egypt, and the associated region) portrait (also known as the "mummy portrait" or "Faiyum portrait" describes the class of naturalistic portraits rendered on the wooden boards attached to mummies from the Coptic period.  Produced between the first & third centuries AD, they were a sub-set of the school of panel painting popular in late Antiquity and have been an invaluable source of information for historians, revealing much about fashion, social structures and aspects of religious beliefs and the associated politics.  Fayum was from the Arabic الفَيُّوم‎ (al-fayyūm), from the Coptic (ph̀iom) (the sea, Fayum), from the Egyptian pꜣ ym (Lake Moeris (literally “The Lake”), the construct being pꜣ (the) + ym (lake).  The term “swagger portrait” is one of the informal terms used to describe a work (not of necessity a portrait as one is now conventionally understood) which is rendered in a style deliberately to emphasize their wealth, status or importance.

The portrait versus landscape aspect ratio was much discussed in the early days of televising live sport on television, the producers concluding there were "landscape sports" and "portrait sports".  Human vision is naturally in a landscape aspect which is why the 16:9 (width x height) ratio works so well in computer monitors and it's said to explain why architecture which follows the dimensionality of the DL envelope is thought to be so pleasing; almost all  the early television screens were in a landscape shape (typically 4:3 or 6:4).  Thus, sports like most football codes (covered with cameras on the long sides and played on a rectangular field) were thought "landscape" and worked best on TV while the forms played on ovals involving much high kicking (such as Australian Rules) was inherently portrait.  Some portrait sports were suitable however because of their small scale.  Tennis was a portrait sport which had to be covered from the small ends but the rectangular courts were small and with attention to camera angles, could be made to work well.  Cricket was (sort of the same) although much panning was involved to cover the rest of the ground when required.     

“Portrait bust” in marble (circa 1895) of Otto von Bismarck (1815-1989; Chancellor of the German Empire 1871-1890) by the German Sculptor Reinhold Begas (1831-1911).

In early 1939, during construction of the new Reich Chancellery in Berlin, workmen dropped one of the Begas busts of Bismarck which had for decades stood in the old Chancellery, breaking it at the neck.  The architect Albert Speer (1905–1981; Nazi court architect 1934-1942; Nazi minister of armaments and war production 1942-1945), knowing that the superstitious Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) regarded the Reich Eagle toppling from the post-office building right at the beginning of World War I (1914-1918) as a harbinger of doom, kept the accident secret and had architect and sculptor Arno Breker (1900–1991) carve an exact copy.  To give the fake the necessary patina, it was soaked for a time in strong, black tea, the porous quality of marble enabling the fluid to induce some accelerated aging.

In sculpture, what was known as the “portrait statue” after the 1690s came to be known as the “portrait bust”, both meaning “sculpture of upper torso and head”.  Bust was from the sixteenth century French buste, from the Italian busto (upper body), from the bustum (funeral monument, tomb (originally “funeral pyre, place where corpses are burned”)) which may have been a shortened form of ambustum, the neuter of ambustus (burned around) and past participle of amburere (burn around, scorch), the construct being ambi- (around) + urere (to burn).  The alternative etymology suggests a link with the Old Latin boro, the early form of Classical Latin uro (to burn) and the sense development in Italian is thought related to the Etruscan custom of keeping the ashes of the dead in an urn shaped like the person when alive.  After the mind-1720s, it was used as a term to describe the “trunk of the human body above the waist” and it’s for this reason it was in the 1880s adapted to mean “the bosom; the measurement around a woman's body at the level of her breasts”.

The Supreme Leader presides over the Fifth Enlarged Meeting of the Eighth Central Military Commission of the WPK, 12 March 2023, the task of the generals & admirals being to write down his every word.  The portraits behind the Supreme Leader (both in landscape aspect) are of the Great Leader (left) and the Dear Leader (right).  Preserving the images of the photographers in the (portrait aspect) mirror was a nice, post-modern, touch.

In August 2023, with tropical storm Khanun bearing down on the DPRK (North Korea) coast, the state media issued instructions that citizens must “with urgency” and “at any cost” focus on “ensuring the safety” of items depicting the three members of the Kim dynasty: Kim Il-sung (Kim I, 1912–1994; Great Leader of DPRK 1948-1994); Kim Jong-il (Kim II, 1941-2011; Dear Leader of DPRK 1994-2011) and Kim Jong-un (Kim III, b 1982; Supreme Leader of DPRK since 2011).  Presumably because they would be more susceptible to the storm’s heavy rain and strong winds than sturdier objects like statutes, the Rodong Sinmun (official newspaper of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea (WPK)) emphasized citizens’ “foremost focus” must be ensuring the preservation of portraits of the Kims although they did caution the need also to safeguard the large number of statues, mosaics, murals and other monuments to the Kim dynasty which has ruled North Korea since its foundation in 1948.

Meeting of the WPK to commemorate the Supreme Leader’s tenth anniversary of his assumption of leadership of the party, Pyongyang, April 2022.  The Supreme Leader’s portrait is displayed in an oval which is not unusual in DPRK Kim iconography.

The order was an interesting insight into the way the regime regards the symbolism of representational objects as a part of its legitimacy but they have set the population an onerous task given the sheer volume of portraits which exist.  At least one each of the Great Leader & Dear Leader are known to hang in every house, café, bus, train carriage or shop and in public buildings there might literally be dozens.  In recent years, it’s been noted portraits of the Supreme Leader have also been more frequently seen and analysts have for years regarded the Kim dynasty’s mode of operation as something like a theocratic state in which the leader and his ancestors are worshiped.  Implicit in that is that statues and portraits are beyond being merely symbolic but are really sacred icons; just as every citizen must be willing (anxious even) to die protecting the leader, so must they be prepared to sacrifice themselves to save his portrait.  It's never been revealed whether any of the Kims read Oscar Wilde's (1854–1900) The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890) but if so, they've learned well.

DPRK citizens during flooding in 2022 (left) & 2012 (centre & right), searching for portraits of the Great Leader, Dear Leader & Supreme Leader that they might be able to save.

Hang

Hang (pronounced hang)

(1) To fasten or attach a thing so that it is supported only from above or at a point near its own top; to attach or suspend so as to allow free movement.

(2) To place in position or fasten so as to allow easy or ready movement.

(3) To put to death by suspending by the neck from a gallows, gibbet, yardarm, or the like; to suspend (oneself) by the neck until dead.

(4) To fasten to a cross; crucify.

(5) To furnish or decorate with something suspended.

(6) In fine art, to exhibit a painting or group of paintings.

(7) To attach or annex as an addition.

(8) In building, to attach (a door or the like) to its frame by means of hinges.

(9) To make an idea, form etc dependent on a situation, structure, concept, or the like, usually derived from another source.

(10) As hung jury, hung parliament etc, where deliberative body is unable to achieve a majority verdict in a vote.

(11) In informal use, to cause a nickname, epithet etc to become associated with a person

(12) In nautical use, to steady (a boat) in one place against a wind or current by thrusting a pole or the like into the bottom under the boat and allowing the wind or current to push the boat side-on against the pole.

(13) To incline downward, jut out, or lean over or forward.

(14) To linger, remain, or persist; to float or hover in the air.

(15) In informal use (to get the hang of), the precise manner of doing, using, etc, something; knack.

(16) In computing, as “to hang”, usually a synonym for “freeze”.  Nerds insist a hang refers only to a loss of control by manual input devices (mouse; keyboard etc) while the machine remains responsive to remote control whereas a freeze is a total lock-up.

(18) In chess (transitive) to cause a piece to become vulnerable to capture and (intransitive) to be vulnerable to capture.

(19) As “hang up”, to end a phone call, a use which has continued even though many phone handsets no longer physically “hang up”.

Pre 900:  A fusion of three verbs: (1) the Middle English and Old English hōn (to hang; be hanging) (transitive), cognate with the Gothic hāhan (originally haghan); (2) the Middle English hang(i)en & Old English hangian (to hang) (intransitive), cognate with the German hangen; and (3) the Middle English henge from the Old Norse hanga & hengja (suspend) (transitive), cognate with the German hängen & hangēn (to hang).

Ultimate source of all forms was the Proto-Germanic hanhaną (related to the Dutch hangen, the Low German hangen & hängen, the German hängen, the Norwegian Bokmål henge & Norwegian Nynorsk henga), root being the primitive Indo-European ḱenk- (to waver, be in suspense).  Etymologists compare the evolution with the Gothic hāhan, the Hittite gang- (to hang), the Sanskrit शङ्कते (śáṅkate) (is in doubt; hesitates), the Albanian çengë (a hook) and the Latin cunctari (to delay).  From the Latin cunctari, Modern English retains the very useful cunctator (a procrastinator; one who delays).

Past tense: hung and hanged

Hang has two forms for past tense and past participle, “hanged” and “hung”.  The older form hanged is now used exclusively in the sense of putting to death on the gallows by means of a lawful execution, sanctioned by the state.  Even in places where capital punishment is no longer used, it remains the correct word to use in its historical context.

There are two forms because the word “hang” came from two different verbs in Old English (with a relationship to one from Old Norse).  One of these Old English verbs was considered a regular verb and this gave rise to “hanged”; the other was irregular, and ended up as “hung”.  Hanged and hung were used interchangeably for hundreds of years but over time, hung became the more common.  Hanged retained its position when used to refer to death by hanging because it became fossilized in both statute and common law; it thus escaped the development of Modern English which tended increasingly to simplified forms.  Even the familiar phrase hung, drawn and quartered originally used “hanged”, a change reflecting popular use.  The only novel variation to emerge in recent years has been to use hanged to describe executions ordered by a state and hung when referring to suicides by hanging although this remains still a trend rather than an accepted convention of use.

Fowler’s Modern English Usage holds it isn’t necessarily erroneous to use hung in the case of executions, just less customary in Standard English but, like most guides, acknowledge the distinction still exists while noting the use of hung is both widespread and tolerated.  The consensus seems to be it’s best to follow the old practice but not get too hung up about it.

Hung and not hung

Portrait of Oliver Cromwell (1650), oil on canvas by Samuel Cooper (1609-1672).

Even if it’s something ephemeral, politicians are often sensitive about representations of their image but concerns are heightened when it’s a portrait which, often somewhere hung on public view, will long outlive them.  Although in the modern age the proliferation and accessibility of the of the photographic record has meant portraits no longer enjoy an exclusivity in the depiction of history, there’s still something about a portrait which conveys, however misleadingly, a certain authority.  That’s not to suggest the classic representational portraits have always been wholly authentic, a good many of those of the good and great acknowledged to have been painted by “sympathetic” artists known for their subtleties in rendering their subjects variously more slender, youthful or hirsute as the raw material required.  Probably few were like Oliver Cromwell (1599–1658; Lord Protector of the Commonwealth 1653-1658) who told Samuel Cooper to paint him “warts and all”.  The artist obliged.

Although certain about the afterlife, Cromwell was a practical politician with few illusions about life on earth.  Once, when being driven in a coach through cheering crowds, his companion remarked that his popularity with the people must be pleasing.  The Lord Protector replied he had no doubt they’d be cheering just as loud were he being taken to the gallows to be hanged.

Exhibition of images of Lindsay Lohan by Richard Phillips (b 1962), hung in the Gagosian Gallery, 555 West 24th Street, New York, 11 September-20 October 2012.  Described by the artist as an installation, the exhibition is an example of the way Phillips uses collaborative forms of image production to reorder the relationship of Pop Art to its subjects, the staging and format of these lush, large-scale works said to render them realist portraits of the place-holders of their own mediated existence.

Portrait of Theodore Roosevelt (1903)  by Théobald Chartran.

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919; US President 1901-1909), famous also for waging war and shooting wildlife, after being impressed by Théobald Chartran’s (1849–1907) portrait of his wife, invited the French artist to paint him too.  He was so displeased with the result, which he thought made him look effete, that he refused to hang the work.  Later, he would have it destroyed.

Portrait of Theodore Roosevelt (1903) by John Singer Sargent.

Roosevelt turned instead to expatriate American artist John Singer Sargent (1856–1925).  The relationship didn’t start well as the two couldn’t agree on a setting and during one heated argument, the president suddenly, hand on hip, took on a defiant air while making a point and Sargent had his pose, imploring his subject not to move.  This one delighted Roosevelt and was hung in the White House.

Portrait of Winston Churchill (1954) by Graham Sutherland.

Another subject turned disappointed critic was Sir Winston Churchill (1874–1965; UK Prime Minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955).  In 1954, a committee funded by the donation of a thousand guineas from members of both houses of parliament, commissioned English artist Graham Sutherland (1903–1980) to paint a portrait of the prime minister to mark his eightieth birthday.  The two apparently got on well during the sittings, Churchill himself a prolific, if undistinguished, amateur painter and it’s said he enjoyed their discussions.  He was unimpressed though with the result, telling Sutherland that while he acknowledged his technical prowess, he found the work “not suitable”.  To his doctor he was less restrained, calling it "filthy" and "malignant".

Portrait of Laurence Olivier in the role of Richard III (1955) by Salvador Dalí.

It had been intended the painting would be hung in the House of Commons but Churchill had no intention of letting it be seen by anyone.  An unveiling ceremony had been arranged and Churchill demanded it not include the painting, relenting only when a compromise was arranged whereby both subject and artwork would appear together but rather than being hung in the Commons, it would instead be gifted to him to hang where he pleased.  Both sides appeased if not pleased, the ceremony proceeded, Churchill making a brief speech of thanks during which he described his gift as “…a remarkable example of modern art..”, praise not even faint.  It was never hung, consigned unwrapped to the basement of the prime minister’s country house where it remained for about a year until Lady Churchill, sharing her husband’s view of the thing, had her staff take it outside where it was burned, an act of practical criticism Sutherland condemned as “vandalism”.  Not anxious to repeat the experience of his brush with modernism, Churchill declined the request of a sitting from Salvador Dalí (1904–1989), the result of which might have been interesting.

Photographs of Winston Churchill (1941) by Yousuf Karsh.

Roosevelt’s pose is one favored by politicians but the expression adopted matters too.  The famous photograph taken in Ottawa in December 1941 by Armenian-Canadian Yousuf Karsh (1908-2002) was actually one of several but those where Churchill shows a more cheerful countenance are not remembered.  They didn’t so well suit the times.

The scowl, although immediately regarded as emblematic of British defiance of the Nazis, had a more prosaic origin, the photographer recalling his subject had appeared benign until it was insisted the ever-present Havana cigar be discarded lest it spoil the photograph.  That changed the mood but, the moment captured, he relented and permitted a couple more, including the now obscure ones with a smile.

Effeminate

Effeminate (pronounced ih-fem-uh-nit (adjective) & ih-fem-uh-neyt (verb))

(1) Of the human male, not manly, having traits, tastes, habits etc, traditionally considered feminine (softness or delicacy et al).  Historically it was usually used as a slur and use is now probably offensive except as a self-descriptor).

(2) Characterized by excessive softness, delicacy, self-indulgence etc (often as “effeminate luxury”) and now rare although “feminized product packaging designed to appeal to women remains common).

(3) By extension, of objects, concepts, literature etc, lacking firmness or vigor.

(4) To make or become effeminate.

1350-1400: From the Middle English, from the Latin effēminātus (womanish, effeminate), past participle of effēmināre (to make into a woman), from fēmina (woman), the construct being e(x)- (out-) + fēmin(a) + + -ātus.  In Italian, it became the feminine plural of effeminate.  The ex- prefix was from the Middle English, from words borrowed from the Middle French, from the Latin ex (out of, from), from the primitive Indo-European eǵ- & eǵs- (out).  It was cognate with the Ancient Greek ἐξ (ex) (out of, from), the Transalpine Gaulish ex- (out), the Old Irish ess- (out), the Old Church Slavonic изъ (izŭ) (out) & the Russian из (iz) (from, out of).  The “x” in “ex-“, sometimes is elided before certain constants, reduced to e- (eg ejaculate).  The Latin suffix -ātus was from the Proto-Italic -ātos, from the primitive Indo-European -ehtos.  It’s regarded as a "pseudo-participle" and perhaps related to –tus although though similar formations in other Indo-European languages indicate it was distinct from it already in early Indo-European times.  It was cognate with the Proto-Slavic –atъ and the Proto-Germanic -ōdaz (the English form being -ed (having).  The feminine form was –āta, the neuter –ātum and it was used to form adjectives from nouns indicating the possession of a thing or a quality.  Effeminate is a verb & adjective, effeminateness, effeminatization & effemination are nouns, effeminatize, effeminated & effeminating are verbs and effeminately is an adverb; the noun plural is effeminations.

Role model for aspiring effeminatizers: Lindsay Lohan on the Jimmy Fallon Show with guests including Vinny Guadagnino, Barrett Wilbert Weed, Ashley Park, Kate Rockwell, Bob the Drag Queen, Dusty Ray Bottoms, Monique Heart, Aquaria, Trinity ‘The Tuck’ Taylor and Monet X Change, January 2019.

Effeminate is probably now a word to be avoided because it’s difficult to use except as a slur and even if that’s achieved, such is modern sensitivity it will anyway be interpreted thus.  For a similar effect, the recommended alternative is the early seventeenth century effete (the alternative spelling effœte is obsolete), from the Latin effētus (exhausted (literally “that has given birth).  It used to convey the meaning “substances exhausted, spent or worn-out” but that is obsolete and it now means (1) weak, decadent, lacking strength or vitality; feeble, powerless and (2) someone or something (usually speech or writing) affected, over-civilized or refined to the point of absurdity.

Ladies 45 piece tool kit in pink with pink carry-case.

The verbs feminized & effeminized are sometimes confused and there was a time when them was some overlap of meaning but conventions of use have emerged.  In fields such demographics feminized is used to describe aggregate outcomes such as a preponderance of females in an occupational sector while in botany & zoology it’s a technical term which refers to instances of plant or animal life tending more to the feminine, the latter often suspected to have been induced by human-induced    environmental factors.  In thus refers to physiology though in medicine it’s used in fields like sex & gender-reassignment where it’s applied also in behavioral therapy.  By contrast, effeminized is used only of appearance and behavior.  It’s thus possible to feminize products yet not effeminize them.  Hardware stores every Saint Valentine's Day benefit from this adaptation by capitalism when sales spike of tool kits with tools finished in pink or purple.  There is nothing inherently effeminate about a pink hammer and the irony is that while pink to appeal to women, it appears the buyers are almost exclusively men.

Dodge in 1955-1956 had advertising for men (horsepower, speed and V8 engines, left) and for women (everything pink, the paint, the rosebuds on the upholstery, the handbag, compact, lipstick case, cigarette case, comb, cigarette lighter, change purse, rain coat, rain-cap and umbrella, right).

Pink tool kits continue reliably to appear in prominent spots as Valentine's Day approaches and at least some women probably enjoy the joke.  However, more blatant attempts at feminized products seem no longer in vogue, the implication of condescension just too blatant.  Chrysler offered the La Femme package in 1955 and 1956 on certain Dodge models, a creation that was not a stylistic whim but a response to sociological changes in an unexpectedly affluent post-war US society in which women were found to be exerting a greater influence on the allocation of their family’s rising disposable income and of most interest to Chrysler was that those increasingly suburban families were buying second cars, women getting their own.  Adventurous color schemes were nothing new to Detroit, the cars of the art deco era noted for their combinations though things had been more subdued in the years immediately after World War II (1939-1945) but that changed with the exuberance of 1950s experimentation.  However, sales of the La Femme proved disappointing and within a decade, the manufacturers would work out what women wanted was better designs, cars which were smaller, more manageable and with practical features, not the existing lines “feminized” with pink finishes and accessories.

Actually looking good: Men in lingerie in the PRC.

The economic and political systems of the modern People’s Republic of China (PRC) has many differences from those familiar in the West but, as the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) increasingly coming to realize, there are also many similarities, one of which is after when laws are passed and regulations promulgated, there are sometimes “unintended consequences”.  It was only in 2020 that the CCP’s Central Committee, having decided California’s most recent Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger (b 1947; governor of California 2003-2011) was right in identifying “girly men” as a bit of a problem and cracked down, declaring a war on androgyny, young men deemed too effeminate banned from some very popular television programmes.  Aiming to eradicate the androgynous, the state’s regulator of television content ruled broadcasters must "resolutely put an end to sissy men and other abnormal aesthetics", telling them to ban from the screens the niang pao (derisive slang for girly men which translates literally as "girlie guns”).

That worked well and, presumably encouraged, the CCP decided to eliminate another form of deviance, women modeling underwear on on-line shopping live-streams.  The ban was imposed overnight and streamers were warned that any site flouting the ban would be shutdown, the regulator warning transgressors might be charged with disseminating obscene material.  The streamers of course complied because defying the rules of the CCP is a bad career move but they complied only with the letter of the law, the streams converting instantly to use male models, an appropriately androgynous group presumably in ample supply after being banned from the TV shows.  A classic unintended consequence, in attempting to remove one form of behavior for some reason thought deviant (women wearing women’s underwear), the CCP have created a whole new mass-market genre (men in women’s underwear).  In the West, men in women’s underwear is just another niche segment on the web but for the CCP, truly it must be a ghastly thought that not only has this decadence reached the Middle Kingdom, but it’s all their fault.

April 2022: A new painted portrait (left) of a (then) slimmed-down Kim Jong-un which analysts suggest was based on an earlier photograph (right).

The keen watchers of the endlessly entertaining antics of the DPRK’s (North Korea, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) ruling family are a small industry; they don’t have a snappy title like “Kremlinologist” but in geopolitics it’s a genuine specialty.  Monitoring a dynasty that depends so much on symbolism and representational objects, one thing noted of late has been the increasing proliferation of new portraits of Kim Jong-un (Kim III, b 1982; Supreme Leader of DPRK since 2011).  The portraits began to appear in 2021, coinciding with celebrations of the Supreme Leader’s first decade of rule and their widespread deployment has been interpreted as one of the building blocks of his cult of personality.  In the decade after he assumed office, the only portraits usually seen were those of father and grandfather: Kim Il-sung (Kim I, 1912–1994; Great Leader of DPRK 1948-1994) & Kim Jong-il (Kim II, 1941-2011; Dear Leader of DPRK 1994-2011).

Everywhere one you look, the Great Leader and the Dear Leader are looking at you.  Given the number which exist and their size (there are also paired statutes, many paid for by the imposition of a "metals tax"), it would be a big job to add the Supreme Leader's portrait nationwide.  Still, the Kims have never been afraid of projects at a grand scale and ideologically, it may be unavoidable, the DPRK operating under a "three generations" (G3) hereditary system which (1) permits soldiers to wear the medals awarded to their fathers & grandfathers and (2) under the criminal justice system means "three generations of punishment" in which individuals found guilty of a crime are sent to the labor camps with their entire family, the subsequent two generations of the family born in the camp, remaining locked up for life.  This includes those convicted of “unspecified offences” all of whom, although never quite sure of the nature of their offence, are certainly guilty.  The Pyongyangologists are divided.  Some think it likely a third portrait may appear but that a variation of G3 will be established in that Kim Il-sung (already the DPRK's "Eternal President") will for G3 purposes be also the nation's "eternal grandfather", his portrait remaining forever while the other two will be the two most recent successors.  Thus there will never be more than three portraits.  Others think it's too early and it may be a third will be added only when (God forbid) the Supreme Leader dies.   

Interestingly, at one of the events conducted under a portrait of the Supreme Leader, a forty-minute long televised series of speeches marking the tenth anniversary of him becoming first secretary of the Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK), in addition to being praised for (1) leading the DPRK through the worst hardships, (2) completing the project of acquiring nuclear weapons and (3) ending the history of threats of nuclear war or invasion by imperialists, he was referred with a previously unknown title: Great Guardian.  Whether that’s of any significance isn’t clear but after the death of his father, Kim Jong-un was briefly known as the “Great Successor” so title changes in the third generation of the dynasty are not unknown.  Among the Pyongyangologists, there’s no consensus about whether the authorities are likely to add the portrait to all or any of the thousands of pairs featuring the Great Leader and the Dear Leader.  Such a move would clearly place the Supreme Leader on the same level as his late predecessors and currently, no painted portraits or statues of Kim Jong-un are known to be displayed in the country and artists are not permitted to paint his likeness.

Among those looking forward to a new series of portraits of the Supreme Leader are the meme-makers who found the contours of his soft, fleshy features made him ideally suited to effeminatization.  At top left is an official photograph issued by DPRK Foreign Ministry, the other five are digitally modified. 

Weimar

Weimar (pronounced vahy-mahr, wahy-mahr, veye-mahr or weye-mahr)

(1) A city in Thuringia, in central Germany, the scene (in 1919) of the adoption of the constitution of the German state which came (retrospectively) to be known as the Weimar Republic.

(2) A German surname (of habitational origin).

(3) As Weimar Republic, The sovereign German republic (1918-1933), successor state to the German Empire (1871-1918 and now sometimes referred to as the “Second Reich”) and predecessor to the Nazi regime (the “Third Reich”, 1933-1945).

Pre 1100: The construct was the Old High German wīh (holy; sacred) + meri (sea; lake; pond; standing water, swamp).  The name can therefore be analysed as something like “holy pond” or “sacred lake” but what religious significance this had or which aquatic feature was involved is not known.  A settlement in the area of what is now Weimar has existed since at least the early Middle Ages and there is a document dated 999 which makes reference to the town as Wimaresburg but how long this, or some related form had be in use is unknown.  Over time, the changes presumably reflected as desire for convenience and simplification (not an imperative always noted in evolution of the German language) and during the early centuries of the second millennium the place seems to have been known as Wimares, Wimari & Wimar before finally becoming Weimar.  In a manner not unusual in the Holy Roman Empire (800-1806), it was the seat of the County of Weimar, one of the administrative and commercial centres of Thuringia but in 1062 merged with the County of Orlamünde to form Weimar-Orlamünde, which existed until 1346 when the Thuringian Counts' War (a squabble between several local barons) erupted.  In the settlement which followed, Weimar was taken by the Wettin clan as an agreed fief and over time developed into a major city.  Weimar is a proper noun, Weimarization & Weimarize are nouns and Weimarian is a noun & adjective; the noun plural is Weimars.

One native to or an inhabitant of Weimar is a Weimarer (strong, genitive Weimarers, plural Weimarer, feminine Weimarerin).  The adjective Weimarian (of or relating to the Weimar period (1918-1933) in German can be used in any context but is most often applied to the art & culture associated with the era rather than politics or economics.  The comparative is “more Weimarian”, the superlative “most Weimarian”).  The noun Weimarization (a state of economic crisis leading to political upheaval and extremism) is used exclusively to describe the political and financial turmoil of the Weimar years.  The verb Weimarize (to cause to undergo Weimarization) is the companion term and is applied in much the same was as a word like “Balkanize” as a convenient word which encapsulates much in a way no other can.  The Weimaraner is a breed of dog, bred originally in the region as a hunting dog, the construct being Weimar + the German suffix -aner (denoting “of this place”).

In a constitutional sense, the Weimar Republic came into existence on 11 August 1919 when the national assembly of the German state met in the city to adopt the new Weimar Constitution.  Despite that, many historians use the label to cover the whole period between abdication on 9 November 1918 by Wilhelm II (1859 1941; German emperor (Kaiser) & King of Prussia 1888-1918) and the Nazis taking office on 30 January 1933.  The constitution created what structurally was a fairly conventional federal republic (known officially as the Deutsches Reich (German Reich)), the constituent parts of which were the historic Länder (analogous with the states in systems like the US or Australia though the details of the power sharing differed), each with their own governments, assemblies and constitutions.  Historians regards the inherent weakness of the structure as one of the factors which contributed to the political instability, economic turmoil and social unrest for which the era is remembered but the external forces are thought to have been a greater influence, notably the harsh terms imposed by the Treaty of Versailles (1919) and the extraordinary level of war reparations, the latter particularly associated with the hyper-inflation of 1923.  However, it was a time of unusual social & political freedom and there was an outpouring of innovative cultural creativity.  One thing which tends to be obscured by what came later was that by 1928 the system had been stabilized and the economy was stable.  In the last election prior to the Wall Street Crash (1929), the Nazi vote has slumped to 3% and the party was an outlier with few prospects and it was only the depression of the early 1930s which doomed Weimar.

Lindsay Lohan in court, Los Angeles, 2011.

Actually, rather than the pleasant city in Thuringia which lent the constitution its name, it was Berlin, the national and Prussian capital which came most to be associated with the artistic and sexual experimentation of the republic.  Although most of went on in the place was little different than in other conservative German cities it was the small but highly visible numbers of those enjoying the excesses which attracted attention.  In his novel Down There on a Visit (1962) Christopher Isherwood (1904–1986) wrote of the sort of warning respectable folk would in the 1920s offer to anyone who seemed to need the advice:

“Christopher - in the whole of Thousand Nights and One Night, in the most shameless rituals of the Tantra, in the carvings on the Black Pagoda, in the Japanese brothel-pictures, in the vilest perversions of the oriental mind, you couldn’t find anything more nauseating than what goes on there, quite openly, every day. That city is doomed, more surely than Sodom ever was."  And then and there I made a decision - one that was to have a very important effect on the rest of my life. I decided that, no matter how, I would get to Berlin just as soon as ever I could and that I would stay there a long, long time.

Weimar art: Der Künstler mit zwei erhängten Frauen (The Artist with Two Hanged Women), watercolour and graphite on paper by Rudolf Schlichter (1890-1955).   

Isherwood left London by the afternoon train for Berlin on 14 March 1929, taking a room next to the Hirschfeld Institute for Sexual Science from which he explored the city’s “decadence and depravity” enjoying just about every minute and by his own account every gay bar and club, of which there were many.  That niche was only one of many to which the Berlin of Weimer catered, all fetishes seemingly there from morphine, cocaine and opium houses to a club at which membership was restricted to a “coven of coprophagists [who] gorged a prostitute on chocolate, gave her a laxative and settled down to a feast.”  Actually, at the time, there was plenty of depravity among the Nazis, however much the public platform of the party might stress traditional values and they were as condemnatory as the Pope of such as communists, homosexuals and Freemasons (The Roman Catholic Church among the institutions Hitler admired along with the British Empire and comrade Stalin (and Stalin really was a construct)).  Indeed, in his writings and the recollections of his contemporaries about his discussions, Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) didn’t much dwell on moral matters but he would spend much effort condemning those aspects of German culture he believed the Weimar generation were corrupting including “modernist architecture, Dadaist art, Jewish psychoanalysis, experimental theatre, short shirts, lipstick, bobbed hair, dances like the foxtrot and jazz” (the last of which he derided as “a degenerate negroid sound”).

Weimar art: Sonnenfinsternis (Eclipse of the Sun (1926)), oil on canvas by George Grosz (1893-1959).  Weimar was not untouched by surrealism.

The lurid tales of Weimar Berlin from the diaries of Christopher Isherwood et al now entertain rather than shock as once they would have managed but the expressionist art which flourished at the time remains striking.  A stridently experimental fork of the European avant-garde, the Weimar artists chose to ignore traditional aesthetic conventions and according to some critics the painters were fascinated by ugliness, the composers by atonal dissonance.  They were also artists who were predominately urban and focused upon the city, its decadence and corrosive influence upon the individual.  The Weimar period was the time also when the phrase magischer Realismus (magic realism) was coined, more accurately to describe what had come to be known as the Neue Sachlichkeit (new objectivity).  Magic realism is now thought of as a literary genre in which fantastical elements are interpolated into life-like depictions of the world but the first use was in 1925 by German art historian Franz Roh (1890–1965) who observed many artists in the Weimar Republic were rejecting (or at least ignoring) the idealistic style (fashionable before World War I (1914-1918) and which had combined naturalistic depiction with an amplification of beauty and virtue), in favor of something recognizably realistic yet blended with uncanny elements.  Roh’s understanding of magic realism was at least partially an acknowledgement of technology: the influence of photography and moving pictures (film).  Then as now, there was debate about whether there was some point at which realism stopped and surrealism began but the distinction was that magic realism was a distortion of the actual material world for some political or other didactic purpose whereas surrealism explored the abstractions which lurked in the subconscious mind. 

In the Weimar style: The Rt Hon Theresa May MP (2023), a portrait of (Lady May, b 1956; UK prime-minister 2016-2019) by Saied Dai (b 1958).

Painted by Tehran-born Saied Dai, it will hang in  Portcullis House, Parliament's office complex where many MPs have their offices and not since Graham Sutherland’s (1903–1980) portrait of Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) was unveiled in 1954 has a painting of one of the country’s prime-ministers attracted so much interest, the reception of such works not usually much more than perfunctory.  Sutherland was commissioned (as second choice; Sir Herbert Gunn's (1893–1964) fee deemed too high) by the ad hoc “Churchill Joint Houses of Parliament Gift Committee” to paint a portrait to mark the prime-minister’s eightieth birthday and on 30 November 1954, the members of the Commons & the Lords assembled in Westminster Hall to mark the occasion.  Paid for by parliamentary subscription (the idea of paying for such a thing from their own pockets would appal today’s politicians), it was intended the work would remain with Churchill until his death after which it would be gifted to the state to hang in the Palace of Westminster.

Winston Churchill (1954) by Graham Sutherland.

Things didn’t work out that way.  Churchill, not anyway much enjoying the aging process loathed the painting and felt betrayed by the artist, the preliminary sketches he’d been shown hinting at something rather different.  Initially, he sulked, first saying he wouldn’t attend the event, then that he’d turn up only if the painting wasn’t there but his moods often softened with a little coercion and he agreed to make a short speech of thanks at the unveiling, his most memorable lines being: “The portrait is a remarkable example of modern art. It certainly combines force and candour.”  It wasn’t hard to read between the lines and when delivered to Churchill’s country house, the painting was left in a storeroom, never unwrapped and never again to be seen, Lady Churchill (Clementine Churchill (Baroness Spencer-Churchill; 1885–1977) in 1956 incinerating it in what was described as “a huge bonfire”.  That she'd executed one of history’s most practical examples of art criticism wasn't revealed until 1979.  Curiously, when first she saw it in 1954 she admired the work, Somerset Maugham (1874–1965) who was with her at the time noting she “liked the portrait very much” and was much “moved and full of praise for it.”  Her view soon changed.

The better-received May portrait was commissioned this time by the Speaker's Advisory Committee on Works of Art at a cost of Stg£28,000 (in adjusted terms somewhat less than the 1,000 guineas paid in 1954; this time all from the tax payer) and Mrs May (she doesn’t use the title she gained in 2020 upon her husband being knighted (for “political service”) in Boris Johnson’s (b 1964; UK prime-minister 2019-2022) remarkable (and belated) Dissolution Honours List) was reported as saying she thought the portrait a “huge honour”.  When interviewed, the artist said his “…aim was to produce not just a convincing physical likeness, but also a psychological characterization, both individual and yet archetypal - imbued with symbolism and atmosphere.  A good painting needs to be a revelation and also paradoxically, an enigma. It should possess an indefinable quality - in short, a mystery.”

A work of careful composition, critics have found in it influences from the Renaissance and mannerism but it’s most obviously in the spirit of the German expressionists identified with the Weimar Republic and the addition of a convallaria majalis (the "lily of the valley" which flowers in May) was the sort of touch they would have admired.  Interestingly, Mr Dai expressed relief he’d not been asked to render Mr Johnson on canvas which is understandable because while an artist could permit their interpretative imagination free reign and produce something memorable, Mr Johnson over the decades has been a series of living, breathing caricatures and it would be challenge for anyone to capture his “psychological characterization”.  The Weimaresque May in oil on canvas works so well because it’s so at variance with the one-dimensional image of the subject which has so long been in the public mind.  Whether it will change the perception of Mrs May in the minds of many isn’t known but critics have mostly admired the work and views of her premiership do seem to have been revised in the light of the rare displays of ineptitude which have marked the time in office of her three successors.

After Weimar: Der Bannerträger (The Standard Bearer (circa 1936)) oil on plywood by Hubert Lanzinger (1880-1950).  The post card with the inscription Ob im Glück oder Unglück, ob in der Freiheit oder im Gefängnis, ich bin meiner Fahne, die heute des Deutschen Reiches Staatsflagge ist, treu geblieben (Whether in good fortune or misfortune, whether in freedom or in prison, I have remained loyal to my flag, which is now the state flag of the German Reich) was issued in 1939, one of many such uses of the image which depicts Hitler as a knight in shining armor on horseback, bearing a Swastika flag.  As he did whenever a  postage stamp with his image was sold, the Führer received a tiny fee as a royalty; multiplied by millions, he gleaned quite a income from his pictures.  In one of the many examples of the fakery which underpinned Nazism (and fascism in general), Hitler was “terrible on horseback".

Der Bannerträger was an example of the type of art which proliferated in both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, works intended to enforce the personality cult around Hitler and comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) and reinforce the messaging of both regimes.  Hitler, although he dutifully acknowledged them when they were presented, really did regard them as a kind of kitsch and although he understood their utility as propaganda pieces, they aroused in him little interest.  What he really liked in a painting was beauty as he defined it and in this his differentiation was something like his views on architecture where the standards imposed on the “functional” varied from his expectations of the “representational”.  Hitler would admire modern architecture rendered in steel & glass if it was being used for a factory or warehouse; there it was a matter of efficiency and improving working conditions but for the public buildings of the Reich, he insisted on classical motifs in granite.  In painting, he distinguished between what was essentially “advertising” and “real” art which the expressionism of the Weimar era certainly was not; the “…sky is not green, dogs are not blue and anyone who paints them as such has a sick mind” was his summary of thought on the Weimar art movement.  His preference was for (1) the Neoclassical which drew inspiration from the Greek and Roman art of Antiquity and his fondness extended not only to the voluptuous female nudes historians like to mention but also to the idealized, heroic figures representing nobility and heroism; with these he identified, (2) realistic landscapes, particularly those of the German countryside at its most lovely, (3) German Academic Realism which produced intricately detailed realistic representations of subjects, (4) depictions from Norse mythology which created a link between the legends and the idealized vision of the Nazi project and (5), traditional portraiture, if realistic and flattering (certainly demanded of the many painted of him).

Women in Weimer art: Margot (1924), oil on canvas by Rudolf Schlichter (1890-1955) (left), Porträt der Tänzerin Anita Berber (Portrait of the Dancer Anita Berber (1925)), oil and tempera on plywood by Otto Dix (1891–1969) (centre) and Bean Ingram (1928), oil on canvas by Herbert Gurschner (1901-1975) (right). 

Books of which the Nazis didn’t approve could be burned and the proscribed music not played but the practical public servants in the finance ministry knew much of the Entartete Kunst (degenerate art) removed from German (and later Austrian) galleries was highly sought by collectors in other countries and valuable foreign exchange was obtained from these sales (some of which in the post-war years proved controversial because of the provenance of some pieces sold then and later; they turned out to have been “obtained” from occupied territories or Jews).  Hitler despised Dadaism, Expressionism, Cubism, and Surrealism and expected others in the Reich to share his view but an exhibition of Entartete Kunst in Munich in 1937 proved an embarrassing one-off for the regime because people from around the country travelled to see it and it was the most attended art show of the Third Reich.  It was Weimar’s revenge.