La M.de de Corsets, ca. 1832 : Cést de la vrai (...) c. 1832

Curator: Oh, this piece! There’s something both unsettling and charming about it. Editor: Tell me what we are looking at, since all I see are some layers and fabrics… Curator: It's titled "La M.de de Corsets, ca. 1832: C'ést de la vrai (...)," made around 1832. The artist remains anonymous. The Rijksmuseum holds it. It's a watercolor, mostly, on paper. I call it 'corset drama’. Editor: Corset drama. Accurate. The amount of effort in crafting and wearing… how constrained life must have felt! What does it say about female labor? Curator: Perhaps the humor. Imagine being laced up so tight. I get this distinct sense of the domestic, though—the intimacy and rituals surrounding the body and how it was presented. The intimacy in assisting and even sharing secrets during these preparations, and maybe giggling after pinching a bit. Editor: Good point. But beyond the gossip, think about the materials, sourced through intense colonial extraction. This is a product of global economies as much as female labour and a shared interior. How was it assembled and consumed? These items have their origins somewhere… beyond the mirrored reflection of aristocracy. Curator: And yet the composition, that lovely soft color palette, invites us in to witness something vulnerable. This wasn’t made to challenge the structure itself, just show a day in life, and how much a painting like this becomes an enduring artifact. The romantic era indeed. Editor: Very true. I mean, looking closely at the wallpaper and the drapes in the background; these decorative things hint at an artificial and constricted environment. Not to forget what seems like an array of identical corsets looming on a table in the top left. I agree that this piece goes well beyond mere romantic escapism or sentimentality. It speaks to very tangible things. Curator: So true. Seeing this artwork, these items, feels like touching a bygone era – feeling both the physical constraint and a whisper of their intimate moments. The anonymous nature of the artist almost feels perfect. Editor: Precisely! Examining the texture of the watercolours helps emphasize that. It’s not just pigment but labour captured and commodified; a portrait in female craft of all classes.