Cartografías del deseo

• Main Author: Laura Malosetti Costa
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Centro Argentino de Investigadores de Arte 2015-12-01
• Series: Caiana: Revista de Historia del Arte y Cultura Visual
• Subjects: Desire; Eroticism; Art History; XIX century
• Online Access: http://caiana.caia.org.ar/template/caiana.php?pag=articles/article_2.php&obj=207&vol=7

Taking as a point of departure the two meanings of Desire in the dictionary: “Affective movement towards something” and “Impulse, venereal excitement ", this article proposes a reflection about the art of the Nineteenth century that was staged at an exhibition in 2014. The exhibition was organized both by the National Museum of Fine Arts and the National Library in Buenos Aires in 2014: La seducción fatal. Imaginarios eróticos del siglo XIX. Both dimensions of desire were involved in the selection of that universe of objects: the impulse towards them as objects of desire (as artifacts) and the erotic desire aroused by the bodies and scenes represented. Several aspects of the discipline of Art History are discussed in relation with these issues: it deals with a wide range of affective and cognitive relations between different subjects and objects through time. The desire appears in the center of those relations: objects that raise or sate desire to contemplate or possess them, images that mediate between the desiring subject and his/her emotions.