Critical Analysis

Critical Analysis
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Critical Analysis
Write a critical analysis of "Happy Mothers and Other New Ideas in French Art" by Carol Duncan. Your analysis should include:
A SHORT summary of the author's argument (the main points or arguments) in your own words, consideration of the evidence or information given to support the author's arguments (what sorts of evidence are used?)
The text discusses several 17th C and 18th C French paintings that depict images of blissful families and contented mothers. Parents as well as their children were familiar with secular art, which expressed a different ideology regarding the family that challenged old attitudes and norms (Duncan 1973). Several paintings in the text have been discussed, for instance The Beloved Mother (1765) by Greuze, Saying Grace (1740) by Chardin, The Return Home by Fragonard and The Delights of Motherhood (1777) by Moreau le jeune. These images instance, The Beloved Mother and Saying Grace depict family life as being full of happiness and bliss.
The works emphasize the joy of the domestic family for instance; the man was contented with fatherhood and being a husband while the woman was contented with motherhood and being a wife. They were happy with simply being parents and a married couple in a delightful marital union (Duncan 1973). The author further points out that motherhood was associated with sexual fulfillment in most paintings of 18th C and marriage was portrayed as a status that fulfilled not only sexual desires but also societal requirements for stability, as with the case of Fragonard’s The Delights of Motherhood.
Happiness of the family unit – The author first argues that the artistic imagery that depicts blissful family units and fulfilled mothers was not real in the 18th Century. The author adds that these images instead express a new family idea, which was against old attitudes and traditions, and that marriage was an authorized bond only between family heads and not between couples. There was no happiness in most family households also because parents forced marriage partners on their children. Parents rejected marriages of love and instead organized customary marriages where they chose marriage partners for their children without considering their emotional or sexual wants. Furthermore, the author states that unfaithfulness in marriage was widely accepted in the art of 18th C France, even by the artists who portray the happiness of conjugal union in their works. The other argument is with regard to the Members of the family unit, which the author points out that it was often not restricted only to the immediate family as the images portray, but included other relatives, servants, apprentices among other people.
The third argument is about the role of the husband/father. The author states that contrary to the images, husbands and fathers did not stand for companionship, but power. The husband ruled his wife, and that respect and submission were his traditional due, not love and affection as portrayed by the artists. Widespread view of the conjugal family forms the fourth argument. The author continues that the more general outlook of the matrimonial relationship during the 17th and 18 Centuries as indicated by the images was untrue, adding that the husband and his unfaithful wife were used in scorn and joke stories.
There is the view regarding rising of children since birth. According to the author, young children in the 18th C were seen as greedy and nuisance who could be ignored and people were ...