Musical accompaniment: Rock Me, Baby by B.B. King.
This is Odalisque, the January 1900 photograph by Charles I Berg. She is a woman for the new century. What do you suppose people thought she signified for the century to come?
Wikipedia
Happy Valentine’s Day, lovely friends!
old spirituals 
she’s beautiful and grim
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You do have a way with words, Ruby!
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Dear God, help us!
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😂😂😂
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An Odalisque, I believe, is a mistress, concubine or paramour. The year this photo was taken, i.e. 1900, was a few yeas into The Progressive Era in the United States; a time when great change occurred including women’s rights. Feminism was in the air. Could her upward gaze signify she is dreaming of the future? Women were finally given the right to vote by the 19th Amendment in 1920.
I wonder how Charles I. Berg knew this woman? What was her relationship to him?
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Hmm interesting .. after I read your comment, I looked into Charles I. Berg’s background and found he was an architect by profession. With the meaning of Odalisque in mind, what do you make of this picture?
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Berg had a passion for compositions of unclothed subjects, in one case it is a young child called La Cigale (The Grasshopper). Architects are structural artists. Berg saw artistic beauty in the human form, unclothed and clothed. Look at his Weeping Magdalen work.
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