Human body
Save your search and find it in your favorites
Saved search
Your search is accessible from the favorites tab > My favorite searches
Unsaved search
A problem occurred
I've made peace...with my body
Blair Treuer
Painting - 100 x 84 x 8 cm Painting - 39.4 x 33.1 x 3.1 inch
£10,792
Sylvana Lorenz by Sylvana Lorenz Rime pour Prince Pierre
Sylvana Lorenz
Photography - 20 x 30 x 0.5 cm Photography - 7.9 x 11.8 x 0.2 inch
£881
Dos patchwork
Gaulmier Jean-Luc
Sculpture - 92 x 55 x 20 cm Sculpture - 36.2 x 21.7 x 7.9 inch
£2,426
No title
Katarzyna Zygadlewicz
Fine Art Drawings - 41 x 30 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 16.1 x 11.8 x 0 inch
£440
Autoportrait de la série "Beyond me" n°583
Yousha Bashir
Sculpture - 195 x 70 x 50 cm Sculpture - 76.8 x 27.6 x 19.7 inch
£3,145
Matisse como pretexto sobre blanco
Lorenzo González
Print - 73.5 x 101 cm Print - 28.9 x 39.8 inch
£494
Two figures by the Sea
Martha Erlebacher
Painting - 162.6 x 132.1 x 3.8 cm Painting - 64 x 52 x 1.5 inch
£6,325
Gigèe
Kohlene Hendrickson
Fine Art Drawings - 100 x 70 x 1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 39.4 x 27.6 x 0.4 inch
£2,426
I never knew if she was a real red hair
Fenx
Sculpture - 102 x 48 x 28 cm Sculpture - 40.2 x 18.9 x 11 inch
£5,302
Jeune femme pensive
Jean Daniel Guerry
Sculpture - 27 x 17.5 x 14 cm Sculpture - 10.6 x 6.9 x 5.5 inch
£2,646
The man in the Well
Alberto Savinio
Print - 37.4 x 26.5 x 0.2 cm Print - 14.7 x 10.4 x 0.1 inch
£2,336
Steady Equilibrium ll
Wahyu Srikaryadi
Painting - 150 x 150 x 4 cm Painting - 59.1 x 59.1 x 1.6 inch
£3,594 £3,415
L'intemporelle Joconde
Joël Moens
Photography - 100 x 100 x 2 cm Photography - 39.4 x 39.4 x 0.8 inch
£5,167
Transparence des ailes du papilon
KLA
Painting - 120 x 80 x 2 cm Painting - 47.2 x 31.5 x 0.8 inch
£2,426
Figure Collection : Dark version
Leni Smoragdova
Photography - 74.9 x 110 x 1 cm Photography - 29.5 x 43.3 x 0.4 inch
£1,932
Aria di Giovan-nana
Linda De Clercq
Painting - 100 x 80 x 2 cm Painting - 39.4 x 31.5 x 0.8 inch
£1,887
Useful Object Cover
Mihai Florea
Painting - 120 x 70 x 30 cm Painting - 47.2 x 27.6 x 11.8 inch
£2,067
L'ivresse du conquérant
Anne Procoudine-Gorsky
Sculpture - 200.2 x 200 x 200 cm Sculpture - 78.8 x 78.7 x 78.7 inch
£10,783
Birth
Evrim Özeskici
Fine Art Drawings - 28 x 21 x 0.3 cm Fine Art Drawings - 11 x 8.3 x 0.1 inch
£404
Love
Gino Bonichi
Fine Art Drawings - 30 x 26.5 x 0.3 cm Fine Art Drawings - 11.8 x 10.4 x 0.1 inch
£18,871
TooLess 4692, 3D Lightbox
Koray Erkaya
Sculpture - 132.1 x 119.4 x 10.2 cm Sculpture - 52 x 47 x 4 inch
£8,349
Série : Rituels en Haïti - Les jeunes, Haïti
Cristina García Rodero
Photography - 80 x 120 cm Photography - 31.5 x 47.2 inch
£13,928
Sitting Woman
Jacques Le Breton
Fine Art Drawings - 28.7 x 15.3 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 11.3 x 6 x 0 inch
£270
Not clear at all
Ana D. & Noora K.
Photography - 120 x 90 x 2 cm Photography - 47.2 x 35.4 x 0.8 inch
£9,705
Venus
Virginie Vandeputte
Fine Art Drawings - 69 x 49 x 3 cm Fine Art Drawings - 27.2 x 19.3 x 1.2 inch
£4,089
Sanguine ref 1
Jean Laniau
Fine Art Drawings - 65 x 50 x 0.5 cm Fine Art Drawings - 25.6 x 19.7 x 0.2 inch
£216
Sans titre
Alexandre Saint-Loup
Photography - 150 x 100 x 0.1 cm Photography - 59.1 x 39.4 x 0 inch
£2,184
Being Earth II
Guillaume Liffran
Fine Art Drawings - 44.5 x 37 cm Fine Art Drawings - 17.5 x 14.6 inch
£315
Conte du garçon aux trois pies
Alex Huthwohl
Painting - 170 x 110 x 0.5 cm Painting - 66.9 x 43.3 x 0.2 inch
£4,942
Femme drapée
Jean-Luc Celereau de Clercq
Sculpture - 15 x 56 x 26 cm Sculpture - 5.9 x 22 x 10.2 inch
£6,290
Two
Anna Lageda
Fine Art Drawings - 47 x 32.5 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 18.5 x 12.8 x 0 inch
£359
Figura maschile
Maurizio Bonfanti
Painting - 129.5 x 129.5 x 5.1 cm Painting - 51 x 51 x 2 inch
£15,517
Internal Nude
Tibor Gertler
Fine Art Drawings - 48 x 31 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 18.9 x 12.2 x 0 inch
£270
Reclined figure
Georges Pierre
Fine Art Drawings - 25 x 19 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 9.8 x 7.5 x 0 inch
£180
The caress of water (giclée)
Aurelio Rodriguez López
Print - 140 x 190 x 8 cm Print - 55.1 x 74.8 x 3.1 inch
£10,109
Tiempo nuestro (from Porfolio Grabados Cubanos)
Ernesto Garcia Peña
Print - 59.7 x 44.7 cm Print - 23.5 x 17.6 inch
£422
Portrait sur plan de rivière
Valérie Evrard
Photography - 22 x 16 x 0.1 cm Photography - 8.7 x 6.3 x 0 inch
£359
Nude of Woman
Marcel Spranck
Fine Art Drawings - 17 x 11.5 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 6.7 x 4.5 x 0 inch
£144
Femme à lunette
Luc Masson-Todeschini
Photography - 27.6 x 20 x 0.1 cm Photography - 10.9 x 7.9 x 0 inch
£270
Nude of Woman
Gaspard Maillol
Fine Art Drawings - 27.5 x 24.5 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 10.8 x 9.6 x 0 inch
£359
Au coeur du Minotaure
Rachel Daireaux
Painting - 30 x 60 x 5 cm Painting - 11.8 x 23.6 x 2 inch
£2,696
Liberation
Tatjana Rusakova
Fine Art Drawings - 28 x 28 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 11 x 11 x 0 inch
£270
Je l'ai sentie (I felt her)
San Kara
Painting - 119 x 80 x 2 cm Painting - 46.9 x 31.5 x 0.8 inch
£6,695
Getting somewhere
Kicki Edgren
Painting - 115.6 x 76.2 x 2.5 cm Painting - 45.5 x 30 x 1 inch
£2,530
Human body
'I wanted to conquer the world. But I also desperately wanted to understand human nature, and to know what was inside our bodies. To do this, I have spent whole night dissecting bodies, against the direct orders of the Pope. Nothing disgusts me. What I am looking for, truly, in all of my work and particularly in my painting, what I have looked for all my life, is to understand the mystery that is human nature' – from the notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci in the 16th century.
At the time of writing these notes, da Vinci had already made greater understanding of the human body the primary objective of his investigations. Dissection and study were key to his development of a holistic knowledge of anatomy, which da Vinci believed was vital to the perfect rendering of the nude figures which he painted and drew.
Little by little, the traditional image of the human figure was uprooted and in its place new ways of interpreting the body developed. Contemporary artists relentlessly questioned the traditional codes of figure drawing, liberally reworking the representation of the body to create a new image that was dislocated, geometric, deformed and disfigured.
The body as an artistic subject is at once desired, fantasised, dreamt, transformed, deformed. For painters, photographers and sculptors alike the body represents a rite of passage in their artistic development. Many people say that they most appreciate the talents of an artists by way of their control over the complexity of the figure. For example, it's clear even in Matisse's later, more abstract collages that he had perfectly mastered the human form.
Representation of the body is fundamental to Western art: first and foremost because it suggests a representation of the self, and therefore affirms the artist's own existence and coexistence with the environment that surrounds them. At the beginning of art history, the only bodies represented were the gods, supernatural beings, and spirits who had taken on human form. The body, nude or clothed, is at once one of the most widely depicted and most deeply polemical subjects in Western art (think of the scandals provoked by Courbet's 'Origins of the World', or Renoir's 'Picnic on the Grass').
The body has always been the primary subject of an array of themes, and its history is rich and ancient. Initially, depiction of the body was closely linked to religion, where the Word became flesh in Genesis, but later in more secular times the arousal of the artist when faced with the body made for an equally popular theme. Latterly the notion of the body as an object of beauty was subverted by Cubism until depictions of bodies no longer bore any resemblance to reality or made any pretence of respecting the rules of proportion.
Finally, in modern art the body has taken on an abstract shape within space, becoming one with the environment. In some instances, the body has become the artist's own support, as with Klein's models. The body as an abstract concept is tangible in many different manifestations in art, even in pieces as unassuming as some of Rothko's paintings. It remains the subject of inexhaustible inspiration and eternal debate.