Compare and Contrast The Two Works

Olympia and the Grand Odalisque

Women are beautiful . From head to toe , a women has all the aspects that could captivate any man and beguile him . However , a woman is more than her physical attributes . The depth of her thoughts and the essence of her being is like a sea that can never be measured . A woman can mean many things and the power of her gaze may say a thousand words . The very beauty of a woman is what captured the interest of many artists , making them the subjects of their art

. Among these artists are Edouard Manet and his work Olympia , and Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres and his work the Grand Odalisque . Both these works are now critically acclaimed and adorn the walls of the most famous museums . One cannot help but unveil the secret and the mystery of these women and understand the reason of their gazes . Thus , this aims to determine which among the two works of art is more powerful and has achieved it 's purpose

Olympia and the Grand Odalisque have the same theme , and that is a portrait of a naked woman in bed . Both these works were initially met with much criticism because it was a time of conservatism . The culture of the society in those times was very much traditional and consider a little showing of the flesh as vulgar or immoral . It was the Romantic era and it was a time of much struggles in society . It was a time...