Barbie Has No Knees (and Superman has no genitals): Reflecting on the historical significance of the iconic doll through an exhibit at the Vittoriano

With Greta Gerwig's "Barbie" scheduled to open tonight in theaters, well, everywhere, we are re-posting Bill's 2016 post below, which is chock-full of historical cultural analysis as well as photos of some of the many Barbies we saw at the exhibit. Yeah, go to Rome and see Barbies! We loved it. (Review here: https://www.2filmcritics.com/post/barbie)

Sign for the Barbie exhibit in the Vittoriano - which features a permanent exhibit of The Risorgimento -
Italy's battle for statehood.  Interesting contrast of Barbie and Garibaldi.

60s Barbie, Barnaby Street look

It was 1959 when the first Barbie appeared.  A bit late, it would seem, to catch the wave of conservatism, conformity and consensus that hung over the American nation through much of the postwar era.  When Barbie went on sale, the civil rights movement was well under way, with lunch-counter sit-ins to begin in 1960.  Just two years later, Tom Hayden launched the student protest movement with the Port Huron Statement and Betty Friedan rang the opening bell for the latest version of feminism with her book, The Feminine Mystique.  By 1965 U.S. bombers were pounding North Vietnam.  Barbie should never have survived "the '60s."  But she did. The "Barbie" exhibit at Rome's Complesso del Vittoriano provides some explanations for Barbie's longevity.  One is that Barbie was a well-made and beautifully dressed creature, her every incarnation

a fine-tuned fashion statement.  Having never had a Barbie (I was 16 when she made her debut, and a boy), and having decided that the exhibit was one I hardly cared to see, I was impressed--astounded even--at the "look" of the hundreds of Barbies on display: style, color, elegance, precision, all in abundance.

Right, Barbie as bullfighter.  Left,
hipster exec

Clearly, too, Barbie was flexible, especially in relationship to the burgeoning feminist movement. Barbie could be teen model, a housewife and homemaker, or a stewardess, but over the years she tracked American women as they took on a wider variety of occupations and pursuits--some 180 occupations in all.  Barbie became a pilot, a no-nonsense professional, an astronaut, an eco-friendly architect, a race car driver, a hard rock musician, even a bullfighter, albeit a stylish one.














Barbie's facial expression changed, too, perhaps most famously in the 1970s, when Barbie came to look a bit like Farrah Fawcett, the star of the popular TV series, Charlie's Angels.

Barbie as Hitchcock's Tippi, attacked
by birds

Other Barbies were modeled after celebrities. among them Twiggy, Audrey Hepburn, Madonna, Tippi Hedren (in Hitchcock's The Birds), Shakira, Jennifer Lopez, and Elvis, Barbie could be the Statue of Liberty, too.

And after 1980, Barbie's look had much to do with multiculturalism and globalization. (See the African Barbie at the end of this post). Even so, the curators of the exhibit go too far in claiming that Barbie was on the cutting edge of political and social change. The first black Barbie appeared in 1980, 12 years after the March on Washington, 16 years after the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibited racial discrimination in public accommodations such as restaurants and hotels, and 26 years after the Supreme Court declared school segregation unconstitutional.  In the racial arena, at least, Barbie was a follower, not a leader.


Nonetheless, as a cultural historian, I enjoyed the curators' efforts to link the evolving Barbie with historical movements and trends, from feminism to globalization to the emergence of a culture of celebrity. However, I must admit that my first reaction to Barbie had to do with her physique, and not just her thin-ness.  Indeed, my first thought--and first words in the exhibit--was "Barbie has no knees."  It occurred to me, then, that Barbie was knee-less because the knee is the least attractive part of the leg; knees have bumps and lumps and stick out here and there.

interrupting the attractive flow of the woman's leg from thigh to calf to ankle (admittedly, also somewhat knobby--as it turns out, Barbie doesn't have ankles, either).











No genitals.  Could be model for
Superman Barbie

I'm writing this today because this morning's New York Times carried an obituary for Noel Neill, the actress who played Lois Lane on the Adventures of Superman TV series.  In the accompanying photo, Superman (Steve Reeves) demonstrates his strength by holding Miss Lane off the ground with one arm.  Then I noticed that Superman has no genitals.  


Bill

The exhibit closes October 10.  It's not cheap: Euro 12 or, if you qualify for a reduction, Euro 10.  Most of the hundreds of Barbies in the exhibition come from 2 major Italian collections.

Quilted: Dealing with the Spring "'Chill," ala Romana

It's that in between season, when you don't know whether to bundle up or go for the lighter jacket. Romans know how to handle the spring chill: they're bubble wrapped, happy in their quilted outerwear. Based on a few informal surveys, about half--no joke--of our Re-di-Roma-area sample (or via Nazionale, as in the 2nd photo, or Valle Aurelia, as in the other non-manikin photos) were sporting quilted garb. It's a thing.

Bill 

EUR: the Church of Saints Peter and Paul

In our new book, Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler, one of the "great" walks is in EUR, the mid-century model city/suburb to the south of Rome's center.  But we had never been inside EUR's signature church, a structure sited prominently on the area's western hill and one visible from the trains that ply the airport route and from a variety of places in Rome proper.  Had we missed something?  Should we have included the Church of Saints Peter and Paul on our EUR excursion?

Evoking the aqueducts

No, and no.  Without a doubt, the church is beautifully sited.  A prominent, tree-lined street of shops and cafés leads directly into an enormous, broad flight of shallow travertine stairs, each decorated with geometric inlays: the circle, the square, the diamond.  At the top of the stairs, at the intersection with the piazza that fronts the church, enormous statues of Peter (on the left with keys), Paul (on the right with a sword), look out over EUR and, beyond it, onto the Alban Hills--a view unfortunately--and unnecessarily--disrupted by a multi-story post office building.  To the left and right of the church run concrete constructions that evoke the ancient aqueducts.  So far so good.



Spectacular view, but who authorized the post office, right?

Front door panels, from inside 

A second set of stairs (on the day we visited, a photographer was taking cheese-cake photos of a fashion model, much to the delight of 3 boys observing nearby) leads up to the church, whose entrance is dominated by colorful stained-glass panels--nice, if not elegant, from the inside. 
















Suspended "crown" 

The interior of the church is interesting, but ultimately disappointing.  The design plan was based on Michelangelo's original idea for St. Peter's--a Greek cross.  Its essential roundness is emphasized by a suspended circle of lights--a sort of elevated crown--over the nave.  And the dome, referencing the Pantheon, is high, graceful, and impressive.  Even so, the height of the dome (at 72 meters, the 3rd highest in Rome) alone cannot yield the grandeur or power of the Pantheon, and the effort at roundness--so magical in Santo Stefano Rotondo--is checked on all sides by short, squared-off areas for the entrance, the chapels, and the apse.

Side chapel, with mosaics

Mosaics decorate the side chapels, but neither they, nor the bas relief stations of the cross, have
the refinement or quality to rescue the edifice from ordinariness.  At bottom, the building's failure to produce the sense of "awe" that all good churches have stems from its structure and size: a small structure, neither round nor square--a bit of both, in fatal compromise--with only height to evoke the infinite. 


Work on the Church of Saints Peter and Paul was begun in 1939 and completed in 1954.  It became a parish church in 1958.  It was designed by an architectural team; six architects are mentioned in some sources, and three prominently: Arnaldo Foschini, Tullio Russi, and Alfredo Energici.  Too many cooks, perhaps. 
Bill

Fashion shoot in progress on church steps

The Fishing Jacket: Roman Fashion Statement

Except for the occasional line in the Tevere, there's no fishing in Rome.  But that isn't to say that Romans don't look the part.  Among ordinary, at-leisure, middle-aged and older Roman men, the garment of choice is none other than the fishing jacket.  Sleeveless, beige, or yellow, pockets everywhere for lead shot, line, lures, pliers--or just keys, cigarettes, and spare change--the fishing jacket has been in style for male casual wear for at least a decade.

wives love those fishin' jackets

Fishing jackets can be purchased in small clothing stores, department stores, outdoor markets--anywhere elegant clothing is sold.  They make excellent "authentic" (as in, "the Italians really wear these"!) gifts.  We bought one for our fashion-conscious LA son.  It was on ebay a day later.

Bill 

goin' fishin'

Men in Coats: Looking Good in Piazza San Giovanni di Dio

I have fond memories of Saturday mornings more than a half century ago, when my father would take me "downtown"--downtown, that is, in the sleepy suburb of Des Plaines, Illinois.  We would go to the hardware store and the bank, where he seemed to know everyone.  In that dignified way he had, he wore a sport coat. 










I see something of him, that desire to present oneself well, to look good even on a Saturday morning, in the older men of Piazza San Giovanni di Dio, far from the center.  We were renting close by, on via Palasciano, and I couldn't help but notice the attire of these older, doubtless retired men: sport coats to be sure, less often a suit, commonly a tie, now and then a dressy cap, sometimes, today, a trifle corrupted with jeans and tennis shoes.  The age of mannerly dress, now long gone for most Romans, kept alive by these elderly gentlemen.  Bill

Original Fake: Store-window takes on Originality

It's getting harder and harder to be "original."  Andy Warhol made that clear in the early 1960s, when he capitulated to capitalism and advertising in the most obvious way, making art that looked very much like a can of Campbell's Soup.  And, to add to the confusion over originality, much of his work was produced by his assistants, not by Warhol himself.  

At about the same time, architects abandoned the quest for the uniquely original aesthetic, retreating to the postmodern preference for mixing and matching historical forms: a bit of the neoclassical here, the pyramids there, and hey, why not a mansard roof?  It was original, but only if the definition includes reassembling the past in a somewhat different way. 

Popular music has always been evolutionary, the province of covers and copies, but especially so after 1970, with the widespread acceptance of "sampling."

That's all background for a couple of photos we took of Italian store windows, each of a shirt with a phrase on it.  One advised, "Don't Copy/Be Original,"  a curious injunction, given that the shirt was obviously mass produced--that is, copied.  The other questioned the idea of originality even more directly: "Original Fake."  

Bill

intimissimi: Too Much Intimacy

What are these Italian guys doing?  They're doing what I'm doing: hanging out in front of intimissimi while their wives shop for bras, panties, slips and other intimate apparel.    Bill

Fashion Extra! Color of the Moment is...ORANGE

We would never claim that the arbiters of fashion in Milan, Paris, and New York look to provincial, bureaucratic Rome for hints of what's to come.  Indeed, we assume that Rome is a follower in the fashion world.  Whatever its role, and for what it's worth, we offer this insight, based on many hours of walking the city's streets, in neighborhoods as different as Garbatella and Trieste: this year's color is ORANGE. 

It's everywhere, and on everything.

That yellow shirt is the exception that proves the
rule; you may also recognize it from the post
on misspellings on shirts

We have no good explanation for this phenomenon.  The color is hardly universally flattering.   We also associate it with fall, and the weather here is the hottest it's been in (so we read) 231 years.  That's not a typo. 

Another association, pulled from some random braincell, is with the late 1950s--orange and Scandinavian furniture.  So go figure. 

Window display in a town in Italy's northeast

Oh, Dianne, you are so out of fashion!

And buy something orange. 

Bill

Fashion's Night Out: Photos from Rome

Nudo in Vetrina (nude in store window), as Eve at Gattinoni on Via Sistina.  Object of the Gaze.

Our new friend Giorgio, the London School of Economics grad and tv newsman who's behind the new website Buzz in Rome, certainly had the right idea when we asked him if he would be attending Fashion's Night Out (Notte della Moda):  "I don't like to shop."  We don't either, but we couldn't resist poking around in what promised to be a huge outdoor event on a warm, late summer evening--450 shops in and around the already glitzy Spanish Steps area--especially, Bill notes, when one of the attractions was "nudo in vetrina" (nude in a shop window).  We took some photos, and here they are, complete with captions.  Bill

The event was produced by Vogue, which
had done something similar in Milan recently--but never Rome.
The lady in red just happened to walk by.

Selling cars near the Spanish Steps.

Broadcasting near Piazza San Silvestro.

An advertising slogan for Lancia's Ypsilon auto moves across the building.

The woman in the store window was mixing chemicals.
Why, we don't know.  Woman in red, surrounded by her partner and 3 saleswomen
 who no doubt were telling her how great she looked, was close to
actually buying the coat (probably several thousand Euro).

The only food and drink we found.  The Asian
guy at top was pouring small glasses of wine from
pitchers, and there were small bowls of nuts, overly
policed by a tall woman. 

I thought I was lucky to catch this couple in their
embrace.  But the embrace lasted for several minutes.

Camper, which sells high ends shoes, had a DJ.

Free event T-shirts?  Sorry.  E25 (about $40)

Dressed for the occasion.

View from the Spanish Steps, looking down Via Condotti. 
What would Keats - who died overlooking these steps - have thought?

The wrong place to be driving a car, or even a scooter. 
Lots of frustrated motorists.