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Multimedia Review: The Sexualization of Islam
Little sex? Lots of sex? Who knows for sure?
The European Painters
Imagine living in medieval Europe circa 1700. You have some talents and skills for painting people and scenery. If you can’t make a living painting, you will be working in the fields, mines, or construction sites. Which occupation is preferable?
Well, if you want to eat, you need to sell your paintings. But it is only the rich people who have enough money to pay for your work. So you have to paint things the rich people want. Well, in those times, some rich people had a fascination for the harem culture in the Ottoman Empire and Barbary States. So some painters made scenes of this life: semi-naked women languishing boringly in opulent Oriental surroundings.
Money exchanged hands. The patron got the scenes. The painter didn’t have to work the fields, mines, and construction sites. Some painters even visited the harems to gain a better understanding of the harem culture to make better paintings.
In essence, Francesco Rizzuto uses that time’s popular art as the foundation of his treatise The Sexualization of Islam.
Why would the artists paint harem scenes if the patrons were not interested in this topic?
