Critical analysis of the representation of the femme fatale in the image. An anthropohistorical approach.

Abstract

In this paper we analyze the representation of the femme fatale in the graphic novel Pietrolino (2009), written by Alejandro Jodorowsky and illustrated by Olivier Boiscommun, which corresponds to the stereotype of the femme fatale, simplification of the archetype of the threatening woman. The foregoing, based on the fact that Colombella, a female character in the narrative, presents similarities with the iconography and archetypal symbolism of women who threaten men by transgressing the social conventions of their time, by freely exercising their sexuality and seeking their emancipation and empowerment. We support the use of images to understand the development of visual culture around the stereotype of the femme fatale in Walter Benjamin's proposals, in which he validates the mechanical means of art reproduction as sources for the study of social and cultural phenomena in a specific historical context. To show the anthropohistorical development of these stereotyped images, we will use the analysis of the detail and the fragment, formulated by Omar Calabrese. In addition, through the search for indexical inferences raised by Carlo Ginzburg, we will review elements of Greco-Roman and Middle Eastern mythologies, the medieval painting and literature, Renaissance painting and theatre, nineteenth-century painting and cinema. Finally, this work seeks to show a general semblance of the continuity that the representation of women has had in the image, by presenting her as an enemy of the hegemonic social order for seeking her emancipation and empowerment.