Butterflies and Codpieces: The Delightful Horrors of Royal Portraiture
A monarch for a monarch.
When the new, official royal portrait of King Charles III dropped on Tuesday, I immediately thought, “Is this The Picture of Dorian Gray?”
(My kingdom for Oscar Wilde’s hot take on this.) From the story, it reminds me of the painting Dorian Gray trades his soul for in order to remain young and beautiful. While he stays dewy and pristine through many years of debauchery, his hidden soul-portrait takes the hit, growing more and more ghastly as his sins accumulate, each one marring the canvas.
I can’t stop thinking about this painting, so perhaps it’s an itch only writing can scratch. This portrait haunts me as much as it delights me. It’s like I see it for the first time every time I look at it. I wince with joy. I laugh with horror.
I’m not necessarily drawing a parallel between the sins of Dorian Gray and King Charles, but more addressing the crimes of colonialism and the transgressions of the royal institution, which he inherits with the title. I think that’s the tension here—are we looking at a portrait of a person or the portrait of all he represents?
I’ll come back to that. Earlier this week, while browsing the art section in a bookstore, I reached for a book when another book fell off the shelf. I picked it up and it truly felt like…destiny. The book that found me was Thrust: A Spasmodic Pictorial History of the Codpiece in Art by Michael Glover. It’s succinct and written with an academic cheek that made me laugh out loud. I impulse bought it and finished it the next day.
Yes! This book is a tiny chronicle of the codpiece, an article of clothing used to shield the junk of men, most popularly worn in 16th century Europe. The codpiece also functioned as a pocket, a wallet, a space-expanding device for constrictive stockings, and a more ornamental surface to conceal the stains of the ointment used to treat syphilis. As time wore on, the author explains, “What had started as a gesture of modesty, a means of concealing the male genitals, grew into a garment that drew attention to, mimicked, and even aggrandized them to a ridiculous degree.” In portraiture, the codpiece served as a symbol of virility (just look at this heir-making machine!) and emphasized a primal confidence and swagger beyond wealth and titles.
As I flipped through the book, I studied English and Italian court portraits from the 1500-1600s, all men who filled the canvas with voluminous clothing made of expensive, textured fabrics, heavy jewelry, feathered caps, weapons, and maybe a symbolic prop or two. And yes, the codpiece, rising to the occasion, always butting in between the folds of the doublet. These portraits reeked of empire, conveying dominance, power, and a manhood so potent and suffocating you had no choice but to succumb. Look no further than Hans Holbein the Younger’s portrait of King Henry VIII.
So, I was in this headspace when I first viewed the newly unveiled King Charles portrait. It’s obviously a very different vibe. There is nothing unabashedly masculine or grand, no nods to heirs or legacy. And while I wouldn’t describe this as a humble characterization, the self-aggrandizing is kept on a tight leash.
The portrait of King Charles is red. Very red. The same red of his uniform as the Regimental Colonel of the Welsh Guard. His face and hands receive the most detail as the rest of his body fades into an obscure, cherry-flavored London fog. Rather than the stern, aloof gazes of his forefathers, King Charles’ expression looks gentle but determined—and dare I venture, a smize? A twinkle in his eye? Is he about to wink while slyly slipping us a Werther’s Original and/or a goblet of blood?
The grotesqueness I alluded to earlier with Dorian Gray isn’t just from this harrowing red, but also, the chaotic brushstrokes surrounding him and the mottled treatment of aging flesh. While I was not familiar with Jonathan Yeo before this, I would describe his rendering as Freud in the face, Bacon in the back. Yeo’s style for skin pulls from Lucian Freud’s aesthetic—though a bit less tonally severe, and the raw background textures of Francis Bacon, whose oeuvre is as freaky as it is figurative.
While previous portraits of kings screamed power, this one breaks from tradition. Yeo deemphasizes the King’s military medals and decorations, as his uniform blends into his surroundings. The sword could be a walking stick (or a polo mallet) for all intents and purposes, a place to rest soft hands. The only aggressor here, is the color. What strikes me most is how much the body is subverted. King Charles does not take up space, but rather, he is space. Edges of his form blur against a scarlet that swallows him up—where does he end and begin? Is he the wielder of this omnipotent vermillion or just repressed by the overwhelming weight of it? And while it’s a bit reductive to frame it in this way, perhaps that is the experience of the crown, a vacillation between the two extremes, a spectrum of those hostile hues.
As a genre, I’m not that interested in royal portraiture, however, I find depictions of power and their changes over time very fascinating. A butterfly hovers over the King’s shoulder, a gentle nod to his transformation, a near lifetime of chrysalis as he ascends to the throne, finally unfurling his wings. Not a hound or a horse, but a monarch for a monarch. And while that delicate creature offsets the violent symbols found in royal portraits of the past, the bloody ramifications of an imperialist legacy will always blind us to the individual. The red is a reminder.
Thanks for reading.
[p.s. Speaking of power, I’m working on an essay about Ana Mendieta for Volume 07: Unearthing, the theme I wrote about last week. It’s coming soon, just think of this as a snack between meals.]
I…kinda like it? Anyway, amazing breakdown and loved the eurostep back to the codpiece as a parallel
this was so succinct and interesting and clear! loved it!