Mary Shelley’s Visions Live again through Diane Arbus’s Photographs

Abstract

Mary Shelley and Diane Arbus are two prominent artists who lived at different times, in different countries and social contexts, and expressed themselves in two different fields: literature and photography. Nowadays the value of their art is unquestioned, but their popularity is also due to the powerful presence of monstrous, disquieting but also fascinating and intriguing images we find both in Shelley’s Frankenstein and in Arbus’s photographs. This research tries to detect some of the reasons that urged the two artists to develop and stress the visual element in their works. In a sort of risky parallel between two distinct arts, the so called “monster theory” is applied to the analysis of their production. The monstrous body, be it a giant, a demon or a “freak”, is the symbolic interpretation of fears, desires, cultural unease that pervade society in every age. In particular, it is also the expression of specific intellectual, political, sexual doubts and fears that women artists and women in general encounter and try to overcome in their lives and careers. Evident similarities between the two life experiences also confirm that every creative woman exerts an influence on the subsequent women artists, and this process constantly opens new research fields for us.