2026-09-21T21:16:54Z https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/24298 2023-07-10 col_2142_5131 col_2142_17355 com_2142_5130 com_2142_14307 com_2142_5126

Greenhill, Jennifer A. Weber, Amy L. 2011-05-25T14:50:11Z 2011-05-25T14:50:11Z 2011-05-25T14:50:11Z 2011-05 Ralph Clarkson, a prominent Chicago portrait painter, created his best known work, the painting 'Nouvart Dzeron,' in 1912. The painting depicts a full-length portrait of a young woman dressed in traditional Armenian dress. Between 1912 and the 1920s, the title of the painting would change from 'Nouvart Dzeron' to 'A Daughter of Armenia' to eventually a combination of the two titles: 'Nouvart Dzeron, A Daughter of Armenia.' This changing title reveals how socio-political conceptions altered how people read the seemingly simple composition of a model posed against a blank background. This painting acts as a site of exploration for the changing conceptions of whiteness and commodification of ethnicity during a fifteen years span in the beginning of the twentieth century. Between 1912 and 1915, Clarkson used this painting to depict a generic idea of the Orient in order to bolster his own status as a fine artist. With the Armenian genocide of 1915, the painting’s subject moved into the realm of symbolism and ceased to be just a commodity of Clarkson’s to further his career. Instead, the more valuable commodity became Dzeron’s specific ethnicity: Armenian. And finally, in the mid-1920s, the two titles were combined as public opinion turned against the Armenian cause and the painting’s memorializing effect lessened. Item withdrawn by Mark Zulauf (zulauf@illinois.edu) on 2011-04-29T14:37:26Z Item was in collections: University of Illinois Theses & Dissertations (ID: 1) No. of bitstreams: 1 Weber_Amy.pdf: 2125758 bytes, checksum: f064c2734a19fd8b06ce06c43a0afaa6 (MD5) Made available in DSpace on 2011-05-25T14:50:11Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Weber_Amy.pdf: 2125758 bytes, checksum: f064c2734a19fd8b06ce06c43a0afaa6 (MD5) license.txt: 4058 bytes, checksum: faec9a617e3d0c2362052bd1587a523c (MD5) http://hdl.handle.net/2142/24298 en Copyright 2011 Amy L. Weber American Art History Ralph Elmer Clarkson Armenian-Americans Chicago Circulation, exchange and race in Ralph Clarkson's 'Nouvart Dzeron, a daughter of Armenia' 1526 Art History 0250 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Thesis M.A. MA:Art History -UIUC 10KS0250MA Art & Design