European scholars, soldiers, administrators and tourists were flooding into Egypt, Turkey and other exotic countries in large numbers during the 19th century. So we can expect that they would want to bring back souvenirs with them to remind them of the amazing colours, cultures and tastes they saw there. Orientalism became a Western cultural movement, climaxing in the mid-late C19th, and was especially well represented in painting, sculpture, literature, drama and travel writing.
Orientalist descriptions of the Middle East and North Africa were not necessarily accurate, even though they were based on real observations of these cultures. It didn’t matter. People coming back from Constantinople or Cairo could not possibly have known what the inside of a harem looked like: they simply wanted exotic, colourful images from their travels. And people who had NOT been travelling to the East wanted images of what they might one day see.
Eugene Delacroix and other French romantics drew their subject matter from literature and from actual travels to the Middle East. Delacroix travelled to Morocco and Algeria himself in 1832, and was very taken with the local colour, bright light and dignity of the locals. From then on he painted dazzling coloured versions of the places he had visited or imagined: Algerian Women in their Quarters 1834; Odalesque 1857. Educated Europeans couldn’t get enough of the exotic Orient. Returning French travellers in particular loved Orientalist taste, because presumably it reminded them of France’s past glory days.
![]()
Jean-Leon Gerome
The Moorish Bath, 1870
Fine Arts Museum San Francisco
Orientalist descriptions of the Middle East and North Africa were not necessarily accurate, even though they were based on real observations of these cultures. It didn’t matter. People coming back from Constantinople or Cairo could not possibly have known what the inside of a harem looked like: they simply wanted exotic, colourful images from their travels. And people who had NOT been travelling to the East wanted images of what they might one day see.
Eugene Delacroix and other French romantics drew their subject matter from literature and from actual travels to the Middle East. Delacroix travelled to Morocco and Algeria himself in 1832, and was very taken with the local colour, bright light and dignity of the locals. From then on he painted dazzling coloured versions of the places he had visited or imagined: Algerian Women in their Quarters 1834; Odalesque 1857. Educated Europeans couldn’t get enough of the exotic Orient. Returning French travellers in particular loved Orientalist taste, because presumably it reminded them of France’s past glory days.
The Moorish Bath, 1870
Fine Arts Museum San Francisco
Pictures which represented small genre scenes in the colourful every-day clothing of the Orient were very popular. No-one did images from North Africa or the Middle East better than Horace Vernet. His meticulously finished panoramas brought him enormous success in the Salon and heaps of fans amongst the fashionable art lovers. The Arab Tale Teller 1833 was painted before he visited Algiers in 1837, showing a clear narrative approach that was extremely popular. Arabs Travelling in the Desert 1843 came after his trip and was still meticulously remembered.
Jean-Leon Gerome was a pupil of Paul Delaroche and used his master’s highly finished academic style. Gerome travelled widely in Turkey, the Holyland, Egypt and North Africa. His female figures had the same classical precision of Ingres, but were in much more realistic poses. His best-known, most popular works were his Oriental scenes eg The Draught Players 1859. Later in his life Gerome used a camera to supplement his preliminary sketches, and his paintings achieved realism AND brilliant lighting with vivid colours. The Moorish Bath 1870 showed his scrupulous attention to detail.
Old themes could be presented in new contexts - the undraped female form in harem pictures, hunting scenes with tigers and camels instead of horses, domestic interiors with highly decorated Moorish tiles and screens etc. The Harem Guard by Jean Discart 1885 was magnificent in its detail and exotic in its subject matter. Moroccan Coffee House by Eugene Girardet c1874 was everything the European tourist wanted to remember from his travels to the East. Guards of the Harem by Ludwig Deutsch depicted the never ending boredom endured by these colourful men. Viennese-born but trained in Paris by Gerome, Deutsch’s themes were primarily ordinary Orientalist paintings. Deutsch made several trips to Egypt in his life and many of his settings are from Cairo. The subjects that he painted had little to do with the reality he saw in Cairo; they were fantasies he created for an eager public.
![]()
![]()
Jean-Leon Gerome was a pupil of Paul Delaroche and used his master’s highly finished academic style. Gerome travelled widely in Turkey, the Holyland, Egypt and North Africa. His female figures had the same classical precision of Ingres, but were in much more realistic poses. His best-known, most popular works were his Oriental scenes eg The Draught Players 1859. Later in his life Gerome used a camera to supplement his preliminary sketches, and his paintings achieved realism AND brilliant lighting with vivid colours. The Moorish Bath 1870 showed his scrupulous attention to detail.
Old themes could be presented in new contexts - the undraped female form in harem pictures, hunting scenes with tigers and camels instead of horses, domestic interiors with highly decorated Moorish tiles and screens etc. The Harem Guard by Jean Discart 1885 was magnificent in its detail and exotic in its subject matter. Moroccan Coffee House by Eugene Girardet c1874 was everything the European tourist wanted to remember from his travels to the East. Guards of the Harem by Ludwig Deutsch depicted the never ending boredom endured by these colourful men. Viennese-born but trained in Paris by Gerome, Deutsch’s themes were primarily ordinary Orientalist paintings. Deutsch made several trips to Egypt in his life and many of his settings are from Cairo. The subjects that he painted had little to do with the reality he saw in Cairo; they were fantasies he created for an eager public.
Jean Discart
The Pottery Workshop in Tangiers, c1890
35 x 46 cm,
private collection
The Pottery Workshop in Tangiers, c1890
35 x 46 cm,
private collection
In Britain there was perhaps less excitement about the Orient as there was in France. Nonetheless, as the accessibility of the Middle East grew, colonial expansionism by Britain advanced in Egypt etc. There was a passion for all things Egyptian. David Roberts produced popular collections of prints from his travels in the 1830s. Frank Goodall did desert scenes. Lawrence Alma Tadema painted lavish Egyptian scenes before turning to Greece and Rome. Holman Hunt went to Israel and Egypt to paint local colour, and JF Lewis painted harem scenes while living the life of a Turkish nobleman. EJ Poynter caused a sensation with his large picture Israel in Egypt in 1867.
In English architecture, there was also an Orientalist fashion, and an excellent example is the Arab Hall in Leighton House. We need also mention John Nash's Indian-style Royal Pavilion and the piers in Brighton. The Prince of Wales thoroughly enjoyed the Royal Pavilion at Brighton which he had refurbished in Oriental taste. The once classical villa began to look like an Indian palace, complete with domes, minarets, pinnacles and pagodas. My favourite rooms are the banqueting room, with its high dome, palm tree, dragon and Indian motifs and the golden corridor, complete with Chinese porcelain and sculpture. Was the young prince besotted with the Indian romance that inspired English literature and art at the time? The architect, John Nash, tied the whole project together with one long crenellated cornice. And completed it in 1822.
**
Professor Edward Said (1935–2003) has influenced many art historians’ views since the 1970s. In his definition, Orientalism referred to a particular academic tradition in the West, preoccupied with conceptualising and representing the non-Western societies as the opposite or Other of the Occident. The emergence of Orientalism was not random as it occurred in a particular historical context i.e the global ascendancy of the capitalist, militarised West.
According to this view, Orientalism misrepresented the social-cultural reality of both the East and the West by presenting the West as rational, progressive, humane and civilised, and the East as cruel, exploitative and regressive. And by presenting the progress of the West as a natural consequence of the intrinsic virtues of Western culture, it also distorted the historical reality of Western modernity.
European Orientalism therefore served an important ideological function in the 19th century. It both justified Western exploitation of North Africa and the Middle East, AND it turned colonialism into a noble, historic mission: the West’s heroic attempt to help the Other, the uncivilised, the lazy, the savage Orient. The main themes presented in Orientalist art presumably reflected the colonial imperative: violence, laziness and sex; signs that the Oriental civilisation was on the decline, shown through depiction of crumbling architecture etc.
In English architecture, there was also an Orientalist fashion, and an excellent example is the Arab Hall in Leighton House. We need also mention John Nash's Indian-style Royal Pavilion and the piers in Brighton. The Prince of Wales thoroughly enjoyed the Royal Pavilion at Brighton which he had refurbished in Oriental taste. The once classical villa began to look like an Indian palace, complete with domes, minarets, pinnacles and pagodas. My favourite rooms are the banqueting room, with its high dome, palm tree, dragon and Indian motifs and the golden corridor, complete with Chinese porcelain and sculpture. Was the young prince besotted with the Indian romance that inspired English literature and art at the time? The architect, John Nash, tied the whole project together with one long crenellated cornice. And completed it in 1822.
**
Professor Edward Said (1935–2003) has influenced many art historians’ views since the 1970s. In his definition, Orientalism referred to a particular academic tradition in the West, preoccupied with conceptualising and representing the non-Western societies as the opposite or Other of the Occident. The emergence of Orientalism was not random as it occurred in a particular historical context i.e the global ascendancy of the capitalist, militarised West.
According to this view, Orientalism misrepresented the social-cultural reality of both the East and the West by presenting the West as rational, progressive, humane and civilised, and the East as cruel, exploitative and regressive. And by presenting the progress of the West as a natural consequence of the intrinsic virtues of Western culture, it also distorted the historical reality of Western modernity.
European Orientalism therefore served an important ideological function in the 19th century. It both justified Western exploitation of North Africa and the Middle East, AND it turned colonialism into a noble, historic mission: the West’s heroic attempt to help the Other, the uncivilised, the lazy, the savage Orient. The main themes presented in Orientalist art presumably reflected the colonial imperative: violence, laziness and sex; signs that the Oriental civilisation was on the decline, shown through depiction of crumbling architecture etc.
Ludwig Deutsch,
Nubian Guard, 1895
51 x 33 cm
J Paul Getty Museum, California
Nubian Guard, 1895
51 x 33 cm
J Paul Getty Museum, California
I agree that all cultural productions are self serving – otherwise how would painters, for example, get their paintings sold at home? But I would argue the very opposite of Said's view. Orientalist study of Muslim society arose at least in part from the denial of narrow, religious dogma; rather Orientalism actively encouraged learning about alternative cultures.
And it seems that Orientalist artists truly loved the colours, costumes, architecture, weapons, markets and weather of North Africa. Yes there are slave scenes, but slaving was a product controlled largely by Europeans. We should be impressed more by the focus on Islamic education, warm family relationships, personal hygiene, busy craft markets and other qualities that could have taught the West a lesson or two.
And it seems that Orientalist artists truly loved the colours, costumes, architecture, weapons, markets and weather of North Africa. Yes there are slave scenes, but slaving was a product controlled largely by Europeans. We should be impressed more by the focus on Islamic education, warm family relationships, personal hygiene, busy craft markets and other qualities that could have taught the West a lesson or two.