Standing Female Nude

by Carol Ann Duffy

Six hours like this for a few francs.

Belly nipple arse in the window light,
he drains the colour from me. Further to the right,
Madame. And do try to be still.
I shall be represented analytically and hung
in great museums. The bourgeoisie will coo
at such an image of a river-whore. They call it Art.

Maybe. He is concerned with volume, space.

I with the next meal. You're getting thin,
Madame, this is not good. My breasts hang
slightly low, the studio is cold. In the tea-leaves
I can see the Queen of England gazing
on my shape. Magnificent, she murmurs,
moving on. It makes me laugh. His name

is Georges. They tell me he's a genius.

There are times he does not concentrate
and stiffens for my warmth.
He possesses me on canvas as he dips the brush
repeatedly into the paint. Little man,
you've not the money for the arts I sell.
Both poor, we make our living how we can.
I ask him Why do you do this? Because
I have to. There's no choice. Don't talk.
My smile confuses him. These artists
take themselves too seriously. At night I fill myself
with wine and dance around the bars. When it's finished
he shows me proudly, lights a cigarette. I say
Twelve francs and get my shawl. It does not look like me.

Analysis
Carol Ann Duffy was born in Scotland (in 1955) but moved with her family to Stafford in the English Midlands when still a child. She knew from the age of 14
that she wanted to be a poet but she was 30 before she really "arrived" with her first major collection, "Standing Female Nude". Since then her lively
commentaries on modern life have won her a huge audience with the double result of her poems being regularly featured on school English syllabuses and
the award (in 2009) of the Poet Laureateship, which she will hold until 2019.
"Standing Female Nude" was the title poem of Duffy's first collection, and can be taken as a symbolic reference to her status as a poet at the time, in that she
was laying her soul bare by standing up for feminism in a male-dominated world.
The poem comprises four stanzas, each of seven unrhymed lines. Duffy uses a technique that involves regularly running clauses and sentences between lines
and even across stanzas, which creates a form of poetic prose that is relaxed and non-formal, thus allowing the reader to concentrate on the words and
phrases themselves. She only uses words that are likely to be familiar to her audience, and on occasion these are slang or with sexual overtones. She has a
directness of style that readers of poems by Philip Larkin would recognise. All these elements are present in the poem under review.
"Standing Female Nude" is a monologue "spoken" by an artist's model in a Paris studio. Her concern is to "make a few francs" while his is to create a work of
art and a reputation for himself as a great artist. She admits to being "a river whore" who sells her body in more ways than one, but the two are using each
other to an equivalent extent.
In the first stanza, the model crudely sets out her stall as she displays "Belly nipple arse in the window light," but also reflects on the outcome of the
encounter: "I shall be represented analytically and hung / in great museums. The bourgeoisie will coo / at such an image of a river whore. They call it Art."
She is therefore amused as the pretentiousness of the exercise that transforms a whore (which is her perspective) into great art (which is the viewpoint of
people other than herself).
There is a telling comment in "he drains the colour from me", in that the physical ordeal of standing still for six hours somehow transforms the colour of her
skin into an image on the canvas. The pain is hers, but the art is someone else's.
The second stanza states the contrast in attitudes in the clearest possible terms. On the question of "Art" she says "Maybe", but then: "He is concerned with
volume, space / I with the next meal." However, he sees her thinness as "not good" not out of concern for her welfare but because it will affect her shape as a
model. She continues to daydream about her future as a work of art: "I can see the Queen of England gazing on my shape. Magnificent, she murmurs, /
moving on." However, she sees the irony in this situation, so that "it makes me laugh".
Crossing the gap between the third and fourth stanzas is: "His name / is Georges. They tell me he's a genius". This seems to indicate that the artist in question
is Georges Braque (1882-1963) and the painting that Duffy has in mind is probably his "Large Nude" of 1908, which certainly emphasises the "belly nipple
arse" of the poem's second line. This also adds something to "he drains the colour from me", mentioned above, in that this painting is notable for its subdued
tones. If this is the painting in question, then the "Queen of England" mentioned in the second stanza must either mean the wife of the British king or be a
future "in the tea leaves" prediction of a time when Britain would next be ruled by a queen.
The third stanza is interesting for the description of the power play between the two characters. The model is aware of the sexual power she possesses, in
that the artist "stiffens for my warmth", but this is followed by: "He possesses me on canvas", although this possession is also expressed with sexual
symbolism in "as he dips the brush / repeatedly into the paint". The tables are turned again in the model's mind as she retorts: "Little man, / you've not the
money for the arts I sell", but compromise is reached in the stanza's final line: "Both poor, we make our living how we can".
In the fourth stanza the model attempts conversation with the artist but is soon rebuffed: "I ask him, Why do you do this? Because / I have to. There's no
choice. Don't talk." She then contrasts their two lives, mocking him for taking his art too seriously while she is able to "fill myself with wine and dance around
the bars". When the painting is finished he shows it to her "proudly", but her reaction is to ask for her money, get dressed and leave, finishing with the
dismissive comment: "It does not look like me".
Because this is the model's monologue, it is not surprising that it justifies her side of the interaction with the artist. She believes that her life is better than his,
even to the extent of regarding the future of the painting as an image of her rather than as a creation of the artist. The irony should not be lost on the reader,
who will probably know the name of Georges Braque and might even be familiar with the painting in question, but have no knowledge of who the model
might be. The model's final comment might therefore be read as a realisation that she is mistaken, and posterity will not be able to appreciate her as a
person because she is unrecognisable for who she is in Braque's Cubist style. However, it does not sound as though this will bother the model too much,
because she has been paid for her work and is more concerned about living day to day than immortality on canvas.
"Standing Female Nude" is fascinating for its presentation of a contact between two people in which there is no real interaction. This is a business deal, with
money changing hands for a service provided by one party for the other. This is portrayed as a form of prostitution, with the model likening her night-time
work to that of her six hours of posing. Duffy has captured very well the strange relationship between artist and model that involves a fully clothed man
staring for hours at a naked woman for a purpose that has nothing to do with sex, although the model fantasises that there might be a hint of feeling on the
artist's part to do with her being a woman as well as a shape. When all is said and done, though, the model has her money, the artist has his masterpiece, and
both people end the encounter satisfied and ready to move on, as though the meeting had never taken place.