Lolita and the guarded subconscious. Johann Köler's Faithful Guardian (1878)
Anders Härm

	The following analysis focuses on Johann Köler and his painting Faithful Guardian (1878). In the given context, the allusion to Nabokov and his cult novel Lolita primarily functions in the role of workable and obvious metaphor. Too far-reaching conclusions about Köler's sexual preferences should be avoided, just as one shouldn't equate Nabokov with his literary character. The discourse ought to be taken rather as an academic speculation, and not as fireworks of absolute assertions. Still, it should be kept in mind that the Faithful Guardian undermined the moral norms of its time, and that there is a grain of truth in the main postulate of psychoanalysis - an artist's work may well act as a means to earth his suppressed urges. Childhood and sexuality Faithful Guardian has become a central attraction of the permanent display of the Estonian Museum of Art. Postcards depicting this painting are in great demand at the souvenir counter, apparently confirming the principle truth of media magnetism that photographs of children, animals or women have the greatest appeal. Faithful Guardian fulfils two of these three requirements. The desire of the masses for something lovely and innocent is of course by no means a phenomenon of the 20th century. Artists have tried to satisfy this particular desire at least since the time when children began to be seen as little adults, and since Rousseau's definition of childhood in the late 18th century. After all, Humbert Humbert, describing his motives and suffering pangs of guilt, also tries to justify his feelings through historical and mythological examples and parallels. As a counterbalance to Humbert's agony, one could point to Nabokov's contemporary Heinrich Mann, and his most liberal description of the sexual behaviour of 11-12 year-olds and even younger children in 16th century French culture in his double novel Youth and Manhood of King Henri IV. The sexuality of children or young adults is similarly reflected in the art of the 16th century and of a few subsequent centuries. It is sufficient to have a look at the paintings of Agnolo Bronzino and Caravaggio. However, contrary to the general belief that sexuality was repressed in 19th century culture, Michel Foucault points out in his History of Sexuality that, instead of becoming hushed up and hidden, sexuality became part of the regulation process of social behaviour under the cover of science. Via the mighty mechanisms of State, Medicine and Law, the criteria for what was permissible were established. Although the State succeeded in making the Church reconsider sexual morality, the language of guilt and purity crept into the secular sphere. "Discovering" childhood also meant changes both in a child's social status and in the biological-medical treatment of man as a whole. This signified the rise of the sexual initiation level of achieving sexual maturity to a much higher age and in a longer perspective. It also meant, especially in the conditions of Victorian morality, the end of treating young boys and girls as sexual objects. During the 19th century, children were banished from the sexual sphere once and for all, and acquired the absolute right to exclusively exist as little darlings. In the regulation process, children's sexuality and its representation remained forbidden. Sexuality and its representation as a whole was thus covered by a strict veil of double morality. This is demonstrated for example by endless disputes about classical nude painting that lasted throughout the 19th century. Although this set of problems remains outside the context of the current treatment, it might nevertheless be mentioned that the body was politicised and the existence of sexuality in art became legitimate through a complicated social regulation mechanism, which determined the status of the body depending on place, time and the manner of treatment. Faithful Guardian Johann Köler painted his Faithful Guardian in 1878. The 'little Lolita' in the painting is the daughter of the Tsarist army general, and court minister Frederichs, whose portrait Köler has also painted. Besides these simple facts, there is hardly anything else known about this painting. It is likely that the picture was painted either in the minister's summer residence or his country mansion. The 19th century and its art loved children, and this is the background against which Faithful Guardian can be projected. Two main discourses can be pointed out in the depiction of children in 19th century art. There is the sentimental, sugary-sweet tendency emerging from the academic tradition on the one hand, where children were taken as embodiments of innocent sweetness. This was opposed by a pietist cult of children (orphans) made up of realists-moralists that aimed to get the tears flowing. Köler's Faithful Guardian certainly belongs in the first category, in which children, as a rule, were depicted as playing in a golden landscape. In most of the critiques of Köler and also in his reception as a whole, this painting has always been somehow overlooked. Both in a direct and indirect sense. In most cases, the painting has only been categorised by its genre; the Faithful Guardian has been projected against the background of landscape painting from the earliest interpretations onwards. Alfred Waga, for instance, writes in his Köler biography in 1931 that "in its design, Faithful Guardian is a landscape rather than a composition painting", and he places it among the "open-air paintings that started their worldwide march of triumph at that time". Likewise, 45 years later Mai Levin writes that Faithful Guardian "brings new, open-air painting features into the artist's manner, but at the same time he rather condescends to public taste". The painting has actually not been thoroughly analysed. The status of Faithful Guardian in the mirror of reception has been something like this: it has to be mentioned, but if it's considered unsuitable then it must be immediately pushed aside. It is natural, in a way, that a classical art history reception, minted by modernist urges clearly had to shift the focus of attention from elements of kitsch. Still, has it been despised just because it so perfectly suits 'mass taste'? Or has it been somehow felt that another, a far more refined, taste preference has been satisfied here? Faithful Guardian is indeed a relatively exceptional painting in Köler's work. Not in terms of genre - a figure in landscape is one of his favourite topics, which has survived in large numbers especially from his days of travelling in Italy. Children, too, are frequently depicted in his paintings. Taking a closer look at, for example, his Girl at the Spring (1858-1862) or Italian Girl (1858-1862), the girls here are characterised by strange melancholy sadness. The eyes of Köler's female figures reflect the same kind of melancholy glance; glimpses of mischief are rare. His still-pure Eve is just as irresponsibly frivolous as, say, a watering can filled with water. (Eve with a Pomegranate, 1879-1880). All this can be explained by the canons of academic art that were supposed to depict the 'eternal laws of beauty', as Köler himself frequently stressed in his writing, and to rise above the lowly desires. If hard pressed, one could justify this by his limited range of psychological depiction. Why then has his Faithful Guardian an erotic undertone as in no other painting of his? How and why did he abandon the cold calculating frames of academism? Incited feeling of danger and posture of a nude The posture Köler chose for the girl is most remarkable. It is quite clearly the classical posture of a nude painting, typical not only of Olympia by ¡douard Manet, Köler's contemporary, but also of a tradition which reaches far back into art history, to Ingres and Titian. What irritated contemporaries about painters of 'modern life' was, after all, not the posture, but the vulgarity of their manner of depicting the body that gave not the slightest credit to academic canons of beauty. The fact that Köler might have been quite unaware that to depict 'the little princess' he had obviously chosen one of the most canonical nude postures, the structure of which already contained an erotic code. This fact is highly significant. The pose inevitably draws attention to the arsenal of the little girl's yet undeveloped feminine charms and grace, something that was not often stressed in depicting children. Another fact emphasising the peculiarity of the painting is the sense of danger instilled by the title. The idyllic landscape, abounding in butterflies and flowers, has apparently nothing dangerous about it, and there is no visible reason whatsoever why this possibility should be in any way entertained, unless a signal of danger was already embedded in the consciousness of the viewer of this pastoral scene. The artist must however have perceived the danger in the painting and in the manner of depiction. It sounds like a cliche but the archetypal symbol of faithfulness - the dog - also stood as a metaphor for a lady's chastity belt. There is perhaps maybe no need to refer to Jan van Eyck's The Arnolfins. The proportions of the Saint Bernard seem larger than life, and toying with such forbidden ground caused the artist to make it seem bigger. A vague sense of guilt seems to have left a trace here. Let us recall the voyeur Humbert watching Lolitas at the children's playground, before setting off on his guilt-ridden voyage. Nabokov describes him as 'a vain and cruel scoundrel who manages to seem 'moving''. Faithful Guardian could be similarly described - it is a cruel painting that manages to seem 'moving'. Maybe in this second-rate painting (compared to historical pictures, Köler considered landscapes and portraits banal, as befitted an academician) Köler indeed shyly expressed the desire of his 'private pleasures', and lowers a veil from the face of a hopeless moralist and academician. Maybe he really abandoned the dialectic of the moral and the aesthetic, where aesthetic bliss and charm do not necessarily mean being morally right. Faithful Guardian is certainly one of Köler's most enchanting, if not his most enchanting work, and primarily because of its dark undercurrents and its non-moralistic presentation of forbidden pleasures, which also makes Lolita such an extraordinary novel. But naturally it is difficult to believe all that. The mental dimensions of Köler and Nabokov cannot be compared, nor can their cultural contexts and ideals. However, in a sense, their status has by now become almost equal. Just as Köler's painting has the effect of a girl art classic, so 'Lolita' is probably unable to really upset more sensible people any more. It is nevertheless not possible to make the darker side of the Faithful Guardian's sentimental idyll any lighter.
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