More than Fashion

Abstract

This article is concerned with identification and interpretation of the costumes featured in two portraits of Polish aristocratic women by Franz Xaver Winterhalter: Katarzyna Potocka née Branicka in Oriental Costume, 1854 (National Museum in Warsaw) and Wieńczysława Barczewska, Madame de Jurjewicz, 1860 (Museum of Fine Arts in Boston). The former outfit, brought by the wearer from her journey to the Near East, references dress worn by Greek women in the Ottoman Empire. The latter is fancy dress featuring the jacket called polka, harking back to the overcoat called kontusz, iconic of the Orient-inspired historical Polish national dress. Winterhalter’s painterly treatment showcases the wearers’ agenda for selecting the ensembles that reflected their personal circumstances and also conveyed patriotic allusions in the context of Poland’s current status as a partitioned nation. The meanings of the “oriental” elements in both costumes extend beyond the note of exoticism to which they have been hitherto reduced.