French Orientalist Painting as an Expression of Cultural Imperialism: Parisiennes en costume algérienne

Sa？etak Came to be as a consequence of the Orientalist discourse, Orientalist painting has significantly marked the 19th-century French art. It was an extremely popular form of cultural representation of the French power and colonial domination, but also a way of constructing the Oriental reality. Although primarily remembered as a painter of the French daily-life, the renowned impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir had also tried his hand at Oriental themes. He painted the Parisiennesen costume algérienne in 1872, nearly ten years before he personally experienced the Orient. Undoubtedly, created under the influence of the Femmes d’Alger, Renoir’s work is entirely opposite of the famous Delacroix’s painting in its presentation of the Orient. The fact that the painting originated in a specific historical context – the era of great colonial empires – gives a reason for analysing its role in the construction of the Orient but also the representation of the Occident/West as its lasting contrary