Voluptas Mors 1951

Philippe Halsman made this photograph, Voluptas Mors, in the late 20th century in collaboration with Salvador Dali. In it, a group of nude women are arranged to create a large skull. The image recalls the memento mori tradition which can be seen throughout the history of European painting. This was a trope in which artists reminded their audiences of their mortality with symbolic skulls and decaying objects. Voluptas Mors, meaning 'the pleasure of death', makes the interesting suggestion that the female body is a symbol of both life and death. As an art historian, my role in understanding this image is to consider how it challenges existing social norms. What does it mean to use the female nude to represent death in this way? What might Dali and Halsman have been trying to say about the relationship between pleasure and mortality? To answer these questions, I might look to sociological and cultural studies scholarship to help me better understand how these artists were engaging with the politics of imagery in their time.