Imaginary Monsters

Throughout the eighteenth century, scientists, philosophers, and academicians strove to solve an epistemological uncertainty that encircled abnormal births, singularities in nature, and the rare or miscellaneous that fit into a loose concept of monstrous alterity.  The very existence of aberrant bodies challenged the notion of nature’s order and man’s ability to understand the world through rational classification.  Excessive, defective, or composite figures defied categorization and Aristotelian beliefs in pure and functional forms.  In contrast, philosopher Denis Diderot’s materialist views provided an alternative natural order, one that allowed for unpredictability, decomposition, and the blurring of boundaries.  The monstrous proved to be a logical contradiction, a paradox ripe with the residue of whispered Old World superstition and the authoritative voice of burgeoning science. 

Johann Daniel Herz’s Design for a Fountain and selected prints from Francisco Goya’s Caprichos exemplify this lingering fascination with fantastic creatures and grotesque bodies.  More importantly, they attest to a continued taste for viewing anomaly and entertaining mythical thought that persisted in an era characterized as purging the whims of imaginative excess.