When I started working in the U. This fascination with the exotic image that these postcards represent for Westerners seems to be quite common. I often wonder if these dancers have the information about how these Colonial postcards were made.
Differences in taste within differing cultures become more obvious when considering other factors relating to the beauty of a woman. For the Western male society, semi-nudity is sensual and provocative, while in Oriental norms, it is immodest and tasteless.
Orientals would reject models chosen by painters as beautiful dancers as bony. Being well-fed was something everyone aspired to in the 19th century in Algeria; and only the rich could afford it, so the more opulent a woman was, the more she was considered beautiful.
Furthermore, Orientalist painters illustrate a certain Orient close to their own vision. Even if he never met the dancer, he was able to easily find Oriental dance costumes in fashion magazines to dress his character. The painter would uncover the hands, the bosom and everything else he could on the dancer. His goal was to suggest the sexuality contained in belly dance as opposed to the dances in Europe such as ballet, couple dances in salons, or folk dances.
Between the turn of the 20th century and World War I, postcards became the mass media of communication and were collectible objects for the first time in French history. However, colonial postcards had complex origins. Since the French presence in Algeria had relied on capitalist involvement in tourism. ND covered Algeria extensively. ND studios sent photographers to the colony to take pictures. ND processed and edited the images in Paris and then marketed them to businesses in Algeria.
