Paradox of Pearls

Pearls and Privilege

Pearls on Black servants and nonwhite figures reinforce racial hierarchies and colonial agendas. The whiteness of pearls serves to elevate the British elite while accentuating the subjugation of others.

Robert Dodd, after William Hogarth
The Indian Emperor, or, The Conquest of Mexico, Act 4, Scene 4
Etching and aquatint with stipple
Published January 1, 1792, by J. & J. Boydell
Drawer 49 3646 no. 6
The Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University

Hogarth’s image records a performance of John Dryden’s The Indian Emperor in the home of Master of the Mint John Conduitt. The drawing room, complete with paintings, sculptures, and an ornate fireplace, has been transformed into a private theater. Conduitt’s children act out the play dressed in their usual finery ornamented with pearls. The actress downstage left wears a pearl necklace that echoes the pearls worn by two women in the audience, one of whom gestures toward the stage. Dryden’s play about the Spanish conquest of Mexico originally featured costumes brought back to England from Surinam by the playwright and novelist Aphra Behn. Act 4, scene 4 takes place in a prison and involves a murder and suicide attempted by the female characters. Pearls in this private theatrical performance reflect unsettled lines between reality and performance, conquest and domesticity, and the irony of re-enactment in diverse spaces.

Lady Frances and the Lady Catharine Jones, Daughters to the Right Honble Richard, Earle of Ranelagh. . .
In Portraits of Ladies in Mezzotint: After the Paintings of Famous Artists from Anthony Vandyck (1599–1641) to Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723–1792)
Folio 75 P839 800 vol. 3, page 1
The Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University

The daughters of the Right Honorable Earl of Ranelagh are portrayed in a pastoral setting wearing fashionable gowns adorned with pearls on the bodices and sleeves. Kneeling below them is a Black servant, who offers them flowers and wears pearl earrings. A grand house and fountain are visible in the background. In addition to signifying whiteness, wealth, and commerce, pearls reinforce the idea of ownership. The Black servant is a possession in the same way that the daughters are, here advertised as available commodities on the marriage market; they will be exchanged by their father to their husbands. This composition echoes many well-known paintings of white subjects and their Black servants. (See also Smirke’s Induction Scene, which features a Black servant in pearls as well.)

Agostino Brunias, after his own painting
A Negroes Dance in the Island of Dominica
Stipple engraving and etching
Published February 15, 1779
779.02.15.01
The Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University

This print after a painting by Agostino Brunias features a group of Caribbean men and women dancing under a coconut tree. Brunias was well known for his idealized depictions of free individuals, colonists, and slaves participating in daily activities in the West Indies. His portrayals include important documentation of fashion trends and accessories. Several figures wear pearl necklaces, earrings, and bracelets indicating that pearl accessories were part of everyday style and self-presentation.

Robert Thew, after Robert Smirke
Taming of the Shrew, Induction
Stipple and etching
Drawer 724 803B no. 82
The Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University

This print from Boydell’s Shakespeare Gallery depicts the induction scene from The Taming of the Shrew at the moment when the drunken beggar Christopher Sly awakens and believes that he is now a wealthy man due to an elaborate trick played upon him by a lord. The artist portrays Sly as an exotic Eastern caricature. A Black servant with a pearl earring posed theatrically, holding a large wine or water jug, echoes blackamoor figures in European decorative arts. The Taming of the Shrew is not a play typically associated with race, racist discourse, or ethnic stereotyping, but the imagery suggests the artist’s exaggerated representation of the otherness of these characters.