Sujet 2 - Partie 2 · Bac Anglais Métropole Candidat libre 2021 (sujet 2)

Thématique: « Expression et construction de soi »

Document A

[...] Until the twentieth century, it was accepted that women were secondary to men, the mothers, daughters and wives whose value lay in their beauty, their modesty, their biddability 1, their usefulness to their families in terms of marital alliances. The line in Milton’s seventeenth-century epic poem sums it up: ‘he for God only, she for God in him’.

One result of these gender conventions is that when you look at portraits made in earlier centuries, you would be hard-pressed 2 to find a woman with anything much to say for herself. The men hold guns, wear their medals of state, look at globes, read books, point to plans. The women dangle their books in the folds of their skirts, look fetchingly off into the middle distance, stroke a little dog, wear costly clothes. The fact that we know that many of these women had talents and skills, were great letter writers or fine embroiderers, for example, or ran huge households, play instruments or paint to an impressive standard is not usually included in female portraits before the twentieth century. [...] A particularly interesting extension of the language of self-portraiture came from women artists of the past.

When I was writing a history of women’s self-portraits, I realised that some of them must have been dissatisfied with the masculine self-portrait patterns available to them. There was the artist with the tools of his trade. The artist looking like a gentleman. And several variations of the artist at work. But as women, they had a special problem: if they worked for money, they were not considered ladies. If they boasted of their skills they were not considered feminine. If they looked too arty or too industrious, they invited ridicule. So how to depict themselves as both feminine but professional? [...]

Women used the conventions of their times in an original way, showing off a sophistication to rival the men while never for a moment undercutting the modest femininity the age demanded of the weaker sex. [...] Portraiture is continually refreshing itself. At the start of the 1970s, the feminist artists who confidently marched on to art’s stage extended the concept of self-portraiture, turning it from a painter speaking about herself to an artist embodying ideas that mattered to women in general.

Many of these works have become classics, like Eleanor Antin’s 3 144 photographs of herself taken over 36 days in 1972 as she dieted to lose weight. Its witty title, Carving: A Traditional Sculpture, is a reference to the Michelangelesque idea that a sculptor chips away at the marble to release the body inside. Antin is using her body as a way to personify abstract ideas about the female search for the ideal shape, the constant dieting, the perpetual watching of oneself.

Frances BORZELLO, “Facing the Truth”,

Script of a talk given at the National Portrait Gallery of Australia, Canberra, July 11 th 2013

1 biddability: obedience

2 be hard-pressed: find it difficult

3 Eleanor Antin is an American artist.

Document B

Lynn HERSHMAN LEESON (American artist born in 1941),

Roberta Construction Chart #1, 1975.

Roberta Breitmore is a fictional person, created by Lynn Hershman Leeson, in 1974.

The photo gives detailed instructions on how to create Roberta’s appearance.

Document C

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.

I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size

But when I start to tell them,

They think I’m telling lies.

5 I say,

It’s in the reach of my arms,

The span of my hips,

The stride of my step,

The curl of my lips.

10 I’m a woman

Phenomenally.

Phenomenal woman,

That’s me.

I walk into a room

15 Just as cool as you please,

And to a man,

The fellows stand or

Fall down on their knees.

Then they swarm around me,

20 A hive of honey bees.

I say,

It’s the fire in my eyes,

And the flash of my teeth,

The swing in my waist,

25 And the joy in my feet.

I’m a woman

Phenomenally.

Phenomenal woman,

That’s me.

30 Men themselves have wondered

What they see in me.

They try so much

But they can’t touch

My inner mystery.

35 When I try to show them,

They say they still can’t see.

I say,

It’s in the arch of my back,

The sun of my smile,

40 The ride of my breasts,

The grace of my style.

I’m a woman

Phenomenally.

Phenomenal woman,

That’s me.

Now you understand

Just why my head’s not bowed.

I don’t shout or jump about

Or have to talk real loud.

50 When you see me passing,

It ought to make you proud.

I say,

It’s in the click of my heels,

The bend of my hair,

55 the palm of my hand,

The need for my care.

’Cause I’m a woman

Phenomenally.

Phenomenal woman,

60 That’s me.

Maya ANGELOU (American writer and civil-rights activist, 1928-2014),

“Phenomenal Woman” in And Still I Rise, 1978

Partie 2. Traduction en français [4 pts]

Traduisez le passage suivant du document A en français:

« When I was writing a history of women's self-portraits, I realised that some of them must have been dissatisfied with the masculine self-portrait patterns available to them. There was the artist with the tools of his trade. The artist looking like a gentleman. And several variations of the artist at work. But as women, they had a special problem: if they worked for money, they were not considered ladies. If they boasted of their skills they were not considered feminine. » (lignes 14 à 19)