University of Groningen
Literary and Cultural Research Master Thesis:
Bewitched by Fashion: The Appearance of the Witch in Western Film and Television
Roos Fopma
S2756439
14 April 2020
Professor Julian Hanich
31,142 words
Table of Contents:
Introduction 2
The Foundations of the Witch Stereotype 3
The Cultural Resurgence of the Witch 7
Chapter 1: Witchcraft, Beauty, and Glamour 28
Beauty Equals Power 28
Beauty and the Abject 38
Constructed Glamour 46
Chapter 2: Costuming the Witch 53
Balance and Disruption Through Costume 55
The Witch in Red 60
Costume in Magic Practice 73
Chapter 3: Clothing and Characterization 82
Sartorial Differences 84
Sartorial Transformations 102
Conclusion 119
Final Thoughts 119
Future Research Recommendations 120
Bibliography 123
Introduction
Vengeful necromancers and voodoo priestesses are dressed in sophisticated ensembles while participating in horrific magical rituals. Bloodthirsty sorceresses and seductive enchantresses make sure their looks are on point before they approach their enemies. While it may seem unlikely at first, this is how contemporary film and television tends to portray the witch.
Modern filmic representations of witches are highly stylized, depicting witch characters who are as engaged in fashion as they are in occult practices. Series like American Horror Story, whose third season is about a coven of witches, present meticulously stylized universes in which fashion takes center stage. Recent films likeSuspiria (2018) provide the viewer with a sufficient amount of magic-induced gore, while also satisfying those with a lust for aesthetic pleasure through costumes that could be part of an haute couture fashion show. The witch is the ultimate combination of fashion and the macabre, eliminating the boundaries between beauty and ugliness. It is this tension between her simultaneous monstrosity and elegance that makes her such a fascinating character. Being obsessed with both fashion and the occult, this is precisely why the witch speaks to me on a personal level, and why I feel inclined to further research the unexpected yet spellbinding link between fashion and witchcraft as demonstrated in film and television today. While I have been fascinated with witchcraft for as long as I can remember, in recent years a collective obsession with witches seems to have emerged. The most prominent part of the cultural resurgence of the witch is her current prevalence in Western film and television, which is the area that this thesis will focus on. To fully understand how popular the witch really is at this moment in time, some of the other realms in which she has been resurrected are worth exploring. Before doing so, however, some terms and concepts need to be defined more carefully in order to avoid confusion. Moreover, some general historical information about witchcraft is required to comprehend the position of the witch in Western culture.
The Foundations of the Witch Stereotype
Defining the Witch
While defining witchcraft as a whole is too ambitious for the scope of this thesis, clarifying the concept within the limits of this research project is a more feasible option. Numerous scholars have attempted to find a definition for the term “witchcraft.” One of the leading witchcraft scholars, medievalist Richard Kieckhefer, has called witchcraft a “problematic word,” as “neither historical nor modern works maintain any clear and consistent definition of the word.” Ronald Hutton, who has written extensively on the topic of witchcraft and its1 rich history, has dedicated one of his more recent books to defining witchcraft by tracing the witch throughout history. Hutton points out that the standard scholarly definition of “witch”
was formulated by British social anthropologist Rodney Needham as “someone who causes harm to others by mystical means.” Indeed witchcraft is often associated with causing harm, 2 but, as Hutton notes, that is merely one interpretation of the word. Other current usages of the term “witch” include “any person who uses magic,” a “practitioner of a particular kind of nature-based Pagan religion,” or “a symbol of independent female authority and resistance to male domination.” Depending on context, this thesis will use the word “witch” to refer to all3 four definitions that Hutton describes in his book. It will focus on female witches, as the stereotype of the witch is historically female and the witch as a cultural figure continues to be imagined mainly as a woman today. During the medieval and early modern witch trials, “the witch was almost by definition a woman,” but male witches certainly existed and their role 4 in the history of witchcraft should not be ignored. In areas such as Burgundy, Normandy, Estonia and Iceland, for instance, men actually comprised the vast majority of the accused in witch trials. Yet, as pointed out by Michael Bailey, across all of Europe, approximately three5 out of every four victims of witch trials were female. He explains that
1 Richard Kieckhefer, European Witch Trials: Their Formations in Popular and Learned Culture, 1300-1500 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976), p. 7.
2 Ronald Hutton, The Witch: A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017), p. ix.
3 Hutton, p. x.
4 Norman Cohn, Europe’s Inner Demons (St Albans: Paladin, 1976), p. 226.
5 Lara Apps and Andrew Colin Gow, Male Witches in Early Modern Europe (Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 2003), p. 46.
women were generally more legally vulnerable than men were, especially widows or the unmarried.
Women who were not under the control of some immediate male family member raised concerns about supposedly unrestrained female sexuality. Unmarried daughters could be an economic burden on their families, particularly as they aged, and women who had married but were then widowed could obstruct (ideally patrilineal) inheritance patterns. Ingrained cultural beliefs about both women and magic also played a significant role, insofar as a great deal of witchcraft (harmful magic that often affected fertility) was associated with areas of predominantly female activity: childbirth, the care of sick children, food preparation (with attendant possibilities for poisoning), and so forth.6
The association between witchcraft and women is deeply rooted in medieval and early modern tradition and has resulted in the creation of an inherently female stereotype that still exists in popular culture today. As this thesis is interested in analyzing the development of this stereotype, as well as the continuing relevance and prominence of this stereotype in Western culture, analyzing the female witch will arguably provide the most insightful results.
As this thesis is focused on the depiction of the witch in film and television, the word “witch”
will also be used to designate cinematic witches. In sections that discuss both reality-based and fictional witchcraft, the distinction will be marked by adding an adjective to the term that implies which version of witchcraft is referred to.
The Witch in History
As the foundations of the cultural stereotype of the witch lie primarily in the late medieval and early modern Western witch trials, this is the historical period that this thesis will draw on. The following chapters will zoom in and out of this historical period, highlighting the events that are crucial to understanding certain aspects of the witch stereotype. Before doing so, however, a brief overview of how the stereotype of the witch came into existence is required. Kieckhefer’s influential work European Witch Trials explores the trials that took place in the thirteenth until the fifteenth centuries, distinguishing between popular and learned beliefs of the time. The main difference between popular and learned beliefs was that the learned tradition emphasized the role of the devil in magic, while the devil played little to no role in popular notions of witchcraft. It was the idea of the witch as a diabolical entity that 7
6 Michael D. Bailey, “Diabolical Magic,” in The Cambridge History of Magic and Witchcraft in the West: From Antiquity to the Present, ed. David Collins (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), p. 378.
7 Kieckhefer, p. 36.
became dominant during the early modern witch trials and which caused the witch hunts to escalate. Another significant work on the history of witchcraft, Europe’s Inner Demons by British historian Norman Cohn, further elucidates how this diabolical stereotype of the witch came into being. Cohn explains that peasant communities believed in two types of witches:
“ladies of the night,” who attended collective nocturnal flights, bringing blessings to those 8 whom they visited at night, and “night witches,” who were believed to attend similar flights, but instead of performing beneficent magic, they would go on “amorous, murderous, or cannibalistic errands.” While popular belief did not necessarily associate these two types of9 witchcraft with one another, the educated elite blended the two popular notions into “a single fantasy about organized masses of witches flying by night, intent on cannibalistic orgies, and guided by demons.” The adoption and transformation of popular beliefs about witchcraft by 10 the educated elite, which led to a diabolical image of the witch, allowed for the mass witch hunts in the Western world to occur.
The role of the devil in witch hunts is further explored by Lène Dresen-Coenders in her book Het Verbond van Heks en Duivel . Dresen-Coenders also argues that the clergy interpreted folk beliefs about witchcraft as Satan’s work, thereby connecting witchcraft to the devil. In 11 her book, Dresen-Coenders analyzes the Malleus Maleficarum to find out why the collective image of the witch in Western society between 1400 and 1700 led to a merciless witch hunt.
The Malleus Maleficarum, generally translated as the Hammer of Witches, is a treatise written by Henricus Institoris and Jacob Sprenger in 1486, which denounces witchcraft and advocates the persecution of witches. The Malleus is particularly hostile towards women, claiming that women “lacked moderation and so were prone to extreme goodness or excessive evil; they were more gullible than men and so more easily deceived by demons;
they lacked reason and were prone to strong emotions, and they were vain and lustful.” 12 Dresen-Coenders cites the Hammer of Witches as extremely influential in the creation of the witch stereotype during the Western witch trials, as the treatise can essentially be seen as a
8 Cohn, p. 218.
9 Cohn, p. 207.
10 Cohn, p. 219.
11 Lène Dresen-Coenders, Het Verbond Van Heks En Duivel: Een Waandenkbeeld Aan Het Begin Van De Moderne Tijd Als Symptoom Van Een Veranderende Situatie Van De Vrouw En Als Middel Tot Hervorming Der Zeden (Baarn: Ambo, 1983), p. 11-12.
12 Catherine Rider, “Common Magic,” in The Cambridge History of Magic and Witchcraft in the West: From Antiquity to the Present, ed. David Collins (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), p. 323.
manual that directs the reader towards specific characteristics that might identify certain individuals as a witch.
While the Malleus certainly played an important role during the early modern witch hunts, Cohn stresses that a number of aspects of the witch stereotype already existed before the Malleus appeared. As Cohn points out, the13 Malleus fails to mention the witches’ sabbath that was a central element of the witch stereotype in the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries. A Sabbath was believed to be a nocturnal meeting during which a group of witches would fly on demonic animals or broomsticks, performing maleficent acts such as child sacrifice and cannibalism. As endorsed by the early modern Church, the idea of Sabbaths turned witches14 into essentially evil and wicked beings, which was the dominant notion during the climax of the Western witch trials. Moreover, Hutton emphasizes that several ancient popular beliefs from all over the world contributed to the image of the witch, and that the Church’s alteration of these ideas ultimately created an environment for a witch hunt. Overall, as will become 15 clear in the following chapters through close analysis of the witch stereotype, the notion of the witch that existed during the early modern trials has had the most impact on the creation of the stereotype of the witch that persists in Western culture today and has made its way into filmic representations of witchcraft. Interestingly, contemporary representations of witches in film and television also subvert the history of the witch, rewriting it from the perspective of women and emphasizing female agency. This trend corresponds to the ways in which the witch is invoked as a figure of empowerment throughout Western culture as a whole.
13 Cohn, p. 225.
14 Cohn, p. 101.
15 Hutton, p. 147.
The Cultural Resurgence of the Witch
Invoking the Witch in Politics
One of the major realms that the witch has entered in recent years is the political landscape.
As a figure who has been marginalized throughout history, the witch has become a powerful symbol for addressing issues related to racism, trans rights, environmentalism, and feminism.
It is in part the supernatural nature of the witch that makes her an appealing figure to those who are trapped on the margins of society. Emily Edwards points out that “magic has always been the refuge of the powerless and of people who stumble outside the borders of mainstream culture, a message clearly reinforced in media stories.” In early cultures, 16 Edwards explains, people turned to magic to control symbolically that which they could not control physically. The figure of the witch presents a similar kind of control to those who17 feel powerless in the face of today’s political climate. The witch has become a particularly prominent icon of feminism, embodying female empowerment and defiance of patriarchal structures. As pointed out by Amerlia Crowther, “the witch has always been a potent symbol of female transgression.” Citing Gerhild Scholz Williams, she explains that during the early18 modern witch trials, “witches embodied the essence of disorderliness, for they subverted the order of sexual and procreative practices, family structure, and the divine institute of the state.” Crowther notes that it is therefore unsurprising that feminists have appropriated the19 witch as a political symbol since the 19th century. Though the witch has been a figure of resistance for some time, it seems that in recent years the witch has become particularly present in politics again. Signs during political protests of the last five years demonstrate how the witch is summoned by feminists as a statement of power (figures 1 and 2). Slogans such as “we are the granddaughters of the witches you couldn’t burn” reveal that parallels are being made between the history of witchcraft and the position of women in society today. In the context of feminism, women using the witch as a figure of justice are aligning themselves with the historical witch. By dressing up like witches and by invoking the witch
16 Emily Edwards, Metaphysical Media: The Occult Experience in Pop Culture (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2005), p. 127.
17 Edwards, p. 127.
18 Amelia Crowther, “Hag Witches and Women’s Liberation: Negotiations of Feminist Excess in the U.S.
Horror Film, 1968-1972,” Frames Cinema Journal: Magical Women, Witches & Healers 16 (Winter 2019), https://framescinemajournal.com/article/hag-witches-and-womens-liberation-negotiations-of-feminist-excess-in- the-u-s-horror-film-1968-1972/ (accessed November 7, 2019).
19 Crowther.
linguistically, participants of feminist demonstrations compare themselves to the witch in history; a mimetic approach that blends the history of the Western witch hunts with contemporary political issues.
Figure 1. Feminist demonstrator invoking the history of the witch.
Figure 2. Protest against white supremacy, transphobia, racism, and fascism. The witch is conjured visually through clothing and linguistically in the text on their signs.
It is not just the history of the witch that is blended with the experience of women today, but it is also witch mythology. As a product of history and folklore, the cultural icon of the witch today is neither historically accurate nor completely mythical. Writing about the role of the witch in feminist demonstrations, Silvia Bovenschen points out that “in the image of the witch, elements of the past and of myth oscillate, but along with them, elements of a real and present dilemma as well. In the surviving myth, nature and fleeting history are preserved.” 20 Though defending real political issues with a tradition that is partly based on myth may seem problematic, Bovenschen explains that in channeling the witch, feminists are producing a new, artificial myth that reframes ancient feminine myths into narratives relevant to the present and the future: “liberation from enforced role behavior and diffuse anxiety, which in part also consists of dismantling the evaluation and mythification of femininity built up during the centuries of patriarchal domination. Women establish their own autonomy by
20Silvia Bovenschen, Jeannine Blackwell, Johanna Moore, and Beth Weckmueller, “The Contemporary Witch, the Historical Witch and the Witch Myth: The Witch, Subject of the Appropriation of Nature and Object of the Domination of Nature,” New German Critique 15 (1978): p. 87.
invoking the feminine ‘witch’ myth, and it only looks like a new myth has been created.” In 21 the context of feminism, the witch thus allows for feminists to address their personal experience through the medium of historical and mythological suggestion. This mimetic approach provides feminists with a framework through which they can convey their political message. This approach is not unlike the use of the Guy Fawkes mask in numerous political protests. The mask symbolizes the denial of the legitimacy of authorities and reiterates the political events surrounding Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. Guy Fawkes is 22 invoked by protest groups to channel the anti-government rebellion and subversion which he has come to represent. In the same way, feminist invoke the witch to channel the subversion embodied by the witch.
In addition to the empowerment that the figure of the witch can provide, the history of the witch has also been misappropriated in recent political events. The Me Too movement, which has been labeled a “witch hunt” by several media outlets and public personalities, is one of those events. The hunted in this scenario are the men who are unjustly accused of sexual assault. This can and has been referred to as unfair appropriation of the witch figure, as
“witch hunts existed because of the lack of power women had, and to associate the term with men, who so often hold the power, is a misunderstanding of the term and a dismissal of the deaths of women branded witches.” The backlash that public figures such as Terry Gilliam 23 faced after connecting the Me Too movement to the witch hunts reveals that the figure of the witch is strongly intertwined with the female experience. However, while some women are calling themselves “witch” as an act of empowerment, other women are being called “witch”
as an attack. Chloe Carroll points out that “powerful women such as Rachel Notley and Hillary Clinton are being labelled witches and attached to the negative stereotypes created by misogyny.” On the other side of this linguistic conflict are female public figures subverting24
21 Bovenschen et al., p. 90.
22 Maximilian Lakitsch, Political Power Reconsidered: State Power and Civic Activism Between Legitimacy and Violence (Münster: LIT Verlag, 2014), p. 11.
23 Richard Newby, “‘Suspiria’ and Rethinking the Witch,” Hollywood Reporter, 5 November, 2018, https://www.
hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/how-suspiria-redefined-witch-movies-new-generation-1158152 (accessed November 6, 2019).
24 Chloe Carroll, “‘Wouldst thou like to live deliciously?’: Female Persecution and Redemption in The Witch,”
Frames Cinema Journal: Magical Women, Witches & Healers 16 (Winter 2019), https://framescinemajournal.
com/article/wouldst-thou-like-to-live-deliciously-female-persecution-and-redemption-in-the-witch/ (accessed November 9, 2019).
these insults by deliberately embracing the witch identity. During Donald Trump’s inaugural period, American singer Lana Del Rey posted an obscure tweet that contained mysterious information about a collective witchcraft ritual to “bind” president Trump (figure 3). Binding spells are meant to prevent individuals from doing something, which in the case of Trump meant preventing him from causing further harm.
Figure 3. Lana Del Rey’s mysterious tweet regarding the collective effort to “bind” Trump through magic.
In a time when decades of advancements in women’s rights are threatening to decline, the discussion regarding reproductive rights being one of the most controversial results of the
Trump administration, it seems that it is impossible for the witch to remain dormant. The25 current political climate calls for a force that is strong enough to battle these issues. As the upcoming chapters will show, the political role that the witch takes on today is also reflected in cinematic representations of the witch. Through the witch narrative, directors can explore and bring to attention political and social issues through themes of power, women’s agency, and female liberation.
A New Generation of Witches
As a religious and spiritual movement, witchcraft has reached new heights as well. Wicca, Neopaganism, and New Age are among the most widely practiced forms of reality-based witchcraft in the Western world today. While “Neopaganism” and “New Age” are broader terms and refer to a variety of spiritual practices and movements, “Wicca,” also referred to as
“Witchcraft,” is a modern Pagan religion which originated in England in the 1940s. Wicca 26 is a nature-based religion and is part of the occultist current in Western esotericism, “a broad array of philosophies, religions and pseudoscientific practices that have developed within Western society since Late Antiquity.” Wiccans venerate a God and Goddess and their27 practice often involves ceremonial and ritual magic. Interestingly, during the past years,28 Wicca and other forms of witchcraft have increasingly attracted a younger demographic. 29 There seems to be renewed curiosity in witchcraft as part of a revival of New Age spirituality. While older forms of witchcraft often involved collective magic practice in30 covens, Helen Berger and Douglas Ezzy point out that “since the middle of the 1990s Witchcraft has become much more individualistic, with the majority of practitioners tending
25 Françoise Girard, “Implications of the Trump Administration for Sexual and Reproductive Rights Globally,”
Reproductive Health Matters 25, no. 49 (2017): p. 6.
26 Ethan Doyle White, Wicca: History, Belief, and Community in Modern Pagan Witchcraft (New York: Sussex Academic Press, 2015), p. 2.
27 White, p. 17.
28 White, p. 5.
29 Peg Aloi, “A Charming Spell: The intentional and unintentional influence of popular media upon teenage Witchcraft in America,” in The New Generation Witches: Teenage Witchcraft in Contemporary Culture, eds.
Hannah Johnston and Peg Aloi (Farnham: Ashgate Publishing, 2013), p. 122.
30 Emma Featherstone, “Crystals, potions and tarot cards: the mystical rise of new age businesses,” The
Guardian, January 18, 2018, https://www.theguardian.com/small-business-network/2018/jan/18/crystals-potions -and-tarot-cards-the-mystical-rise-of-new-age-businesses (accessed November 12, 2019).
to practice on their own as ‘solitaries.’” Moreover, Sabina Magliocco explains that “the 31 term ‘magic’ in the context of New Age and Neopagan movements differs from magic as it was previously conceptualized in Western culture. Instead of implying surreptitious or irregular ways of controlling the natural world, it refers to a set of techniques for altering consciousness and bringing about personal transformation.” Perhaps it is not surprising that32 witchcraft appeals to younger generations today. Millennials are concerned with environmental issues, and generally take an increasing interest in spiritual practices such as yoga, meditation, and mindfulness. These cultural trends, along with the prevalence of33 feminism, align with the general principles of pagan and Wiccan thinking, which advocates
“human growth and potential,” at an individual as well as a cultural level. 34
Moreover, the rise of social media has had a profound impact on the growing popularity of witchcraft among younger generations, and continues to play a significant role in the self-identification of young men and women as witches. As Stephanie Martin argues, “the Internet has helped diverse populations come together.” While it can certainly be said that35 the Internet has contributed to uniting those who identify as a witch, it should also be noted that Internet culture can lead to a “homogenization of opinion caused by a bandwagon mentality.”36 This homogenization of witchcraft is exceptionally visible on one online platform: the photo and video-sharing social networking service Instagram. Compared to other social media platforms such as Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook, Instagram has the most substantial online community of witches. Instagram is flooded with stylized pictures of tarot cards, crystals, cauldrons, herbs, potions, and “witchy” fashion such as black dresses and pointy hats. The widely used hashtag #witchesofinstagram currently counts close to four million posts, demonstrating the extensive size of the Instagram witch community. While a
31 Helen Berger and Douglas Ezzy, “Mass Media and Religious Identity: A Case Study of Young Witches,”
Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 48, no. 3 (2009): p. 503.
32 Sabina Magliocco, “New Age and Neopagan Magic,” in The Cambridge History of Magic and Witchcraft in the West From Antiquity to the Present, ed. David Collins (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), p.
635.
33 Justine Afra Huxley, Faith, Spirituality and Generation Y: Putting Spiritual Values into Action (London:
Jessica Kingsley, 2019), p. 271.
34 Magliocco, p. 635.
35 Stephanie Martin, “Teen Witchcraft and Silver RavenWolf: The Internet and its impact on community opinion,” in The New Generation Witches: Teenage Witchcraft in Contemporary Culture, eds. Hannah Johnston and Peg Aloi (Farnham: Ashgate Publishing, 2013), p. 129.
36 Martin, p. 130.
number of Instagram users contributing to this trend on Instagram actually claim to practice witchcraft, a significant number of this group approaches witchcraft purely as an aesthetic inspiration for their personal style. It should not come as a surprise that companies have taken note of this trend and have commodified it. The French cosmetics and beauty chain Sephora recently released their Pinrose Witch Kit, a product advertised as a starter kit for beginner witches, including sage sticks, tarot cards and several perfumes. Sephora soon received criticism from practicing witches and Wiccans who were offended by the brand’s capitalization on their spirituality. This commercialization of witchcraft can be explained as 37 appropriation of a marginalized tradition by dominant groups. Witchcraft has been claimed by the mainstream, thereby obscuring the origins of witchcraft. However, the backlash shows that, despite its current mainstream popularity, witchcraft has by no means lost its original meaning and continues to be valued and practiced as a spiritual movement by those who understand and respect its roots. Furthermore, the increasing visibility of witchcraft in popular culture and mass media also helps legitimize witchcraft as a religion, providing reality-based witches with “a framework or cultural backdrop within which they begin to explore Witchcraft and develop their religious identities.” The representation of witches in38 contemporary film and television certainly contributes to providing such a framework.
The Witch in Popular Mass Media
In recent years, witchcraft has clearly permeated modern culture, entering the realm of politics, but also changing the personal lives of a new generation of young witches. As pointed out in the previous section, modern reality-based witchcraft primarily focuses on personal growth and self-realization, a theme which also prevails contemporary cinematic representations of witchcraft. Indeed, as Hannah Johnson and Peg Aloi mention in their book about this new, younger generation of witches, the new interest in witchcraft and magic is in part a result of the current popular mass media representation of witchcraft. They point out that “large numbers of young people, particularly young women, but also some young men, began to explore Witchcraft while popular books on Witchcraft were simultaneously
37 Whitney Shoemaker, “Sephora Pulls ‘Starter Witch Kit’ After Massive Backlash from Actual Witches,”
Altpress, September 8, 2018, https://www.altpress.com/news/sephora-pulls-pinrose-starter-witch-kit/ (accessed October 12, 2019).
38 Berger and Ezzy, p. 501.
becoming widely available and positive images of Witchcraft began to appear in the mass media.” Berger and Ezzy mention Andrew Fleming’s supernatural horror film39 The Craft (1996) as one of the first of a series of positive representations of witches that led to a renewed interest in witchcraft. The Craft focuses on a group of young female witches who explore their identities through the practice of witchcraft, using their craft to empower themselves and each other. Moreover, Berger and Ezzy point out that, while mass media has previously tended to portray witchcraft negatively and as comparable to cults, “television programs such as Charmed or Buffy the Vampire Slayer portray Witchcraft positively, and even as desirable, associated with successful participation in mainstream society, even if the religion is not presented completely seriously.” Following this series of positive portrayals 40 of witchcraft in popular cinema were J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potterbooks from 2000 onward, which appealed to a worldwide audience and were subsequently turned into a widely popular movie franchise. It seems that the resurgence of witchcraft in mass media, particularly in film and television, is an ongoing trend.
Writing about the recent resurgence of the occult theme in cinema, Carrol Fry explains that
“as occult religions have proliferated and knowledge of them has bubbled into the popular imagination, Wicca, Spiritualism, Satanism, and various New Age beliefs have been mined by scriptwriters. These films reflect society’s fundamental reaction to the occult. Many find the promise of transcendent experience from the occult attractive, and even those who find it frightening and perhaps threatening are still interested in it enough to make it an enduring genre of film and literature.” From the year 2000 onwards, the witch continues to appear on 41 screen, and has been warmly welcomed into the collective consciousness of an audience that is desperately searching for anything that deviates from the bleak reality of the Digital Age.
While the witch never fully disappeared from the screen, the past two decades in particular are marked by a widespread hunger for the supernatural and the occult. The release of a significant number of popular occult television series demonstrates the current interest in supernatural creatures such as vampires, zombies, and witches (e.g. 42 The Vampire Diaries,
39 Berger and Ezzy, p. 503.
40 Berger and Ezzy, p. 503.
41 Carrol Fry, Cinema of the Occult: New Age, Satanism, Wicca, and Spiritualism in Film (Bethlehem: Lehigh University Press, 2008), p. 13.
42 Heather Greene, Bell, Book and Camera: A Critical History of Witches in American Film and Television (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, 2018), p. 230.
2009-2017; The Originals, 2013-2018; Supernatural, 2005-2019; True Blood, 2008-2014, The Walking Dead, 2010–; iZombie, 2015-2019; Santa Clarita Diet, 2017-2019; Dracula, 2020; Good Witch, 2015–; The Worst Witch, 2017; Salem, 2014-2017; Penny Dreadful, 2014-2016). According to Heather Greene, the surge in witchcraft film and television starting around the year 2010 is a direct result of cultural destabilization and societal polarization surrounding a variety of issues, among which climate change and women’s rights are two of 43 the most controversial. Greene argues that the current mainstream interest in the supernatural
“demonstrates a searching for re-enchantment in a culture that becomes increasingly homogenous, technology-driven, and disconnected from its essential self.” This search for 44 re-enchantment corresponds to the new interest in witchcraft as a spiritual practice, and it can indeed be said that the representation of witches in film and television has contributed to the growing interest in spirituality.
A Concise History of the Cinematic Witch
Considering the popularity of the witch in recent years, it may seem surprising that the filmic witch has received little academic attention. Though the filmic witch is addressed in research that focuses on horror, fantasy or occult film and television—for instance Emily Edwards’
Metaphysical Media: The Occult Experience in Pop Culture , in which one chapter is devoted to distinguishing the characteristics of witch films—there are only a few monographs and articles dedicated fully to the cinematic witch. One study that stands out as the most thorough and pertinent is Heather Greene’s Bell, Book and Camera: A Critical History of Witches in American Film and Television, in which she traces the history of the filmic witch from the emergence of cinema up until today. She analyzes the development of the witch in American film and television, paying specific attention to the ways in which film reflects the continuous transformation of the witch as a cultural stereotype. Greene’s work will be used throughout the following chapters, but some of it is worth reiterating here briefly, so as to gain a more complete image of the filmic witch and her history before diving into closer analysis.
Beginning in the age of silent film, Green points to filmic texts like The Witch (1908), Hansel and Gretel (1909) and Macbeth (1916), the narratives and visual elements of which were
43 Greene, p. 228.
44 Greene, p. 253.
“resurrected from literature, religious mythology, and art.” She then moves on to the45 classical Hollywood period, where movies such as The Wizard of Oz (1939) and animations like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) established a witch character that would become the typical Halloween witch. While the witch had mostly been a secondary character, by 1939 “the witch took center stage as a single, powerful, and terrifying monster - one that has continued to frighten children decades after her original creation.” The next period that 46 Greene distinguishes is defined by films like I Married a Witch (1942) and the television series Bewitched (1964-1972), which shed a more positive and comical light on witchcraft.
The following period marks the birth of the satanic horror witch, in which movies such as Rosemary’s Baby (1968) and Carrie (1976) connected witchcraft to the devil. This connection was amplified during the Satanic Panic in 1980s America, when movies such as The Witches of Eastwick (1987) linked satanic witchcraft to female sexuality. The late 1990s saw the release of The Craft (1996), Practical Magic (1998), Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996-2003), and Charmed (1998-2006), transforming the witch into a more relatable character suitable for coming of age narratives, as well as presenting options for the empowered woman. Finally, Green addresses the most recent wave in witchcraft cinema,47 one which started in 2000 and is still in progress. Some of the contemporary witch films and series she mentions are the Harry Potter franchise (2001-2011), The Conjuring (2013), Beautiful Creatures (2013), American Horror Story: Coven (2013),Salem (2014-2017), The VVitch (2015), and The Love Witch (2016).
Regarding the current witch wave, Greene argues that the witch narrative and the depiction of the witch have become more nuanced. Indeed, if anything, the witch has become even more48 ambiguous than she already was. Taking on roles ranging from a frightening spirit haunting the land on which she died in The Conjuring to a modern-day witch who uses fatal magic to make men fall in love with her in The Love Witch, it is impossible to connect her to a specific set of characteristics. Frames Cinema Journal recently published an issue titled “Magical Women, Witches & Healers,” which approaches the witchcraft renaissance in film from a 49
45 Greene, p. 48.
46 Greene, p. 84.
47 Greene, p. 222.
48 Greene, p. 265.
49 Ana Maria Sapountzi and Peize Li, “Magical Women, Witches & Healers,” Frames Cinema Journal, 16 (Winter 2019), https://framescinemajournal.com/ (accessed December 10, 2019).
number of different perspectives. Chloe Carroll, one of the authors contributing to this issue, writes that “witches are no longer malevolent forces in cinema, rather, the witch is contesting the history which sought to persecute women and reclaim her power.” As her role in other 50 contemporary cultural environments also demonstrates, the witch has turned into a symbol of empowerment. More than ever, the witch is celebrated and respected as a character in her own right, who transcends the fictional realms into reality and is able to empower those who feel alienated in the current social order.
Fashion and Witchcraft
Existing research on the cinematic witch is predominantly focused on the changing nature of the fictional witch, her increasingly prominent role within narratives, and the ways in which she relates to gender roles. These are topics discussed in Greene’s work, but also in Diane Purkiss’ bookThe Witch in History. Purkiss analyzes representations of the witch throughout history, showing how the witch represents fears, desires and fantasies, both in contemporary cultural settings and in the early modern period. As publications like Greene’s and Purkiss’ 51 show, the witch is far from being ignored in the academic environment. However, her current presence in film and television should be examined more closely, also beyond the context of American cinema. There are several aspects that existing research fails to address, but which are essential to the construction of the witch stereotype in Western culture. An important feature that currently lacks sufficient academic awareness in the appearance of the cinematic witch. While Greene occasionally refers to the physical appearance, clothing, makeup, and hairstyles of fictional witches, she avoids close analysis of these features and instead mentions them as evidence of the ways in which the stereotype of the witch has transformed over the years. Considering the research topic of Greene’s work, it makes sense to approach the appearance of the witch in this way. However, a lot remains to be said about the ways in which television shows and films portray the witch in terms of physical appearance, and closer analysis of the witch’s style and clothing can provide new insights into her position in
50 Carroll, “Wouldst thou like to live deliciously?”
51 Diane Purkiss, The Witch in History: Early Modern and Twentieth-Century Representations (London:
Routledge, 1996), p. 119.
Western culture. The aim of this thesis is to contribute to the current literature on witchcraft in film and television by using fashion studies as an approach.
Though at first glance, the connection between witchcraft and fashion may not be obvious, the witch is actually deeply interlaced with fashion in a number of ways. Firstly, the witch has turned into a style icon for subcultures who identify with the witch as an original outsider. As Edwards notes, “witchcraft seems to have particular appeals for teens who are self-styled rebels who feel socially disconnected” and there is “an eager following among teenagers infatuated with the stylish new image of witches portrayed on television shows and in the movies.” As mentioned, the influence of the witch on contemporary culture can be52 observed when looking at social media platforms such as Instagram, where individuals who identify as witches express this through fashion by wearing distinctly witchy clothing. It seems to be the goth subculture in particular that has adopted the witch as a sartorial role model. Popular gothic clothing and lifestyle brands such as Killstar and Rogue & Wolf frequently invoke the witch in their collections and many of their designs include witchcraft inspired elements, including black dresses, hooded cloaks, hats, and pentagrams (figure 4).
52 Edwards, p. 75.
Figure 4. Two witchcraft inspired items from the most recent Killstar collection.
In haute couture, too, the witch has gained unprecedented prominence. The witch has entered high fashion all over the world, inspiring fashion designers with her dark yet feminine look.
Among the fashion houses that have conjured the witch in their haute couture collections are Alexander McQueen, Yohji Yamamoto, Dior, Ann Demeulemeester, Saint Laurent, and Moschino (figures 5, 6, and 7). The individual interpretations of the witch by the different designers serves as an apt illustration of the different shapes that witch can and does shift into. While Jeremy Scott draws on the Halloween witch tradition in his Moschino Resort 2020 collection, the version of the witch expressed in the Dior Spring 2018 ready-to-wear collection seems to be inspired by teenage witches such as Sabrina Spellman.
Figure 5. Saint Laurent 2013 ready-to-wear collection.
Figure 6. Dior Spring 2018 ready-to-wear collection.
Figure 7. Moschino Resort 2020 collection.
As in high fashion, the witch in film and television shifts into multiple guises. As historian and fashion theorist Anne Hollander points out in her book Seeing Through Clothes, “like any visual art, the art of dress has its own autonomous history, a self-perpetuating flow of images derived from other images. But any living image of a clothed body derives essentially from a picture or, rather, from an ongoing, known tradition of pictures of clothed bodies, inventing anew in each generation or each decade.” Arguably, it is precisely this process 53 that allows for stereotypes to emerge. The iconic appearance of the witch is a product of a long history of visual representations of magical women, and continues to develop through interpretations of the witch in visual art today, most evidently in contemporary film and television. In other words, “the realms of myth, history and present day reality merge into an impressive but undifferentiated fog,” creating a recognizable yet transformative cultural54 icon. In the words of Kristen Sollee, “concocted out of history, myth, and movies, witch style belongs to no single culture. A witch can be draped in a kimono or wrapped in tribal prints.
She can be done up in medieval, Renaissance, Victorian, or Edwardian finery. She can be profoundly stylish or oddly out of season. Sometimes, the way a woman wears her clothing more than what she is actually wearing betrays her witchiness. But most often, we think of the witch cloaked in darkness—all in black.” 55
The very ambiguity surrounding the appearance of the witch makes her an interesting topic from the perspective of fashion theory. Fashion studies are a relatively new field of study, which addresses topics such as fashion production and sustainability, fashion in popular 56 culture such as literature and music, the materiality of clothing, and fashion as a semiotic 57 58 59 system. The word “fashion” in this field is generally used as an overarching term to refer to60
53 Anne Hollander, Seeing Through Clothes (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), p. 311.
54 Bovenschen et al., p. 91.
55 Kristen Sollee, Witches, Sluts, Feminists: Conjuring the Sex Positive (Berkeley: Stone Bridge Press, 2017), p.
107.
56 Nikolay Anguelov, The Dirty Side of the Garment Industry: Fast Fashion and Its Negative Impact on Environment and Society (Florida: CRC, 2015).
57 Joseph Hancock et al., Fashion in Popular Culture: Literature, Media and Contemporary Studies (Bristol:
Intellect, 2013).
58 Janice Miller, Fashion and Music (Oxford: Berg, 2011).
59Ingun Klepp and Mari Bjerck, “A Methodological Approach to the Materiality of Clothing: Wardrobe Studies,” International Journal of Social Research Methodology 17 (2014): 373-386.
60 Roland Barthes and Matthew Ward, The Fashion System (New York: Hill and Wang, 1983).
all aspects relating to the fashion industry itself, physical items of clothing, style, but also hair and makeup. This thesis will use the word ‘fashion’ in the same way that Agnès Rocamora and Anneke Smelik do in their book Thinking Through Fashion, referring not just to dress, but also to appearance and style. Accessories, make-up and hairstyles will also be included 61 as constituent parts of fashion. When discussing fashion in the context of (audio)visual art, it is important to be aware of the artificiality of the clothing that is depicted, and it needs to be remembered that fashion in film is essentially a representation of fashion rather than fashion itself. The clothes, accessories, makeup, and hairstyles worn by actors who play fictional characters on screen are perhaps better described as costume. Characters in visual media are constructed, their looks are stylized and deliberately assembled as a device of character building and meaning making. Hollander explains that
Ordinary clothes automatically become extraordinary on the stage or screen. The frame around the events invites intensified attention to what is being worn; we know it is there intentionally even though it represents something worn casually, and so it has the ancient status of dramatic costume. This same intense perception of clothes, however, as they are being worn in the magnified circumstances of cinematic life, also has the opposite effect - that of making ordinary dress seem dramatic because it resembles what is worn in the movies. It is there that the true influence of movies on fashion operates. 62
Indeed, as eloquently phrased by Adrienne Munich, “fashion and film are gorgeously intertwined.” The way in which film and television elevate dress partly accounts for the63 impact that film has on fashion. In the case of witchcraft films, the elevated position of clothing in film explains why the cinematic witch has become a fashion icon to some. Film emphasizes the aesthetic elements that define the witch, amplifying certain physical and stylistic features that are associated with the witch in popular culture, and thus contributing to the evolution of the witch stereotype.
The cinematic witch is inseparable from her appearance, and clothing is a key element in the construction of the witch character. In turn, aesthetics and visuals are essential in film making. Costume and styling are crucial aspects of constructing a convincing and captivating
61 Anneke Smelik, Thinking Through Fashion: A Guide to Key Theorists (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2015), p. 2.
62 Hollander, p. 239-240.
63 Adrienne Munich, Fashion in Film (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2011), p. 10.
fictional world. With the aid of costume in film, moods and atmospheres may be established, morality or immorality may be conveyed, the villain may be identified, or suspense may be created. These are just some of the ways in which clothing can operate within the context of64 film and can heighten the viewing experience of the audience. This thesis will analyze the aesthetics of the witch character in film and television, paying particular attention to fashion.
The following chapters will explore the ways in which the witch is culturally interlaced with fashion to find out more about the cultural status of the witch today. Lyndal Roper, who has studied the witch in early modern Western visual art, writes that “like all great art, images of witches in literature and paintings could offer insight into the deepest human emotions, without necessarily acting out such passions in violence against individuals accused of witchcraft. The figure of the witch resists definitive interpretation. It is the enigmatic ambivalence at the heart of these potent images that makes their exploration irresistible.” 65 Indeed, this thesis is motivated by a similar curiosity regarding the ambivalence of the representation of the witch. A survey of recent films and television series about witchcraft reveal that the witch defies classification, which may be one of the reasons why she has become a symbol of empowerment to those who feel removed from societal labels.
In any case, the goal of this thesis is therefore not to define the cinematic witch and limit her to one specific set of characteristics, but instead to embrace the various guises she takes on.
The filmic texts included in the survey are a number of witch films and television productions that lend themselves particularly well to an analysis of fashion due to their highly stylized cinematic universes in which costume is integral. While it has been argued that there is no prescribed witch genre, there has been a recent flux of films and series that focus on66 witchcraft specifically. As this thesis is interested in the cultural position of the witch today, the focus will be on these contemporary filmic texts. It will include both popular television and independent films, which can be viewed as part of the same movement, but which also differ in crucial ways that will be analyzed. The first chapter will discuss the appearance of the witch in contemporary cinema by exploring the theme of beauty in relation to witchcraft.
This chapter will draw on feminist theory as well as the grotesque to analyze the witch’s
64 Julia Petrov and Gudrun Whitehead, Fashioning Horror: Dressing to Kill on Screen and in Literature (New York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017), p. 1, 2.
65 Lyndal Roper, The Witch in the Western Imagination (Virginia: University of Virginia Press, 2012), p. 24.
66 Greene, p. 5.
inherent connection to her appearance. The second chapter focuses on costume in witch films and series as an element of mise-en-scene, analyzing features of clothing such as color, fabric, and feel. Additionally, this chapter will dedicate a section to the role of garments in cinematic depictions of magical practice. The final chapter will analyze the role of clothing in the characterization of witches in film and television, looking at sartorial differences between witch characters as well as sartorial transformations of filmic witches. This chapter will compare popular television to art house productions, examining the ways in which these different types of media solidify and subvert certain witchcraft tropes through their use of clothing. As the witch archetype is rooted primarily in the early modern Western witch trials, this period in history will be invoked throughout the thesis. In doing so, I expect to find new connections between the past and the present, which will hopefully contribute to achieving a more complete comprehension of the witch as a cultural figure. Ultimately, by introducing fashion theory as a new lens through which to analyze the cinematic witch, this thesis aims to gain new insights into the development of the witch stereotype, as well as attaining a better understanding of her current popularity and prevalence in Western popular culture.
Chapter 1: Witchcraft, Beauty, and Glamour
Though often imagined as an old crone with distinctly unbeautiful and monstrous features,67 the witch is in fact deeply interlaced with notions of beauty and glamour. One the one hand, the fictional witch is obsessed with her appearance and uses supernatural forces to harness her beauty and youth, sometimes to fatal extents. On the other hand, she uses makeup and other tools that enhance her physical appearance to empower herself, weaponizing her body to achieve her goals. In both cases, the appearance of the witch is key to her narrative and to the construction of the witch character. This chapter will analyze a number of television series and films to explore the link between witchcraft, beauty, and glamour. It will turn to the history of the early modern Western witch trials, as well as to historic visual and fictional depictions of witches to uncover the witch’s ancient connection to her appearance. In doing so, it will examine how contemporary filmic representations have adopted and altered the witch’s engagement with her physical appearance to find out how the stereotype of the witch has developed in recent years. Some of the aspects explored in the chapter are the connection between beauty and power, the association between the witch and the grotesque, and the inherently abject nature of the witch. Finally, the chapter will explore some of the new ways in which witchcraft is linked to beauty and glamour, paying particular attention to the feminist subtext of modern witch film and television.
Beauty Equals Power
In the introduction of her book Bell, Book and Camera, Heather Greene points out that, “at her very essence, she [the witch] is the woman who knows too much—about society, about life, and about herself. She is both the oppressed and the empowered.” The witch is aware 68 of her position in society as a woman, and she knows all too well that she is oppressed by the socially constructed notion of female beauty. In a world where beauty is a woman’s greatest weapon, the loss of beauty is her biggest fear. The fear of losing beauty is a theme that has frequently been explored through the character of the witch, and which continues to be told
67 Barbara Creed, The Monstrous-Feminine: Film, Feminism, Psychoanalysis (New York: Routledge, 2015), p.
2.
68 Greene, p. 7.
through witchcraft narratives today. A classic example is the Evil Queen from the German fairytale Snow White by the Brothers Grimm, who was first portrayed on screen in the Disney animated feature film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937). When the Evil Queen finds out that she is no longer the first, but only the second most beautiful woman of them all, she turns wicked and focuses her hatred on Snow White, who has taken the Queen’s place as the fairest woman in the land. The Evil Queen’s obsessive desire for youth and beauty leads her to perform malevolent magic. As pointed out by Emily Edwards in her book on the occult in popular culture, female witches “are frequently driven by vanity” and they predominantly use their magic “to enhance their own beauty and desirability or to escape aging.” Besides the 69 Evil Queen, there are countless other examples in popular media of witches whose fixation on maintaining their beauty results in a vicious battle motivated by vanity, such as Lamia (Michelle Pfeiffer) in Stardust (2007), for instance, who uses her magic aggressively to restore her beauty and youth.
A more recent example of a television show that explores similar themes relating to beauty is American Horror Story: Coven (2013-2014), the third season of the FX horror anthology television series American Horror Story, created by Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk. The season focuses on a coven of witches based in New Orleans, who live together at a boarding school named Miss Robichaux’s Academy, led by the head witch Cordelia Foxx (Sarah Paulson). The main conflict of the series is centered around the search for the next Supreme Witch, a term that refers to the leader of the coven. In order to become the next Supreme, the witch has to perform in the trial of the Seven Wonders, a test designed to showcase the witch’s ability of seven crucial magical powers. The role of Supreme lasts an entire generation, after which a new Supreme needs to be appointed in order to ensure the coven’s future prosperity. When a coven needs a new Supreme, the health and physical state of the current Supreme gradually start to decline until the next Supreme has been found and initiated. The storyline about the search for the next coven leader emphasizes the dynamic between older and younger witches, and inevitably leads to a discussion of beauty and power.
The witch character in American Horror Story: Coven through which these themes and motifs are explored most clearly is Fiona Goode (Jessica Lange), the mother of Cordelia as
69 Edwards, p. 128.
well as the current Supreme of the coven. In the narrative of American Horror Story, Fiona takes on the role of the classic fairy tale witch who is obsessed with her appearance. As pointed out by Elisabete Lopes in her chapter on the portrayal of the witch character in American Horror Story, “the fact that [Fiona] seeks eternal youth and beauty makes her the living embodiment of the Evil Queen of Snow White’s tale.” Just like Snow White’s Evil 70 Queen, Fiona “sees her female power depending on her physical beauty.” Fiona is visually 71 compared to the Evil Queen several times, most strikingly in episode 8, “The Sacred Taking.”
The way in which she is looking at herself in the mirror, mourning her beauty and youth, is reminiscent of the famous “mirror mirror on the wall” scene in Snow White (figure 1).
Figure 1. Fiona Goode mourning her beauty and youth.
Like the Evil Queen, Fiona aims her anger on a younger, more beautiful woman, named Madison Montgomery (Emma Roberts), who appears to be next in line to become the Supreme. As Madison’s powers seemingly grow, Fiona’s health starts to decrease at a rapid
70 Elisabete Lopes, “Witchcraft and ‘Bitchcraft’: A Portrayal of the Witch Character in American Horror Story:
Coven,” in Perceiving Evil: Evil Women and the Feminine, ed. David Farnell, Rute Noiva and Kristen Smith (Leiden: Brill Online, 2019), p. 60.
71 Lopes, p. 64.
pace. Fiona tells Madison: “my force is literally pouring out of my body and into yours.” 72 Fiona is subsequently diagnosed with cancer and starts to lose her hair, thus making her deepest anxieties come true: she is dying and she is losing her beauty. The power struggle between the young and the old is verbally as well as visually highlighted in the series. Calling Fiona names such as a “stupid hag,” and flaunting her body in front of her, Madison is 73 purposefully reminding Fiona of her fading youth and looks. Fiona’s aging and ill body is often shown next to Madison’s, an image that is taken to the extreme in episode 8. Madison’s beauty is exaggerated, as she wears a red dress and high heels, while the light is accentuating her glowing skin and shiny, voluminous hair. Indeed, as Cordelia says in a later episode, “the hallmark of any rising supreme is glowing, radiant health.” Opposite Madison, a very ill 74 Fiona is shown, whose brittle hair has started falling out as a result of chemotherapy (figure 2).
Figure 2. Madison visits Fiona in her bedroom.
72American Horror Story, season 3, episode 3, “The Replacements,” directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, aired October 23, 2013, on FX.
73American Horror Story, season 3, episode 1, “Bitchcraft,” directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, aired October 9, 2013, on FX.
74American Horror Story, season 3, episode 13, “The Seven Wonders,” directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, aired January 29, 2014, on FX.
Madison’s radiance, however, turns out to be skin-deep. She has a heart condition that reveals it is impossible for her to become the next Supreme. It is Cordelia who eventually takes on the role of the coven leader, causing Fiona to antagonize her own daughter. Before she dies, Fiona has one final conversation with her daughter, in which she admits that Cordelia was “a constant reminder of her worst fears” and that every time she looked at Cordelia she saw nothing but her own death. Ultimately, their complicated mother-daughter relationship is75 reconciled, but even on the verge of death, Fiona’s vanity endures. She tells Cordelia that she will be a much better Supreme than she herself ever was, but that she “won’t look half as good doing it.” Fiona and Cordelia are never shown completely isolated from one another.76 Even when the camera focuses on Cordelia, the back of Fiona’s balding head is shown in the margin of the frame, and vice versa (figure 3). In this scene, the series again makes sure the tension between youth and old age, beauty and ugliness, remains tangible.
75American Horror Story, “The Seven Wonders.”
76 American Horror Story, “The Seven Wonders.”
Figure 3. Fiona has one final conversation with her daughter before she dies.
This tension can be traced back to early modern depictions of witches in visual art. As early as the late fourteenth century, painters depicted the emotion of envy as an old, hag-like woman with sagging breasts, who envied younger women. Lyndal Roper, who examines the77 visual representation of witches in early modern Europe in his book The Witch in the Western Imagination, points to depictions of witches in the margins of early modern manuscript images, where the witch is looking enviously at the main subject of the image: a younger,
77Roper, p. 91, 100.
