The sexualization of Oriental women and the pornographic image of harem life was not helped by salacious accounts that had been available to the public for centuries. Accounts in this vein were circulated everywhere, painting the harem as a sultan’s sexual playground and the Oriental woman as the plaything for their masters. The British diplomat Paul Rycaut wrote of the Turkish harems:

The western knight consumes himself with combats, watching, and penance to acquire the love of one fair Damsel; here [Turkey] an army of Virgins make it the only study and business of their life to obtain the single nod of invitation to the Bed of their great Master.^[15]

She was a woman who had a love of the romanticized Orient herself, and who knew how to play on these tropes that Oriental enthusiasts sought and valued.

This simple, but telling description of harem life perfectly shows the kind of image Western society was receiving from their “ethnographers” and travelers on the Eastern front. It is a description that appeals directly to male desires, creating the perfect background for sexual fantasy. Roderick Cavaliero states that “[Westerners] viewed the harem as voyeurs view pornography.”^[16] He couldn’t have been more correct in both the figurative and literal sense. The harem and the Oriental harem beauty became popular subject matter for contemporary pornography. The Lustful Turk — a popular erotic novel published less than a hundred years before la belle époque — cites all of these myths about the hyper-sexualized harem environment and the submissive Oriental woman. This is only one example of the many pornographic materials based in and/or on the aforementioned stereotypes.^[17]

So what does all of this have to do with Mata Hari? Though she was not necessarily respected by high society, Mata Hari was a celebrity and one of the most expensive courtesans in belle époque Paris.^[18] She did not get to this position on luck alone. She was a woman who had a love of the romanticized Orient herself, and who knew how to play on these tropes that Oriental enthusiasts sought and valued. She knew that her society valued the Oriental woman as an object of sexual desire, and armed with this awareness, manipulated those cultural connotations for her own gain. Unlike many other courtesans during this period, charges of indecency were never brought against her because she created an Orientalist image to shroud the erotic nature of the dances she performed. These performances, accompanied by her “Oriental” charm, attracted clients to her. Because of this, she was allowed to continue propagating herself through photographic portraits, all of which display her awareness of society’s relationship with the Orient and the role of the male gaze within that dynamic.

Mata Hari as Harem Dancer

A portrait of Mata Hari taken in 1906 by an unknown photographer shows her dancing during a performance in an exaggerated, revealing Oriental costume. In this photo, pose and garb come together to create a tastefully erotic image that manipulates both the male gaze and the belle époque obsession with the exotic. Captured mid-step in her dance, she leans to one side, arm bent towards her face, foot stepping out as though she is about to spin herself around. Her other arm is extended, holding out the translucent veil that cascades down from her jeweled brassiere. Bedecked in jewels and an elaborate headdress, Mata Hari establishes herself as a performer who specifically appeals to those enthralled by the distant Orient. Through this sheer fabric, the rounded hint of her bare rear is revealed. This creates a diaphanous curtain between her body and the audience, a kind of “tease” to the male viewer. One could make parallels between the target viewer of this photograph and the Western men who encountered dancing girls in their Orient travels. In this environment, Eastern women are comfortable performing within their cultural norms. They dance in a traditional style — which many travel narratives have described with words like “heaving,” “oiled,” and “writhing,” — that Europeans found sexually exciting, because Western cultural norms forbade such blatant displays of sexuality. This passive, yet inviting exhibition of the female form both terrified and aroused Western men.^[19] Much like the portrayals of Oriental women in travel narratives and pornography throughout the century, Mata Hari presents herself in this photograph as an object of sexual desire, while still carrying a facade of passivity.

This photograph reveals Mata Hari’s constant craving for attention and consciousness of the male gaze. Exposing herself in such a manner shows a subtle awareness of her own attractiveness and sexuality, something she used to propagate her name, but it also shows an awareness of the male gaze in relation to Oriental stereotypes. This photograph is very much an early form of the soon-to-come pin-up, in that it uses the contrast of display and suggestion to promote the self-conscious objectification of the female subject.^[20] This awareness of the male gaze and provocative display of sexuality is made socially acceptable by its theatrical exoticness. Bedecked in jewels and an elaborate headdress, Mata Hari establishes herself as a performer who specifically appeals to those enthralled by the distant Orient. Her public nudity became acceptable in this foreign, theatrical environment much in the way nudity was considered acceptable when placed in a classical setting.^[21]