Today, you will not find her in history books. There is no statue in the town square. But on certain summer evenings, when the light turns honey-colored and the sea is still as glass, the old women of Eressos whisper a story.
Whittemore, distracted by the war, allowed Sullivan to take the idol to Paris in 1919 for study. There, she fell in with a circle of Surrealist artists and poets who were obsessed with primitive art. They dubbed her discovery the "Idole de Lesbos"—the Idol of Lesbos. For the Surrealists, the conjunction of "Lesbos" (evoking Sappho, female love, and forbidden desire) with "Idol" (primitive, pre-rational, sacred) was intoxicating. idol of lesbos margo sullivan
In a stunning interview published in the Paris Herald (March 1929), Sullivan confessed—but with a twist. She had not tried to deceive, she claimed. Rather, she was "completing a conversation with Sappho that time had interrupted." Today, you will not find her in history books
It leans into the "so bad it's good" aesthetic with deliberate, stylized choices. Queer Iconography: Whittemore, distracted by the war, allowed Sullivan to