Lecture 2; The Gaze in the Media

Lecture 2; The Gaze and the Media, 21/10/11

John Berger ‘Ways of Seeing’

‘Women watch themselves being looked at’ this quote is misunderstood, his meaning is that women cannot get away from the view that they are objectified. 

Hans Memling ‘Vanity’ 1485.

He suggests that women that in nude paintings it is not the woman who wants us to look at her body but the painter, there is a feeling that women are doing something wrong by exposing themselves however it is not them exposing their body it’s the artist and viewer.

There is strong use of mirrors within paintings and images of women.

Alexandre Cabanel ‘Birth of Venus’ 1873

The body position reveals most of her body and only a little bit of her head, she looks as if she has just awoke from sleep.

Sophie Dahl for Opium

We are invited to look at the body. This image was considered too sexualised so the Advertising Standards Agency decided that the image would be released vertically instead of horizontally to make of a sexualised image.

BBC News Article about the contraversy surrounding this image of Sophie Dahl.

Titian’s ‘Venus of Urbino’ 1538

An inviting look and casual pose presenting lady-likeness and social status.

Manet ‘Olympia’ 1863

The woman who is the subject of the painting is a prostitute, a contrasting status to the woman painted in ‘Venus of Urbino’. They are in similar poses however Olympia does not accept a gift possibly from a man/admirer of jewellery, this presents her body being adorned and objectified.

Ingres ‘Le Grand Odale Sque’ 1814

Guerilla Girls used this image in the 80s to compare the number of men displayed in museums/galleries compared to women and also the number of femalenude paintings to male. Focusing on the fact that men are still dominant than women in art.

Manet ‘Bar at the folies Bergeres’ 1882

The mirror behind the woman shows her reflection. The viewer and her are central to the portrait as if we are the customer. Her reflection is an impossible one as it is on the right hand side. Artist’s reflection is staring into the woman’s gaze.

Jeff Wall ‘Picture for Women’ 1979

The photographer includes himself in the image, the camera is central to the image which is inspired by Manet’s painting.

Eva Herzigova ‘Hello Boys’ 1994

Wonderbra advert places female nutiny in a public place, looking down on her body. The text suggests a performance by the woman, she knows we are looking, this awareness creates an act.

Men are objectified in underwear adverts too. They are presented as powerful, strong and masculine; a different presentation to the female body.

Marilyn Monroe wearing the William Travilla dress from the film ‘The Seven year itch’ 1955

Here we are the spectator as she performs and poses in the film. The scene is iconic.

Laura Mulvey argues that women in film have a passive role and that the male role is the dominant character and the woman character is ‘decorative’.

Griselda Pollock, and art historian says women ‘marginalised within the masculine discourses of art history’ 1981

Cindy Sherman ‘Untitled Film Still #6’ 1977-79

Model and Photographer of the photo.

Barbara Kruger, photographer. ‘Your gaze hits the side of my face’ 

A reference to some sort of violence.

‘I Shop Therefore I am’ 1983

Replacement of words, think replaced with shop, this is a critique on consumerism.

Sarah Lucas ‘Eating a Banana’ 1990

‘Self Portrait with Fried Eggs’ 1996

A reference to the body as a consumer object.

Tracey Emin ‘Money Photo’ 2001

Reality TV

Offers the power of all seeing. Allows us a voyeuristic passive consumption of a type of reality. The editing of the shows means there is no reality at all, it is a carefully composed representation, they manipulate our views and what we see. The contestants know we are always watching so are never themselves.

‘The Truman Show’

A created world where we observe the main character Truman growing up and watch his every move without him realising. A completely fixed idea of his world and a sculpted personality and person according to what they creator surrounds him with and events that occur in his life. E.g. They make him believe his father died at sea so he develops a phobia of boats, preventing him from discovering this fake world he lives in.      

Lecture 1; Panopticism

Lecture 1; Panopticism 14/10/11

The Panopticon; Building built in 1791, designed by Jeremy Bethans, it was designed as a prison. Panopticism creates institutions and institutional power. How do institutions control and influence our actions? We act according to our surroundings/situation we are in; we act how we think we are supposed to. To understand art ourselves we need to understand institutional framework. Panopticon was a success as it had an effect on prisoners, they are always on display and aware that they are being watched. This in turn means that they won’t do anything wrong because if they do they will be caught instantly. The prisoner can’t always see the guard, the institution creates the illusion that they are always there and watching even if they are not; the prisoner never knows so therefore always behaves. They are assumed to be there constantly. The prisoner willingly submits to what they are told. The lightness of the Panopticon allows scrutiny and permanent visibility. This allows supervision and experimentation on subject with the aim to make them productive and reform. The Panopticon is different to the Asylum where people are put in there, left and forgotten. The birth of the Asylum, ‘Insane’ people put into asylums, they received awards for good behaviour, punishment for bad, treated like children. There was then a shift from physical control to mental control in modern societies. The Panopticon creates isolation of the individual and manipulation of behaviour.

The Great Confinement (late 1600s)

‘Houses of Correction’ to curb unemployment and idleness including single Mums, drunks, homeless people, the mentally ill, and criminals. They were made to work under the threat of physical abuse to make them hard working. This caused corruption within the houses.

Crime and Punishment

The Kings power over what happened to your body. Dispose of it how he chooses. This keeps the hierarchy and social order, showing people the king’s power and control, spectacular public punishment in old societies. This shifts in modern societies. Society realises it is better to mentally control people, improve them and make them useful, making someone work the way the people with power thought they should.

The rise of institutions causes a rise in psychiatry and people becoming psychiatrists, forming careers and emerging new jobs and a new form of specialists in biology and medicine.

Micheal Foucalt (1926-1984) campaigned for causes and was a radical thinker. He died from aids.

Books;

‘Madness and Civilisation’

‘Discipline and Punishment, the birth of the prison’

Foucalt takes the design of the Panopticon as a metaphor for modern society. An example of Panopticism in Modern Society is the shift from cellular offices to open plan. In the open plan office employers can be supervised and are visible at all times. The manager can see what employees are doing at all the time so therefore employees will appear to be working and won’t slack. As in the series ‘The Office’ the character acts in the way he thinks he is supposed to and the way he thinks people want to see him as a boss as he is being filmed for a documentary.

We are conditioned to act certain ways in certain places. As in galleries, people act differently to how they would normally in this quiet environment. The student, teacher relationship is another example, both parties take up the role they are labelled with and act according to this. The way a teacher or student acts is not there normal way of acting, there is a different role and relationship we have been informed of. We are conditioned to act in different ways according to the appropriateness in the role we have given ourselves. We act differently in different places. The space we are in creates productivity.

• Professional/Personal; we act in different ways according to way we are and who we are with.
• Google maps; constantly recorded, we can look at people’s lives and homes, personal and private lives on display. 
• CCTV; we are constantly recorded supposedly for our own protection.
• Registers make you attend; we can see history of attendance and are judged on this.
• Web History; work can access this, see if we have been doing everything we are supposed or have been slacking off.
• 1984, an extreme example of Panopticism.
• Facebook; we can edit how we want people to see us. Presents every aspect of our lives and we are revealed to people we are not necessarily friends with.
• Disciplinary techniques like the gym help us to condition ourselves to be production citizens. We stay healthy, less NHS cost; we work longer and have an older retirement age.
• TV Advertising created so we receive instructions.

The relationship between power, knowledge and the body

• Disciplinary societies produces what Foucalt calls ‘docile bodies’
• Self-monitoring
• Self-correcting 
• Obedient bodies

Key Points

• Micheal Foucalt
• Panopticism as a form of discipline
• Techniques of the body
• Docile Bodies