Art and feminist theory

1. FEMINISM
&
ART

2. LOCATING FEMINISM (USING MARXISM)
• Marxism taught us that social structures are based in Economic
relations
• Ownership of CAPITAL (money) leads to POWER and AUTONOMY
• DIVISION OF LABOR:
Men : Paid work, the “breadwinners”
Women: Unpaid work, the “homemakers”
• Consequence: Women are economically dependent on Men which
makes them lose any choice or sovereignty and establishes an
unequal balance of power between the two parts of society

3. SOME MORE MARXISM…
• Means of Production are made invisible through a system of
cultural beliefs, traditions and social structures
• The imbalance of power between men and women has been
historically NATURALIZED instead of being seen as a cultural
product
• This system is called PATRIARCHY
• Feminism: Making this imbalance visible through history and
trying to achieve equality between genders: socially and
economically.

4. PATRIARCHY IS UNFAIR TO ALL
GENDERS!
• MEN and WOMEN
both are given fixed
roles to PERFORM
• Deviation from
these fixed
standards is
considered morally,
socially and
culturally unfit
• Creation of notions

5. WOMEN’S
LIBERATION
MOVEMENT
1960’S
Itself based on a legacy of
important political, literary
works that have been produced
through history
One IMPORTANT aspect was
looking at art and u

7. Chapter 1: ART HISTORY AND THE
MALE GAZE

8. WHAT IS GAZE?
• Gaze: The Oxford English Dictionary defines
the verb gaze as "to look fixedly, intently, or
deliberately at something,“
• Gradually the word has been come to be used
specifically in relation to ART
• Contemporary art criticism focuses on how the
gaze is used as a vehicle for communication,
and how exactly a gaze transmits information
and assumptions about the viewer/viewed.
• Link between Art and Social Theory

9. GAZE AS SOCIAL THEORY
• The Viewer and the Viewed are linked through the Gaze
• The audience gazes at the art work in order to understand it,
interpret it and enjoy the art work
• Thus the art work becomes a SUBJECT for the audience
• The manner in which this subject is represented reflects
certain concepts about the art work, the artist and the time
that the art work was produced, according to critics

10. NOTIONS OF SURVEILLANCE
OFTEN EMERGE FROM THE GAZE
• The viewer holding a certain
power of the viewed
• Martin Jay, has argued that
the rise of modernism has
laid special emphasis on the
visual medium
• Making anything visible thus
gives the person automatic
power over the things that is
made visible.

11. BACK TO MALE GAZE… • Feminists have
argued that
historically art was
the domain of men
• The viewer and the
artist were both
male, depicting the
female form
• Women in such
artworks lose their
subjectivity to
become just
objects in a Male
dominated world
• Sexual Desire and
Authority is
inscribed on their
body and made
“natural” in this
process

12. T HE GA Z E A S A N
I NVI T A TI ON
Apart from the obvious
difference of men being
clothed and the woman
nude, notice the BODY
LANGUAGE:
The women rests her
gaze as an INVITATION
across the canvas to the
(male viewer) while the
men sit with a stance of
authority.
Luncheon on the Grass; Manet

13. T HE B I R T H OF
VE NUS

14. R E P R E S E N T A T I O N O F
T H E B O D Y : T H E
V I R G I N A N D T H E
W H O R E
The male gaze in art
creates a binary: Either
the woman is the site of
his desire or the site of
purity and nothing in
between.
The body of the woman
then becomes a site
where society tries to
define morality, right and
wrong and other such
CONSTRUCTED
distinctions

15. A B S ORP TI ON I N
VER MEER’ S I ND OOR
P A I NT I NGS
The indoor paintings highlight
the other side of the binary.
Critics point out that the female
subject in Vermeer often seems
to be avoiding meeting the
viewer’s gaze and is engaged in
her work, representing a
DOCILE, SHY and INWARD
character of women within the
household.

17. MALE GAZES TELLS WOMEN…
• How to behave and find their
identity in the approval of the male
gaze even outside a painting
• Their body is not their own but a site
of desire and pleasure entitled to
the men around them
• The continuation of such
representations in contemporary
visual culture generates an
unhealthy obsession amongst
women regarding their bodies

19. B A R B ARA K R UGER

20. Polish Contemporary
artist Jan Smaga.
in Dog, 2007, shows
the male figure
is overwhelmed
beneath a swarm of
images of nude
women which
threaten to obscure
his identity