Lecture 5 - The Gaze and the Media

The Gaze and the Media

"according to usage and conventions which are at last being questioned but have by no means been overcome - men act and women appear. Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at"
Berger 1972

This does not mean women are vain. This is a result of images of women in contemporary society. Women carry around an idea of themselves being looked at.

Hans Memling 'Vanity' (1485)

The mirror is present in the painting as a device which distracts from the fact that the artist paints the womens body because he enjoys it. It appears the women enjoys looking at herself as opposed to the artist and acts as a reference to the title, 'Vanity'. The period in which the painting was painted was when witch hunts were common.

The mirror is also used in contemporary advertising.

Alexandre Cabanel 'Birth of Venus' (1863)

Berger uses this as an example of the tradition of the nude to depict the female figure in a reclining position. Venus is reclining on the wave and raises her hand which partly covers her eyes. This gesture implies she is just waking from sleep or just about to go to sleep. This covering of the eyes allows us to look at her body without having her looking back at us. The body composes almost 3/4's of the painting.

Sophie Dahl for Opium

A contemporary version of the aforementioned painting. This advert was withdrawn initially because of its overt nudity and sexual nature. There is a similar spacing and composition to that of the 'Birth of Venus'. After the advert was refused for publication, they re-released the image simply by changing the orientation from horizontal to vertical. The emphasis is now on the face as opposed to her body in a horizontal format.

Titian 'Venus of Urbino' (1538)

Berger puts this forward as a traditional nude in the sense of although the woman is looking at us, she looks at the viewer as if she is aware of their presence.

Manet 'Olympia' (1863)

Manet represents a 'modern' nude and points out the differences between this and Titian's nude. The subject is elevated and looks at us in the eye. Her pose is more assertive and wears adornments which are reflective of wealth. Although she is a prostate, she gives the impression she is of more wealth.

Ingres 'Le Grand Odalisque' (1814)

1985 - Guerilla Girls - formed in response to an exhibition at the museum of modern art. Only a minority of the artists featured at the exhibition were female. They devised a poster using this image in a poster which 'Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum? Less than 5% of the artists in the Modern Art sections are women, but 85% of the nudes are female. The campaign was never publicised, however, due to its 'sexual' connotations.

Manet 'Bar at the Folies burgers' (1882)

Manet himself is featured in the painting and provides several different perspectives at once. We are facing the barmaid but he is allowing us to see him/ourselves in the painting, also as we are placed in his shoes. It is a distorted mirror reflection as her reflection, in reality, would be composed differently.

Her body is arranged in an open gesture, suggesting an approachableness.

Jeff Wall 'Picture for Women' (1979)

Picture for women was inspires by Manet's masterpiece. In Manet's painting, the subject gazes out of the frame and forms a complex web of viewpoints. Jeff Wall uses this theory and creates a sense of spacial depth through reflections and light. Wall updates the theme by positioning the camera in the centre of the work. There is no hidden recording device as it is looking straight back at the viewer.

The metal poles separates the image into 3 frames - one with the woman, the centre featuring the camera and the third featuring the man.

Coward, R (1984)

The camera in contemporary media has been put house as an extension of the male gaze at women on the streets. There is almost a normalisation of nudity and nakedness in the street - people walk behind the model without looking at her suggesting she is of a normal appearance.

The woman is wearing sunglasses - we are not challenged by her look as her sight is covered.

Eva Herzigova, 'Wonderbra' (1994)

Billboard campaign for the Wonderbra. There is a play between the text and the image - we assume it is Eva Herzigova saying the words providing a flirtatious interaction suggesting it is okay to look at her. She is looking down which in one sense, she is looking down at herself or alternatively, the viewer (as this is a large scale billboard).

Peeping Tom (1960)

The profusion of images which characterises contemporary society could be seen as an obsessive distancing of women... a form of voyeurism. In this film, the man lures women to his apartment to film them being killed.

Men in advertising

Men are also objectified in the media/advertising too. The subject is in a similar position to that of the 'Birth of Venus'.

Dr Scott Lucas 

Scott Lucas Authors the website, genderads.com (A resource for advertising images). He looks at this 'gaze'. He states, "The issue of the male objectification is often raises in gender classes I have taught. I have heard many men and women that men are equally objectified in popular culture. Can men be objectified as much as women are?"

Dolce & Gabbana ad

Display of male strength. The subjects are looking at the viewer directly in the eye.

Laura M (Essay in 1976)

Looks at Hollywood cinema in the 1950's and 60's and analyses the treatment of the female body. The framing of the camera separates the subjects body and features the woman as an object for consumption. She declares than in Patriarchal society that pleasure in looking has been split into active male and passive female roles.

Marilyn: William Travillas dress from 'The Seven Year Itch' 1955)

Artemisia Gentileschi 'Judith Beheading Holofernes' (1620)

There is a tradition in art history that presents this idea of the female as a passive role and the male as an active role. This painting reverses these traditional roles.

Pollock, G (1981)

Women 'marginalised within the masculine discourses of art history'
This marginalisation supports the 'hegemony of men in cultural practice, in art'
Women not only marginalised but supposed to be marginalised

In the history of painting, a womens role is often left out.

Cindy Sherman 'Untitled Film Still #6' (1977-79)

She wasn't making this work with the theory of the gaze in mind. Similarly to the Opium advert, she has rotated the orientation of the reclining body. There is a subversion of tradition. The subject is holding a mirror but is faced away from the viewer - it is therefore not used as a device for vanity.

She has left small clues which remind us that this is a constructed image - one of which being a photographic timer. We are looking at a reconstruction. The womans gaze looks away from us - out of the frame - which makes the viewer slightly uncomfortable due to an unnatural/awkward pose/stance.

She also makes a similar point where she reproduces a paparazzi shot. There is a sense of a celebrity character - the subject comes out of the room looking disheveled.

Barbara Kruger 'Your Gaze Hits the Side of my Face' (1981)

Her work combines text and found imagery. Kruger presents us with statements that are ambiguous and difficult to read. She is offering us the side of the face as an alternative to a full, returned gaze. There is also a reference to violence... 'Your gaze hits the side of my face'.  Kruger is better known for 'I Shop therefore I am'.

Sarah Lucas 'Eating a Banana' (1990)

Seemingly innocuous.

'Self Portrait with Fried Eggs'

Similar theme - she uses food to challenge the idea that the female body is there to be consumed.

Tracey Emin 'Money Photo' (2001)

Represents a pornographic pose - making money from her art/work.


The Gaze OF the Media


Article by Joan Smith on the Amanda Knox case. The article looks at the idea which came from the prosecution, that Knox is represented as an 'evil witch'. "The idea that women are natural liars has a long pedigree. The key document in this centuries-long tradition is the notorious witch-hunter's manual... they claimed that 'all witchcraft comes from carnal lust, which is in women insatiable'... it's not difficult to see these myths lurking behind Pacelli's description of Knox".

Amanda Knox is acquitted yet the Daily Mail online published the wrong verdict. 'Guilty: Amanda Knox looks stunned as appeal against murder conviction is rejected'. This is completely fabricated and the featured image is unrelated.

'The Daily mail has emerged as the major fall guy by mistakenly publishing the wrong online version of the Amanda Knox verdict. The Mail was not the only British news outlet to make the error. The Sun and Sky news did it too... so did The Guardian in its live blog. In time-honoured fashion, echoing the hot teal days of Fleet Street, it prepared a story lest the verdict go the other way. But it over-egged the pudding by inventing 'colour' that purported to reveal Knox's reaction along with the response of people in the court room.... The Mail exposed itself as guilt of fabrication"

Susan Sontag 'On Photograph' (1979)

'To photograph is to appropriate the thing photographed'
The act of photographing is more than passive observing.

Paparazzi shot of Princess Diana

We are implicit in the cycle of the production of paparazzi images. The cycle is perpetuated every time we buy a publication featuring these images. Our desire to see a celebrities mask exposed drives the need for these images.

Reality Television

Appears to offer us the position as the all-seeing eye - the power of the gaze
Allows us a voyeuristic passive consumption of a type of reality
Editing means that there is no reality
Contestants are aware of their representation (eiher as TV professionals or as people who have watched the show)

The Truman Show (1988)

Directed by Peter Weir.

Whole world is fabricated and filmed for reality television. He is the only person that doesn't know his life is scripted.

'Looking is not indifferent. There can never be any question of 'just looking'.
- Victor Burgin (1982)

Further reading

John Berger (1972) Ways of Seeing, chapter 3
Victor Burgin (1982( Thinking Photography
Rosalind Coward (1984) The Look

Panopticism Task

Write a short, 300 word analysis of something in contemporary society that we believe is panoptic. Use terminology referenced in the lecture and seminar and 5 quotes from Foucault's writing. Seamlessly integrate these quotes and fragmented sentences into the analysis.

The panopticon (Jeremy Bentham, 1791) is the 'diagram of a mechanism of power reduced to its ideal form'. Our actions are controlled through self-discipline as a result of our ever-growing panoptic society. We are subject to surveillance which, for the most part, is unbeknownst to us but this pre-existing self-monitorisation controls how we act in society and forces us to consider our actions in comparison to how we believe society wants us to act.

Control and surveillance are in all aspects of our daily life, one of which being supermarkets. There are numerous finite details which stores use to control and influence the way we buy and ultimately act in-store;  cynical promotions, architectural details and pricing strategies all combine to form a sense of panoptic control. We conform to the supermarkets environment; the rigid structure and the 90 degree angles of aisles almost force us to to follow a specific route whilst tills, positioned at the entrance of the store, are in direct viewpoint of all customers.

We are constantly reminded we are being surveyed albeit our only indication are the CCTV cameras, hidden by translucent domes; this invisibility is 'a guarantee of order' and as a result induces a 'state of conscious and permanent visibility'.

Foucault states that through this sense of modern discipline, we come 'docile bodies' that are self-monitoring and obedient. Similarly to the Panopticon, where prisoners were looked upon by a central observation tower without the need of constant surveillance, our daily routine is governed by an ideology which is pre-installed within us and therefore we act in the way we believe we should act without us even realising.

Lecture 4 - Popular Culture

Critical positions on the media and popular culture

Aims

• Critically define 'popular culture'
• Contrast ideas of 'culture' with 'popular culture' and 'mass culture'
• Introduce Culture Studies & Critical Theory
• Discuss culture as ideology
• Interrogate the social function of popular culture

What is culture?

• 'One of the two or three most complicated words in the Enlgihs language'
• - Raymond Williams Keywords
• It is the general process of intellctural, spiritual and aesthetic development of a particular society at a particular time
• A particular way of life - Sub culture, set of values, a certain way of thinking about the world. 
• Works of intellectual and especially artistic significance
• Culture can be used to describe a canon of important art works, literature etc - Da Vinci, Beethoven. Institutions accept these as 'canonic' which is why become part of our culture.

Marx's Concept of Base / Superstructure

Base

Forces of production - Material, tools, workers, skills etc
Relations of production - Employer, employee, class

Superstructure

Social instituions -  Legal, political, cultural
Forms of consciousness - Ideology

The base determines content and form of superstructure which reflects form of, legitimises and makes possible, the base relations.


Raymond Williams (1983) 'Keywords'

There are 4 definitions of 'popular'

1) 'Well liked by many people'
Popular culture quantitively measured; well liked by a large amount of people. However, this may lead to confused results. Although Shakespeare is known and liked by many people, it may not be referred to as popular culture.

2) Inferior kinds of work
They aspire to be important. Who historically has acted as the 'taste-maker' or the judges of cultural importance?

3) Work deliberately setting out to win favour with the people
Anything that aims to be populist (understood by everyone) is referred to as popular culture. It is seen that works which are different is more important. There is an elitism in this judgement.

4) Culture actually made by the people themselves
Made by the people for the people - an organic popular culture which is usually associated with the working class. Symbolises the people and their identity.

**Our choices depend largely on our political decision**

Caspar David Freidrich (1809) 'Monk by the Sea'
Power of nature and makes you question the world and contemplate your relationship with nature

Jenny Morrison 'Sea & Sky in Watercolour'
Popular culture - no one would discuss and analyse this work in the same means as Freidrich's work


Inferioir of Residual Culture

Popular Press vs Quality Press
Quality newspapers as opposed to popular newspapers - what content do these have?

Popular Cinema vs Art Cinema
Popular cinema and foreign, art house cinema

Popular Entertainment vs Art Culture
Pop entertainment and TV and

The latter tend to target towards the 'elite' whereas the others appeal to the masses.


Jeremy Deller & Alan Kane (2005) 'Folk Archive Archive'

These works are examples of artefacts from an art show which toured around the country looking for example of popular culture made by the people, for the people. The first reaction to these works is to laugh as these are pieces of works which are either poorly made, have no significance or simply have humorous connotations. Where do these institutional ideas come from?

To judge by our aesthetic codes and institutional thinking is flawed and evidence of class judgement. Are we laughing at the working class trying to make art and failing?

What happens when this culture enters into the spheres of high culture.


Graffiti

Started out as the expression of youth in the South Bronx in the 1970s. The aesthetic was entirely sub-cultural and reflected in the language and stylised form it used.

Banksy 

His art work is bought and sold, despite being applied to the walls of buidings in the form of graffiti. Although the work represents the people, it is translated to appeal to the interest of the few or minority. The inter-relation between the two forms of culture has broken down.


Urbanisation

Prior to modernity and urbanisation, society had a common culture with on top of shared culture, the elite are an extremely small minority.  The working class work in factories as a mass and are clearly separated from the owners. When industrialisation emerges, there is a clear distinction between the working class and 'elite'. There is now a physical separation as opposed to an ideology which begins to form a cultural separation.

The working class begin to author their own culture as they now belong as a mass. They are cut off, ghettoised and therefore start their own cultural activities - devising their own form of literature. A working class voice emerges.

E.P. Thompson (1963) 'The Making of The English Working Class'

There are two competing voices working against each other and the first workers movement emerges - 'chartism'. The working class were not considered important enough to have a say in society.


Matthre Arnold (1867) 'Culture & Anarchy'

Culture

• 'The best that has been thought and said in the world' - What humanity has achieved; the idea of perfection and beauty of the world
• Study of perfection 
• Attained through disinterested reading, writing and thinking - Without an agenda
• The pursuit of culture
• Culture is the force that can minster the diseased spirit of our time

Known as 'Arnoldism'

Anarchy

Culture polices 'the raw and uncultivated masses'

'The working class... raw and half developed... long lain half hidden amidst it's poverty and squalor... now issuing form it's hiding place to assert and Englishman's heaven born privilege to do a he likes, and beginning to perplex us by marching where it likes, meeting where it likes, breaking what it likes'
(1960, p.105)

There is a definite class division

These theories emerge when the control (upper class) is threatened by the working class. This can still be seen in the modern day.


Leavisism

F.R Leavis & Q.D. Leavis

Became a cult figure and his lectures were massively attended
Very similar to Arnoldism - almost an extension

• Still forms a kind of repressed, common sense attitude to popular culture
• For Leavis, the 20th century sees a cultural decline - degraded and dumbed down
• Standardisation and levelling down

'Culture has always been in minority keeping'
- There has always been an elite whose role it is to preserve culture for humanity
- To defend culture against this 'dumbing down' and the rise of debates and less important forms of culture

'The minority, who had hitherto set the standard of taste without any serious challenge have experience a collapse of authority'

• Collapse of traditional authority comes at the same time as mass democracy (anarchy)
• Nostalgia for an era when the masses exhibited an unquestioning deference to cultural authority
• Culture is more desirable how it was then, than now
• Popular culture offers addictive forms of distraction an compensation whereas real culture is empowering and uplifting - he believes popular novels, for example, creates 'cheap' thrills
• Form of snobbery in attitudes towards popular culture, still seen today

Frankfurt School - Critical Theory

Culture was very different in Germany

Institute of Social Research, University of Frankfurt (1923-33)
Relocated to the University of Columbia in New York (1933 - 47)

Its relocation was because it was closed down by the Nazis due to the emerging Marxist thinkers

5 of the most important writers

• Theodore Adorno
• Max Horkheimer
• Herbert Marcuse
• Leo Lowenthal
• Walter Benjamin

Adorno & Horkeimer

• Reinterpreted Marx for the 20th century - era of "late capitalism"
• Defined "The Culture Industry"
• Culture produced in a 'factory'
• 'All mass culture is identical'

For them, culture in America was mass produced as they believed people began to expect the same things in popular culture. In a way, we start to want these conventions.

'As soon as the film begins, it is quite clear how it will end, and who will be rewarded, punished or forgotten'

'Movies and radio need no longer to pretend to be art. The truth, that they are just business, is made into an ideology in order to justify the rubbish they deliberately produce.'

The idea of art under capitalism has become a business and all existing notions of art has gone
It is now masquerading as 'real' culture


Herbert Marcuse (3)

Popular Culture vs Affirmative Culture

He believes we are coded to think about the world in certain ways as we are receiving. We become one-dimensional as were are stripped of an identity and opinion and think of the world in one way. 'The products indoctrinate and manipulate; they promote a false consciousness which is immune against its falsehood... it becomes a way of life.'

Arnoldists and Leavisists were concerned about mass culture as it represents a threat to the authority of the ruling class. They worried that this anarchy would overcome the ruling class and find its way into 'high' culture.


'Authentic Culture vs Mass Culture'

• Products of the contemporary 'culture industry'
• Depoliticises the working class
• Aspects of culture have become neutralised and simply becomes a symbol

Che Guevara - Used to be a symbol of revolution but has now become part of popular culture; it is stripped of any sense of importance
X Factor - Judged by the middle class of England; teaches people this is the only way they can succeed
Big Brother - No skills required but still forms an aspiration for many people

**We become identified by the culture we consume**

Qualities of auethentic culture

• Real
• European
• Multi-Dimensional
• Active Consumption
• Individual creation
• Imagination
• Negation
• Autonomous

Adorno 'On Popular Music' (1)

The Frankfurt school attacked all forms of mass culture from TV and movies to art and theatre.

• He believes popular music is standardised
• Peculiarity of the industry does your thinking for you and leads your thought processes
• Reduces your capacity for independence and free thought
• Becomes a 'social cement'
• Listening to such popular music makes you passive and adjust your behaviour in various ways; you begin to regulate your behaviour which results in 'rhythmic' and emotional 'adjustment'
• Music becomes an emotional escape from the 'horrors' of the world
• As soon as culture becomes mass produced, it is lost forever

Walter Benjamin (5)

'The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction' (1936)

The way in which techniques of mass production change the status of works of culture.

Mona Lisa

• Significant example of our culture
• However, we know nothing of its origin/meaning
• In an institution, it is placed behind bulletproof glass, connoting its importance
• It is not in one place for the rich and privileged
• We can now redefine the meaning and challenges the meaning of the original

'The technique of reproduction detaches the reproduced object from the domain of tradition. By making many reproductions it substitutes plurality of copies for a unique existence...'

Mass production allows us to redefine culture against the way of 'taste makers' decided it would be

In a way, we are allowed the possibility of challenging high culture

The aura of high culture begins to eradicate 

Adorno - When culture becomes mass produced, it is lost forever

Benjamin - Amongst mass production and plurality, there is an opportunity to form your own meaning

Hebdige, D (1979) 'Subculture: The Meaning of Style'

Young people begin to develop cultures that are challenges to the mainstream/status Quo

Symbolic challenge, radical, creating possibilities

Creates new industries and becomes conventional

• Incorporation - Similar to Banksy and graffiti, these radical challenges are incorporated into mass culture and become neutralised
• Ideological form
• Commodity form