Selfies

Interesting piece on Selfie Culture

'No boys were harmed in the making of this video'

Charlotte Emma Aitchison, better known as Charli XCX, is a British singer and songwriter who rose to fame in 2012 when the song I Love It she wrote and performed with the duo Icona Pop became a worldwide hit. Currently in promotion of her upcoming third album after releasing four mixtapes, two albums and an ep, XCX released a video for her well received single Boys on the 26^th of July 2017 which she directed herself with Sarah McColgan. The music video includes over 60 known male celebrities, including singer and actor Joe Jonas (of the Jonas Brothers), singer Charlie Puth, internet personality Cameron Dallas, diver Tom Daley, rapper G-Eazy, DJ’s and record producers Mark Ronson and Flume and rappers Wiz Kahlifa, Tinie Tempah and will.i.am. In this piece I’ll shortly try to show how this video fits in the discussion about the male and female gaze and the ‘problems’ with portraying male bodies.

Typically, men are said to be the subject of the gaze and women are the object of it. At first glance, this video seems to be the opposite: XCX sings about thinking about Boys and in a rapid pace studio shots of men in everyday activities flash by, without the video having a story line. Striking are the bright colour schemes XCX used for the set and the contrast between the different men depicted. How does this fit in Mulvey’s claim that “the male figure cannot bear the burden of sexual objectification” and “[the] man is reluctant to gaze at his exhibitionist like”. I’ll quickly show three scenes to show the contrasts between the different men portrayed and will end with XCX’s position in the video. 

Cameron Dallas is positioned in a scene that emphasizes masculinity. He’s looking directly in the camera, objectifying the viewer to his penetrating gaze, thereby taking the typical male role. Moreover, he’s dressed shirtless to put emphasis on his body. The chain saw he’s holding is a typical phallic object to again show masculinity, especially since working with a chain saw is often seen as masculine. His facial expression lastly is serious and mysterious.

Tom Grennan on the other hand seems to be put in a scene quite the opposite of Dallas’s. Grennan is filmed doing the dishes wearing bright pink household gloves in front of a wall with floral wallpaper. He’s not looking at us, but laughing and intensely dancing looking at the bowl he’s washing. His appearance isn’t penetrating or mysterious at all: we’re the subject looking at a man doing something not considered masculine.

Diplo’s scene shows how this video can be seen as an ironic approach to masculinity. Being shirtless on the floor we see Diplo lifting two dogs, cuddling when afterwards. His gaze is looking away from the camera at first and isn’t penetrating when he does. If anything, it’s vulnerable. Diplo is in front of a pink backdrop, not standing up as usual when lifting, but sitting down, showing less productivity and power. With dogs replacing weights, this video reflects on what masculinity is as a construct and how it can be problematized. The scene with Jack Antonoff lifting big, pink weights fulfils the same role.

Charli XCX’s own appearance emphasizes the ridiculing of masculine features. The few seconds she’s in the video, she’s the fifth woman in a row turning around showing her face with a moustache drawn on her upper lip.

Maybe calling the men depicted in the video ‘boys’ in her song already opens the possibility for an ironic analysis of the video. XCX surely emphasizes the over-the-top objectification of men in her video by stating ‘NO BOYS WERE HARMED IN THE MAKING OF THIS VIDEO’ in the video description, associating the men with cute animals which can be enjoyed and possessed. XCX hereby shows she’s well aware of the gaze and gender stereotypes in visual culture and how to make fun of it. On the other hand, playing with masculinity and referring to the men as 'boys' might just as well fit in perfectly with Mulvey's statement; you can't portray male bodies without them losing their masculinity.

Works cited:

Charli XCX, Boys [Official Video], YouTube, July 26, 2017, retrieved March 10, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPRy1B4t5YA.

Mulvey, Laura. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” Visual and Other Pleasures, 1989, pp. 14–26.

Entire womanhood versus individual woman in art representations

            


Individuality versus group!

Just as Pollock poses a question of what would be wrong with the photos of women, I also actually do. Pollock discloses a group of women who involved in art and media practice, art history and feminist criticism, were the Women’s Art History Collective was formed in order to attempt for some analysis of women ‘s position in, and in relation to the history of art representations. (Pollock 126) These women had sensed an unfamiliar representation of women in art, and by 1972 they tended to take an initiative to improve the situation. They were not the only; many have been standing up for women representation take a case of the ‘Guerrilla girls' Though many initiatives have been taken, the truth is that the state of women representation lies in this formula of ‘womanhood versus individual woman’ this implies that women turn themselves into objects of gaze. Take an example of Heleen van Royen, with all her exposure in the world as a prominent novel writer, she decided to swim in the opposite direction compared Women’s Art History Collective. She exposed her body for her own interests following the individualism principle.

In 2014, I don’t actually remember the month, as I was much obsessed with the program, De wereld draait door, of Matthijs Nieuwkerk, I was by then striving for better grades in the Dutch language. Also, the fact is that this program consists of many intellectual parts, and a lot of music which makes it a favourite evening program. But while sitting on my sofa watching, Heleen van Royen was suddenly introduced. She was speaking confidently about her ‘vaginaselfies’, and then a moment came for Matthijs to order for a display of some selfies on the screen. I was surprised to see, the once confident woman, asking for a moment for her children to be displaced from the screen to prevent them from watching their mothers’ vaginaselfies. Heleen was not alone; see had come with an escort in the studio, who was a man, and an art expert. This art expert praised Heleen for her confidence, and he was fully convinced that her selfies were fully a piece of art that would sell in different museums. No woman came up to comment on this man’s comment. It seemed that the act of van Royen was not empowering womanhood as a totality. Why would they not praise her act?

Again, in an interview with the show of Humberto Tan, the son of Heleen who had escorted his mother was confronted with a question of what he thought when he had heard that his mother was going to do that what she did. The answer was that; he also found it frightening, but he could swallow it because it was bringing in a lot of money (Late night show September 2016) Heleen also, kept on emphasizing the amount of money she was earning and was going to earn from the selfies.

I know, I might not be the first to write about Heleen on this blog, but there are many women out there making naked photo’s in the name of art and money. I would call this an individual choice that bothers all women. This would have to change, but how?  Pollock thought of challenge and replacement of these images in a notion of a woman as a signifier, an ideological discourse in which one can identify the meanings that are attached to woman in different kinds of images, and how meanings are constructed to other signifier in that discourse. (226) In this way, Pollock was amending a system through which those images depicting a woman’s weakness would be limited. A measure to be taken was making of parallels of images of men in a similar position as that of a woman (127). So, if we consider the photos of Van Royen, we would also have a man making ‘penisselfies’ to realise that balance. But I am afraid there might be few men ready to make penisselfies.

While measures were being taken to ensure that the image of a woman is improved in visual media in 1972. In the 21century it seems that women have emerged from a collective picture of womanhood to an individualistic state. Another example is that of Sheeba Karungi a Ugandan female singer who doesn’t  draw parallels of womanhood to herself. She is of the view that her body was given to her to be used for a survival and even her mother supports her. “There are many people out there who would love to have a gaze at nice woman body. Why not using it”? So, if all is right, one might choose an individualistic side of womanhood, and also thus draw conclusions that it seems that women’s representation in art is at a larger extent an individual choice. And that though individual choice unfortunately affects the entire womanhood.

References

Pollock, Griselda, "What's Wrong with Images of Women", Screen Education, 1977, no. 24, pp. 126-128

 Hombert, The late night show, RTV, (2016, September)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1CBI__iSk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrZRGks7VL8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4xzkQL0ZiU

https://www.ze.nl/artikel/210533-holy-moly-heleen-van-royen-maakt-vaginaselfie

Representation of women on (popular) tv

After not owning a tv for a year or two while living by myself, watching tv at my parent’s house on a Saturday evening became a whole new experience. For an entire evening various popular tv channels were watched, among others RTL4. Among the quantity of entertainment shows, the abundance of commercials and the loudness of both colors and sound, what struck me most was the represented hosts on screen. What I noticed was that men appear more often on tv, and the woman that do appear, are usually not over fifty years old, not of color, and are styled to the extreme in their make-up, hair and clothes. For a whole hour not a single strand of Linda de Mol’s hair moved due to the amount of hair spray that was probably used to give it a voluminous appearance.

The way women are represented here raises questions, as it does not seem to be possible for a women over her fifties, having grey hair or wearing a light layer of make up to appear on tv, presenting herself in public. It looks like for some reason this kind of image does not attract viewers for a tv show. I did not see a single grey haired woman on tv, while for men this does not seem to be the case. Why is this? Is a greying woman not attractive, or is a woman that is not styled to perfection not suitable to be shown during prime time tv shows? And, why is it that more often men are chosen to anchor so called more ‘intelligent’ shows than women, as the majority of the women that I did see were hosting entertainment shows in which they added little more actual content than reading cards and laughing at guests’ jokes (for example ‘Weet ik veel’ and ‘Show News’). This while during talk shows such as ‘RTL Late night’ or ‘De wereld draait door’ the hosts employ conversations and discussions with their guests (taking into consideration however that they probably are also strictly instructed on what are is ‘suitable’ or enjoyable and ensure viewers are entertained).

This raises questions like what happens to those who do not feel are represented in public. Does this imply the message that women of those categories do not contribute to the public sphere, are redundant after a certain age or if they look a certain way? What these kinds of images might do, is send implicit messages concerning what it takes to be ‘successful’: you need to look a certain way, be a certain way, and after a certain age it is no longer possible to succeed in this field. A lack of (public) role models contribute to similar messages, as their invisibility tells this story.

Warrior Women in King of Dragon Pass

In this blog post, I will look at how women are portrayed as warriors in the 1999 video game King of Dragon Pass. King of Dragon Pass (from here on KoDP) is a role-play strategy game from A Sharp. The game is made up of painted scenes, in which the player is confronted with a situation and must then choose from a list of decisions. The player leads a bronze age clan, which is inspired by Norse culture and mythology. The people of the clan are called Orlanthi, after their main deity Orlanth. Men and women are attributed with different emotions as we can see in the following excerpt from the manual.

“The differences between the sexes, as you Orlanthi perceive them, are that men are more emotional, prone to uncontrolled anger and impulsive acts. Women are more calculating, capable of keeping track of their original reasons for choosing a path instead of getting caught up in the moment. Men are more often warriors and fighters, but a substantial number of women put aside cooking and rearing children to practice with the sword. The abilities of your clan’s heroes and leaders have less to do with their gender than with the gods they worship: worshippers of war gods excel in combat, the farming gods’ devotees are more at home behind the plow.”[1]

-King of Dragon Pass manual

We see that Orlanthi society allows for a great flexibility in gender roles. This is highlighted by the presence of a group of warrior women in the game, also called the Vingans. Vinga is the Orlanthi goddess of adventure and the patron of women. She is often depicted as a warrior with short orange hair. Followers of Vinga are exclusively women and dye their hair orange in honor of their goddess.

A Vingan clan chief with characteristically orange hair, KoDP[2]

The player can sacrifice cows to Vinga to gain two blessings with important game effects. The first blessing is Fyrdwomen, this inspires more women of the clan to join the Fyrd (war party). This comes at the cost of lowered childbirth. The second blessing is Pathfinder, which protects the explorers who the player sends out on the game map. This blessing is more powerful if a Vingan leads the exploration party. Another excerpt from the manual shows us how gender is not a barrier to pursuing other professions and positions in Orlanthi society.

“The population categories make no distinction between men and women. Both men and women farm, fight, hunt, and serve as nobles responsible for the ceremonies that maintain contact with the gods. More men than women fight as weaponthanes and as footmen in the fyrd, but even that balance shifts slightly if the clan worships Vinga, goddess of adventurers.”[3]

-King of Dragon Pass manual

A point of critique on the portrayal of the Vingans could be that they are presented as aggressive and violent. These are usually attributed to masculine behavior. There is little room for Vingan femininity.

Vingan warriors attack the player's clan hall.[4]

In conclusion, we see that video games such as KoDP can portray women successfully and positively in non-traditional gender roles. The flexibility of gender roles in KoDP is worthy of further study.

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[1] http://a-sharp.com/kodp/ios/KoDP-Manual.pdf p4

[2] http://kingofdragonpass.wikia.com/wiki/Forming_a_Tribe:_the_Female_Chiefs_Clan

[3] http://a-sharp.com/kodp/ios/KoDP-Manual.pdf p13

[4] http://kingofdragonpass.wikia.com/wiki/Vingan_Mercenary_Attack

The Man Your Man Could Smell Like

“If the first instability of the male pin-up is the contradiction between the fact of being looked at and the attempt of the model's look to deny it, the second is the apparent address to women's sexuality and the actual working out of male sexuality (Dyer 66)”.

Dyer discusses the relevance of how eye contact is made. He argues that men try to keep their power by either looking away in images or to look directly at the viewer, and that being looked at doesn’t necessarily addresses male or female sexuality but male and female power.

In the commercial The Man Your Man Could Smell Like (2010) for Old Spice body wash we see a male actor/former NFL player Isaiah Mustafa. This commercial uses various gender assumptions and stereotypes in a humouristic manner to sell body wash for men.

The commercial wants to reach a female audience, by starting it with Isaiah saying ‘Hello Ladies’ in a deep, low voice. The man is good-looking, muscular and half-naked. He is the ‘ideal’ masculine man.

He looks directly into the camera, at the audience, and just once stops staring in the camera. He knows he is being watched, but he also controls the gaze over him. He does this by telling the audience where to watch. They have to look away, but have to come back to watch him again. He stands there with confidence.

He tells the women that their men aren’t as manly as he is, because they don’t use Old Spice. They smell like ‘lady-scented’ body wash. It is as if when men start using the Old Spice body wash, they’ll be as ‘manly’ as he is. He tells the audience that when that happens ‘your man’ also gives you all the materialistic stuff he mentions.

Dyer argues that men’s body can never be phallic enough, so they have to compensate. This example shows that by using materialistic objects and the ‘manly’ scented body wash.

Isaiah contains his power by looking at into the camera and having control over the audience by telling them what to do. He is the active one looking.

The commercial might put pressure on men to look like him, smell like him and even give their partners all these materialistic stuff.

Old Spice assumes women buy the beauty products for men, so they target their commercials for them. They assume a heterosexual relationship. They assume that Isaiah Mustafa is like the ‘ideal’ man. They assume women want to be with him, and men want to be him. The commercial uses this in a humouristic way, so it is not really clear if they mean it or ridicule the gender stereotypes. 

Old Spice, The Man Your Man Could Smell Like https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owGykVbfgUE

Richard Dyer, “Don’t Look Now: The Male Pin Up.”

The female nude: Renaissance vs. Modernism

The painting Danaë was made by Gustav Klimt in the years 1907-1908. The painting is one of many depictions of sexually conscious women made by Klimt. Represented in the painting is the Greek myth of Danaë at the moment she gets impregnated by the god Zeus, shape-shifted in the form of golden rain. Shown on the painting is a nude, red-haired women in an almost foetal-like position with the golden rain sliding in between her thighs. Her eyes are closed, her mouth slightly open and she has a blush on her cheeks. Her figure is being framed and partially veiled by transparent purple fabric with golden Japanese ornaments.

The myth of Danaë is a classical and common used theme for the female nude in the history of art, but the way Klimt has represented it differs a lot from the approach of traditional artists. What is apparent in the Klimt´s painting of Danaë is the fact that it represents a woman enjoying sexual pleasure. The sexuality of women is a frequent theme in the work of Klimt, making a statement about women’s search for sexual liberation in a time they were still oppressed by men. Around 1900 women were not only socially inferior, but they were also thought of not to experience erotic feelings, there was a big taboo on this subject. The fact that Klimt has depicted a sexually liberated women becomes more apparent when one compares it to a work of a classical painter. Using the example of the painting Danaë with Nursemaid (1553-1554) by the Venetian painter Titian, one can see how this women is depicted in a way to serve as an object of lust for a male spectator. The women is lying passively on the bed, submissive to male voyeurism, with a rather calm and almost emotionless expression on her face. As John Berger mentioned in his book Ways of Seeing, the nakedness in these traditional European oil paintings are not an expression of the woman’s own feelings, her nudity is put on display for the male owner. Her body is arranged to appeal to his sexuality, not to hers: “Women are there to feed an appetite, not to have any of their own”.

On the contrary, in Klimt’s painting of Danaë one can see how the women has her eyes closed, like she is self-indulging and focussing entirely on her own body and pleasure. Her body is in a position not stretched out and fully visible, like in the work of Titian, but more withdrawn into her own erotic sensation. In this painting it is not about the man looking at the woman, but central is the woman’s sexuality. Klimt has addressed female sexuality most directly in his drawings, for example in these two drawings of masturbating woman: Reclining Nude Facing Right (1913) and Reclining Masturbating Woman with Spread Thighs (1916-1917). In these less subtle drawings the motif is also found, especially in the women’s facial expressions which also depict the full focus on the own erotic pleasure.