Biki Aly

Art and Women

Professor Caçoilo

The male look is the demonstration of portraying ladies and the world, in the visual expressions and in writing, from a manly, hetero viewpoint that presents and speaks to ladies as sexual articles for the joy of the male watcher. In other words the male gaze explains the idea that when a women is in a art piece who are used as a satisfaction for the male watcher. This allocation started during the renaissance period and till this day is still going on. The male gaze was coined by feminist Laura Mulvey in 1975. The Male Gaze is influential in craftsmanship and pop culture since it is to a great extent a coherent response to why ladies photo the manner in which they do and why they were painted a specific way. In John Berger’s reading “Ways of Seeing”, he says, “A woman must continually watch herself. She is almost continually accompanied by her own image of herself” (16). By saying this, it shows that while a woman is being looked at unconsciously she is thinking about how she looks to the person “the male gaze” who is looking at her. Down below shows a picture from the Daily Art Magazine that was published by Alina Nevskaya which shows an example of this matter.

In the reading of Bell Hooks “Understanding Patriarchy” he says, "Patriarchy is a political system that insists that males are inherently domineering, superior to everything and everyone deemed weak, especially females, and endowed with the right to dominate and rule over the weak and to maintain that dominance through various forms of psychological terrorism and violence" (Hooks 18). By saying this, Hooks is saying that patriarchy can be a very valid reason as to why the male gaze is still happening until today.

Sexism can be an example of the male gaze. Society has the idea that men need to be dominant and strong at all times. When men engage in an act of sexism it makes them feel like they are dominant. An example of this is, in the movie “Fifty Shades of Grey” one of the main characters, Christian Grey is an example of patriarchy because he has this sexual abusive relationship with the second main character Anastasia. In the movie Christian gives Anastasia these paper that list all these sexual things that he can do to her whenever he wants to. In his home he has this secret room that no one was allowed to enter except for him and her but she was not allowed to enter it herself. He would take Anastasia in there and blindfold her so that she cannot see what he is going to do to her. In other words Christian is the dominant character and Anastasia is the submissive character which means Christian can do anything he wants to her. In the photo below it will show you how Anastasia is blindfolded having no idea what is going to be done next while Christian who is dominant is behind her taking control.

Another example is one of my own personal examples. Growing up in an Egyption family household my family was very strict on me and all my girl cousins. My male cousins were only 5-6 years older than me. When I ask to go out the following statement after that is that I have to be home by 10pm and while I am out my parents call me 3-4 times just to check up on me. On the other hand when my male cousins go out they do not have to be home by a certain time and they don’t have to be checked up on. To continue on, another personal example is when I go to Egypt with my family the one thing I can be sure of that will happen as soon as I leave my house is a man whispering at me, or calling me a “working machine” which is a phrase in Egypt that means a women with a good body for sex. Some man would even go out there and follow you with their friends just so they can seem like their cool.

After talking about the male gaze and patriarchy in class and looking more into it it really showed me how much they actually happen. Now a days a lot of men look at women for not who they are but more of how their body is shaped. A woman can be intelligent, wise and more but if she does not have a good body than she is looked upon because she is considered to not fit in the picture that man create for us. This is an embarrassment for society because a woman having a good body is not what it should be all about. It is very heartbreaking knowing that when I have kids one day they are going to have to live in a world as cruel as this.