Typology

 

Considering the theme of typology, the study of type and duplication of images within the same composition, I developed my original Rayogram work, as my project is a question of “…the pornographic reductions of the female body to a mere form for the purposes of consumption and exploitation.” O’Reilly.(2009, p.21) and considering the aspect of the male gaze, I chose to exploit that. Through the topic of femininity I have discovered that throughout art, women can become exploited on stereotyped to be a representation of a visual spectacle. Even in advertisements in the 21^st century women are poised in certain ways to appeal to the idea of the ‘male gaze’. Therefore, considering the artist Gina Pane, I believe she was using herself as the visual spectacle and inducing the pain and constraints society inflicts on her as a women in a real life experience but in its most extreme form. She was showcasing her self-ownership of her body. This way she had the power to confuse people and make them gaze at her, not in a sexual way, but in wonder. Her performances challenge her audiences with discomfort or shock and therefore her audiences leave the performance with a deeper understanding of the inferiority of the female body. It is this shock or repulse that is a central theme to all of my chosen artists. Therefore, this is the theme I adopted for the idea of typology. I followed the depiction of tampons and exaggerated the idea. Using real tampons I coated them in red paint to depict blood and displayed the visually ‘used’ tampons on white background in a systematic way. The white of the background contrasted hugely with the red and made the image more of a spectacle. The splats of paint that are also on the white background add a sinister feel to the image. The overall image is a representation of the male gaze. If women are to be a spectacle and objectified by men as merely beautiful specimens with essentially, large breasts and a perfectly proportioned figure, then why not objectify ourselves in which such behaviour can constitute an act of liberation from perspective and authoritarian control. The image basically portrays an everyday regime of women, it shows women in their realistic raw form, away from any superficial ideas that society have labelled them with. It is a repulsing spectacle of the representation of women.