Be a Woman ~ Luzangela Martinez

Performance is the act of staging a play or other forms of entertainment. It is much more than photographs, paintings and other methods of representation. Often, it can express self-identity and issues that affect self-identity. This is because the body serves as a site of identity performance by demonstrating to others our personality, beliefs, and skills. This performance shown below was inspired by Marina Abramovic’s “The Artist is Present” performance, where she gazes into the eyes of several individuals for approximately 2 months. 

In modern society today, the idea of male gaze is still heavily present. Many males objectify woman and view their feelings, thoughts, and sexual desires as less important than their desires. In this performance, my mother portraying the “man” with a black mustache dressed in a grey hoodie and black cap symbolized this idea of male gaze. On the other hand, the “woman” portrayed by me symbolized the idea of woman submitting to the “man”. As you can see, the table separating both individuals contains girly products such as a hairbrush, hair iron, makeup, and facial products to help improve a women’s appearance. One can also observe the vanity that is behind “the man.” Each of these items represents the idea that men often force women to believe that they should only focus on their appearance to please their significant other. 

To understand male gaze, it is important to consider the consequence of an act. As Berger states, “how a woman appears to a man can determine how she will be treated.” For instance, if a woman is beautiful to behold, the man may pursue her whereas if the man does not fancy her, he will avert his gaze. In John Berger's book “Ways of Seeing,” there is a focus on nude from European oil paintings where women were portrayed as subjects. This nudity stands as “criteria and conventions by which women have been seen and judged as sights.” In other words, the author makes several references to the Eurocentric standard of beauty being the focal point for women.

This perspective enables this patriarchal impression to dictate the treatment of women based on their skin color, shape, and other physical features. To retaliate against this view, one way to understand ourselves is to understand what it means to be naked, which is to be oneself. This view is a self-focused idea where the goal is to recognize the beauty that lies in women bodies. Unlike this notion of being naked is to be nude, where one's naked self is unrecognizable and objectified which is what the male gaze employs if left unchallenged. Unfortunately, most women, like myself, have grown accustomed to this theory of male gaze. This idea of how women should be “are assigned to us as children,” where it is taught to us in our family origin, particularly “taught to us by our mothers” (Understanding Patriarchy).

John Berger 

Chapter 5 

“A painting could speak to the soul”

"All reality was mechanically measured by its materiality".