Women - Objects

 

I decided to perform the way women are treated. Both men and women undergo pressure from society and are taught from the moment they’re born to act a certain way. Women in specific are taught to take a submissive role in society and are often treated as objects rather than equals to men. While men also face underwhelming situations of defying the typical masculine figure I think that women often face things more aggressively. In this performance, I had the assistance of my younger sister to help depict a woman being treated like an animal. She constantly caresses my hair and shoulder throughout the video, as a human does to any pet and towards the end, she grabs my face to force me to look at her and then towards the camera. Overall this performance is a way to express how women are often seen as objects that people can use rather than letting women act out of will and yet also a performance that depicts the way women are aggressively treated both physically and mentally. In Ways of Seeing by John Berger he mentions an important aspect of the way women are portrayed in paintings “In the art-form of the European nude, the painters and spectator-owners were usually men and the persons treated as objects, usually women. This unequal relationship is so deeply embedded in our culture that it still structures the consciousness of many women.” This quote goes hand to hand with Understanding Patriarchy by Bell Hooks, in regards to her experience growing up as a women, “As their daughter, I was taught that it was my role to serve, to be weak, to be free from the burden of thinking, to caretake, and nurture others. My brother was taught that it was his role to be served; to provide; to be strong; to think, strategize, and plan; and to refuse to caretake and nurture others.” Both quotes helped me decipher what I wanted to express in my piece. John Berger mentions that women were and are still portrayed in forms of sex appeal, they’re depicted in paintings and other forms of art with the purpose of entertaining the viewers, men. Berger also points out that this relationship between men and women is something that still goes on. We see it all the time within advertisements, such as alcohol which usually glorifies drinking by showing beautiful women drinking alongside the protagonist, a man. On top of this, we also get a quote from bell hooks who explains in detail the way society molds us to be who they want us to be from the very start. A woman in the eyes of society should act submissive and ‘girly’ while men take the form of a more masculine and superior being. With this in mind, I created a performance to portray the way women are both physically and mentally treated. While coming up with the idea I had Yoko Ono in mind with her cut piece performance, I wanted to be able to showcase something as significant as her piece without exactly remaking the same performance. While not having to specifically mention women and discrimination or equal rights I highly enjoy this quote from “When Artists Create Flags - Artworks of Creative Time’s Pledges of Allegiance Project”, “Guided by notions that art matters, that artists' voices are important in shaping society and that public spaces are places or creative and free expression” Art is our voice, the work that an artist does is the message that we want to put out there and showcase to others. I think it's an intriguing way to just put an important message out there with the use of a creative source. I also find it very important that as a woman myself I should advocate for equal rights and the end of women discrimination. It was very upsetting and overall just a frustrating performance to go through but I feel that anyone who's looking at this performance video will get to have a feeling of what I felt while making this and the concept in general.