Gazing Woman is a photo series that depicts people as objects of sexual desire, in self-determined portraits.
The work reflects the „male gaze“ and adds sensual-sexual depictions from an explicitly female perspective.
It involves the people photographed in the process by letting them decide how to be portrayed. They are asked questions to which they respond non-verbally in front of the camera.
The people photographed were found within a period of eight months within Germany. They are from Catherine Liesers circle of friends as well of their circles of friends and her private and profesisonal network.
Art print edition
per motif 3 pieces, each size: 60x40cm and 120x80cm (plus each size 2 artist prints) Material: Printed on „FineArt Pearl“ by Hahnemühle, laminated on Aludibond with shadow gap, transfered in an aluminum ArtBox.
Art book: 31 portraits, 68 pages, Softcover with thread stitching.
Exhibitions
The series was first shown during a group exhibition of the Female Photoclub as part of the official program of the European Month of Photography. It was also part of the 10 year anniversary exhibition of Berlin based photo gallery Chaussee 36.
Fotos: Natalia Carstens, Lukas Liniany, Catherine Lieser, Eyal Philip Peleg & CHAUSSEE 36, Minh Ngyuen, Yuko Nagaoka
Catherine Lieser:
» As an artist I am interested in gender roles and social roles and how we as society create these roles and eduacte ourselves in these roles.
As for my project „Gazing Woman“ I asked: „How do we depict sensuality, sexuality and eroticism and who decides, according to which criteria, who is being depicted in what way?“
During my studies at film school I learned about the „male gaze“, a term that was first coined in the 1970ies by film theorist Laura Mulvey. The term explains how heterosexual male movie directors depict women in film. They do it in a way that reduces women to their bodies and turn them into objects of sexual desire.
Since the vast majority of all visua media was and is still created by men, the answer to my question is: Men hold the authority to interpret physical attractiveness, how attraction between men and women works and also, what sexual orientation and what genders are made visible.
Besides the effect that the „male gaze“ visually pleases the heterosexual male audience it has more effects:
1. It normalizes binary genders and heterosexuality.
2. It portrays men as superior, who are entitled to project their attraction onto a woman and that, if they remain persistent, women will give in to mens projection and bow to it.
3. It depicts women as submissive, who consider it desirable to be found attractive by men and to act accordingly and to strive for it.
As long as we are unaware of the omnipresence of the male gaze, we do not reflect on it. We accept these effects as truth about ourselves and the world we live in.
As for my project "Gazing Woman" I have decided to integrate all above-mentioned aspects into my concept as follows:
-Because I am a woman, I have a female perspective, so all of my portraits break through the omnipresence of the “male gaze.”
-I have portrayed all genders, not just women, not only White people, but also Black people and people of color, not only people with a body size of XS, but also those with body sizes up to XL, not only heterosexual people, but also homosexual and queer people.
-I formally asked the subjects before the shoot if they wanted to be objects of desire.
-They responded non-verbally by deciding what to wear, what pose to strike, and what my camera angle would be. In this way, I ensured that there was no projection on my part.
-I offered them proverbial and metaphorical “carte blanche” for their self-expression in the form of a white studio, thereby giving them back the power to interpret their own attractiveness.
-Everyone provided a quote to rule out objectification.
_Webanwendung.jpg)
Fotos: Minh Nguyen