'MALE GAZE' - Representation Theory - VOYEURISM

Theorist's Laura Mulvey (1975)

Focuses on Feminism and how males and females perceive women.

•Laura Mulveys concept looks at:

-How the audience view people who are presented in the media.

1) How men look at women from those images.

2) How women look at themselves from those images.

3) How women look at other women from those images.

•The Male Gaze typically focuses on:

- Emphasising curves of the female body.

- Referring to women as objects rather than people.

-The display of women is how men think they should be perceived.

- Female viewers, view the content through the eyes of a man.

I can apply this theory already to my 1st day of filming - 1/12/13. The main scene which I am going to apply this theory to it to is shot no.12; the mise-en-scene of the costume is a red dress, which represents my artist as being confident and maybe dangerous. Also this costume highlights that she is the main character as it vibrant and attention seeking. The cinematography I have choose is an upwards slow tilt which shows my artist body from a males point of view therefore representing her as a sex object and with her dress being red it connotes lust and love. This does touch all the points which are above, emphasises curves of the female body, acting as an object and females are forced to look at the female from the eyes of a man. I can also apply this to my Digipak photos which are below, showing her full body in the red dress and her red dress doesn't cover below the knee therefore showing a lot of her legs.

Also other theorist's which interlinks with this theorist and idea!
John Berger’s (1972)-‘Ways of seeing’

John Berger analyses the manner in which men and women are culturally represented:

•In "Ways of Seeing" Berger claims that the representations of men and women in visual culture entice different "gazes", different ways in which they are looked at.

•He states that ‘men act women appear. Men look at women. Women watch themselves been looked at.’

•The woman is usually posed in a way to please the viewer, her gaze is meant to entice the viewer, and this notion is the same in modern day advertisements and photographs. Berger comments that a woman unconsciously acts in a way knowing she is being viewed. Women are constantly being surveyed, not only by men but by other women, and by themselves.

Jib fowles states ‘in advertising males gaze and females are gazed at’ (Fowles 1996)
therefore this concludes showing that both Mulvey and Berger feel that women are the objects for to men
to look at, desire and seek pleasure from.