02/12/20 I had an end of semester informal assessment with Jane to see where I am at – theoretically/practically. We discussed this new relation of social media & the female gaze where I have tried to make it work in my practice as I am working with the digitalization of the gaze through time due to social media in my dissertation.
Reflection 19/02/21: Was very beneficial as it directed my focus back within the male gaze, sexual objectification, women as treat like object etc, from the female gaze. My work has in-depth meaning that is reciprocated in the visual.
I want to use my dissertation within my work, but only aspects of it e.g. the male gaze, sexual objectification. Reflecting on my group crit 20/11/20, the feedback I received was very beneficial for me Only Touch With CLEAN Hands presented effects of the male gaze but at the time I tried to bend the feedback round to the effects of social media instead to make my theory work. As the feedback I received was very male gaze heavy me and Jane discussed I should use it.
- Hands & breasts conveyed women are dominated still by men. Hands sanitisers suggested how women are seen as these objects to have sex with and then disregard afterwards. Dropping of the breasts create the idea of destruction/heavier visual of women being disregarded after use. Counting of the breasts represented ideas of a body count: women have sex they are seen as dirty, but is the complete opposite for men. – All these fall to sexual objectification of women through the male gaze and don’t suggest social media. Rewatching the crit allowed me to see that my practice with social media didn’t work as successfully as I felt.
Reflection 15/03/21: It was as though the concept of social media simplified my work and appeared to not have any depth further than the statement. With my current films To Bite, there’s the harsh visual forced in front of the viewers face, as though they must watch.
But, with The Haze of Social Media, I felt this theory worked well for this work. There’s the visual distortion from social media that creates this illusion for everyone one to see, that you must be perfect. As in my dissertation chapter 3 focuses on building my argument of social media creating a warped version of the gaze and created an inverted self surveillance for women and adapted them to become a self-surveyor of their own body compared to what they see on the social media screen. With this comes the paranoid paradox and censorship with the body. This all worked for my dissertation but not my work as The Haze of Social Media suggested pregnancy/fertility – something I hadn’t seen before/didn’t want to explore.
- It opened up more confusion than discussion for my artwork – it question my research/theory.
Reflection 14/04/21: I am glad I came to this conclusion as it allowed me to develop my research/work to respond to exposing the effects of the male gaze/sexual obj in life, cinema and pornography upon women through a female perspective. This allowed me to realise performance has been very successful within my work.
For my dissertation I have been researching the development from the gaze, to the male gaze to the female gaze due to social media. For this I have searched theorists and writers like Jacques Lacan, Sigmund Freud, Michel Foucault, Christian Metz, Laura Mulvey and Charlotte Jansen. This is something that works really well for my dissertation as it allows me to explore the growth and where its adapted/changed in the world among women as well as artists. I am really interested in the way social media has changed the formation of the gaze to have created an inverted self surveillance within women for my dissertation.
