Reading Response No. 5

Getting Ready to Read:

● Imagine that you are going to draw a picture of a woman. Which way would she be facing and why? Is she the only object in the picture? What kind of scene do you put her in? Is she naked or nude?

If I were to draw a picture of a woman, she would be facing the left, she would be the only object in the picture, and there may not even be a scene in the backround for her to be in. Since the woman I'm drawing would probably be a stick figure, she would be naked or nude on a technicality. However, I most likely wouldn't go that far as to draw clothes on a stick figure.

Reading Response:

In his article "Ways of Seeing," Berger attempts to show society how both men and women are precieved in classical oil paintings and how gender roles are clearly defined in such paintings. He argues that due to the separate gender roles, the way that society sees women has not changed, and that women are often dipicted much differently than men. This is because the intended or assumed audience are men.

Questions for Discussion and Journaling:

1. Do you think artists of these paintings knew what they were doing when they created? Why? Would Berger agree with you?

I think that the artists of these paintings knew what they were doing when they created the images. If anything, painting nudes was a way to express sexuality in a time when it was unacceptble to do so. However, if the painting was of Adam and Eve, perhaps the artist didn't quite have sexuality in mind when painting a biblical scene. I think Berger would agree with me because in the last paragraph of the article he says that women were painted that way to flatter the male audience.

2. Berger mentions that a woman’s presence is defined by her mannerisms, her attire, her surroundings, and how she expresses herself. This presence is in contrast to a man’s presence, which “is dependent upon the promise of power he embodies”(208). Are these assumptions about culture any different now than they were when the article was published in the 1970s?

 

I would say that yes these assumptions are different now than they were in the 1970s because of the changing times and the changing gender roles. The gender roles that were around since the begining of time began to change in the 1970s, therefore, when this article was published, the gender roles that were in place were basically the same gender roles that were in place when those paintings were created.

Applying and Exploring Ideas

1. Can you think of artwork that represents men in a particularly viewed way? Is there a generation gap between the paintings Berger chose and the one you can think of? Do you think that gap contributes to how the image is viewed?

I think that most artwork portrays men as the dominant figure in society. Wether he is in a painting with a woman, or a painnting of a battle, men are usually always dipicted this way, once again, due to the set gender roles. I can think of one painting that does have a generation gap between some of the paintings that Berger chose. The painting, whose title I cannot remember, is of a man and woman dancing. The woman is wearing a red dress, and the faces of both dancers aren't visable. The generation gap between this painting and the classical era paintings does have an impact on the way thisi image is viewed because of the fluid gender roles our society accepts. The two look more like equals rather than the man being the dominant one in the image.

4. How does humor define a person? Is humor something that is compensating for something else? Or as Berger states, does humor fall on gender lines? Explain your answer.

In some respect, humor can define a person. Depending what what kind of jokes they are telling, wether they be smart jokes or a simple "why did the chicken cross the road" joke. Not only could humor define how smart a person is, but also how uptight someone is. I think that humor fell on gender lines when gender roles were stricter than they are today. In old movies or movies that take place in the past, a woman who is funny and likes to tell jokes is usually pinned as strange or someone who doesn't quite fit in with the other women around.

Meta Moment

Why do you think you need to read an article concerned with the similarities and differences between nudes, nakedness, spectator, viewer, art, and advertisement? How could any of these concepts be connected to writing, audience, and authorship?

Since writing is an art form, I think reading an article like this could be beneficial. Putting together the pieces that connect nudes, nakedness, men, women, gender roles, and so on could be beneficial to writing because this article paid attention to the way women were portrayed in paintings and how the audience responded, which is a very good thing to pay attention to in wiritng; how the audience responds.