Gender, Sexuality, Identity

In this essay, I would like to specifically discuss the issue of gender, sexuality and identity in contemporary artists Marina Abramovic’s work. On top of that, I would also discuss how women are being seen and interpreted in past history in comparison with how the contemporary artist break forth and bring about a whole new perspective of women and their social status. Abramovic is a feminist artist.


How does one’s gender affect the society and what is the effect that comes with it. I would be talking much more in the context of art historical interpretation in comparison of the modern days using contemporary artist Marina Abramovic as a reference. But first of all, what are gender and its definition? Gender is a wide set of characteristics that are seen to distinguish between female and male entities, extending from one's biological sex to one's social role or gender identity. As a word, it has more than one valid definition. In ordinary speech, it is used interchangeably with "sex" to denote the condition of being male or female. In the social sciences it refers specifically to socially constructed and institutionalized differences such as gender roles. As we all know, cultures construct differences in gender. These social constructions attach themselves to behaviours, expectations, roles, representations, and sometimes to values and beliefs that are specific to either men or women. Most feminists argue that traditional gender roles are oppressive for them. They assume that the female gender role was constructed as an opposite to an ideal male role, and helps to perpetuate patriarchy. Women have been fighting for equality (especially in the 1960s with second-wave feminism and radical feminism, which are the most notable feminist movements) and were able to make changes to the traditionally accepted feminine gender role. In gender politics the word patriarchy refers to any form of social power given disproportionately to men. Many construe this to mean a gender hierarchy in which men dominate or exploit women. Men had established certain codes of regulations for the making and judging of art which derived from their sense of what was or was not significant.


Artist Marina Abramovic was born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia in 1946. She began giving performances in the early seventies. In Marina Abramovic’s performances, she refers the human body as physical, visible, sexual and moral. She sees her body as not only one body but two: the female body as well as the male body. Following the Cartesian understanding of the world it is from the basic of the duality mind (culture) - body and (nature) that the duality of the human being gender is being deduced. Women belong to nature and man to culture. Woman and man are usually categorised such as woman/body/nature and man/mind/culture. Hence the certain codes of regulation given to women. Marina Abramovic is a Feminist artist but most importantly, she is a woman. As a woman, judging and making art in the 1960s, 70s was almost deemed insignificant to the society as it was out of the social norms. Women traditionally were supposed to stay home and take care of all domestic issues instead of working and putting themselves out in the masses to be seen. In her performance “The Rhythm 0” that was created in 1975 at the studio Museum of Modern Art was performed in a written instruction to the audience played in the gallery during her performance whereby she stated: “I am the object.” In this sentence one can identify the statement she had made with the social norms of how woman were seen in the past and that woman are usually depicted or seen as a lower status than men and that woman are often associated as an object, in this sense similar to the case of Duchamp and Matisse painting- woman being portrayed as a sexual object. However, one would argue that in this case, Marina Abramovic was being placed in such a manner by herself. She made herself an object. She had the authority to make herself as an object. In this scenario, it dwells on me so strongly that this artist is breaking forth dictating her own life. She is making a statement saying that she is capable and is able to dictate who she is and that she is no longer sticking to the social expectation of traditional woman’s’ code of regulation. She has the authority over herself even if she was portraying herself as an object. It seems to me that she is jeering at the social norms of expectation expected out of woman in this scene. It almost seems as if the audiences, especially the males are being jeered at. She has the power of making herself the object, making the man had her awe at their feet’s ( which traditionally man are suppose to be superior ) which shows a sign of weakness, portraying the man at a lower status as compare to the artist. This scene almost seems like a sarcasms to me in regards as to how she’s treating the audiences which on one hand, I suppose the audiences did not had a clue that they were looked at (especially the man ) when interacting with her, and this in a way shows that they are submitting to her unknowingly.


This further leads us to the question of sexuality. What is sexuality and its association with gender. I will be looking deeper into the area of social standards that was resulted by the artist’s doing and her work . First of all, I would like to bring to your attention that it is important to understand sexuality as different from gender. Sexuality concerns the physical and biological differences which distinguish males and females apart. The exploration and reclaiming of female sexuality has most taken place in the feminist art practise through the representation of enactment [through performance] of the female body. The female body had been until then the most frequent “object” that was depicted as a subject that can be seen in: Matisse in front of the easel beside which stands the naked female model; Duchamp playing chess with a naked woman whose ace was covered by her hair. Women artists have used the central cavity which defines them as a women as their framework for an imagery which allows for the complete reversal of the way in which women is being seen by the culture. That is, to be a woman is to be an object of contempt, and the vagina, stamped of femaleness, is devalued. The woman artist, seeking herself loathed, took the very mark of otherness and by asserting it as a hallmark of her iconography, established a vehicle by which to state the truth and beauty of her identity. Once again, let’s take a look at Marina Abramovic performance: “The Rhythm 0”. After having given the instruction “I am the object” to the audiences, she now places herself before them, allowing them to interact with her as well as doing absolutely anything unto her. Women’s passivity is often interwoven into the concept of femininity and has always had a negative significant. Women’s passivity is always associated with their sexuality. It never fails to disregard them as a sexual object. In this scenario, I can deduce that artist Marina Abramovic is actively making her body passive on one hand and yet on the other showing that she is in control of her passivity. In another word, she makes her body to look feminine and to be look upon as a sexual object. There were 72 objects on the table and anyone from the crowd can make their way up to the table to grab a thing or two and do anything to her. However, there was this one particular man whereby he took nothing but instead went straight up to her, knees knelt and kissing her from her face to sucking her nipple. This clearly shows that Marina Abramovic is being seen as a sexual object. As we can draw reference from past historical examples of how woman is a sexual object to a man and that they are subject to submission however, in this performance, I found the artist (as a woman) on the other hand, was still a sexual object (only that she has the power of making herself one) but instead had the man subject to submission for her. This therefore questions the issues of how man and woman roles or perhaps social expectation have changed from past history to today the modern days.


As I am looking deeper and trying to understand the works of artist Marina Abramovic, it speaks so strongly about her identity as a woman. Women whose works have been built on their own identity in terms of female iconography have been treated by men as if they were dealing with masculine experience in this case where Marina Abramovic’s work “Rhythm 0” shows exactly the masculinity she possesses and display to the audiences in her performance. In her performance, it always involves great risk. She explores the extreme state of physical and mental activity with the purpose of delineating various boundaries such as pain and death. She is seeking to reach the limits of human, rationally and controlled capacity. The act of self injuring one’s own body needs great courage which can be related to masculinity of oneself in the aspect of physical and physic. These great risk and extreme pain inflicted unto her body that can be seen in almost all her performances. Her identity based on masculinity is one very prominent factor.


Social expectations of what a woman should be from past history has more or less been embraced and changed tremendously. Women no longer is subject to only handling domestic issues but being able to have equal rights as well as gender equality in society. Feminist artists such as Marina Abramovic, Judy Chicago, Kiki Smith, Carolee Scheeman had made a huge impact in the feminism movement seeking of equality and addressing issues of inequality. Not to mention, because of the feminism movement, women are beginning to be seen in a different light, not only as a sexual object, not only for pleasures which in this performance of Marine Abramovic “Rhythm 0” shows clearly that she is the dictator of the audiences to a certain extent especially where the man had his knees knelt which speaks very much about the changed of status between a woman and a man. Although woman passivity is always associated with their sexuality and interwoven into the concept of femininity in history has now changed in the performance of artist Marina Abramovic performance whereby her identity is based on masculinity. In current days, a woman can and may posse’s femininity as well as masculinity and vice verse for the man. This expectation has changed as compared to history codes of regulation that was expected out of a woman and man, woman/body/nature and man/mind/culture.





____________________________________________________________








Bibliography


Amelia Jones, The Feminism and Visual Culture Reader, Routledge, Canada 2003

Rebecca Schnieder, The Explicit Body in Performance, Routledge, London 1997

Herausgegeben von Friedrich Meschede, Edizioni Charta, Marina Abramovic, The Artist Body, Italy, 1998



http://www.cddc.vt.edu/feminism/enin.html

http://bbailiwick.lib.uiowa.edu/wstudies/theory.html

http://artnews.org/gallery.php?i=109&exi=7223

http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-IGI-59552684/feminism-movement.html

http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Gender_role#Culture_and_gender_roles

http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Sexuality

http://www.ps1.org/images/pdf/newspaper/08spring/Newspaper_Winter%202008_OK.pdf

http://bullybloggers.wordpress.com/2010/04/05/the-artist-is-object-%E2%80%93-marina-abramovic-at-moma/