What's Wrong with Images of Women? -- Griselda Pollock

VIS201 -- Contemporary Critical Issues
This PDF file is one of Griselda Pollock's articles. Click here to download the PDF file.

Important point taken in the

Important point taken in the historical use of images linked to sexuality. These then are acting as there own signifiers. Thus using the reversal techniques will only point to the discrepancy of gender and the selling of body/products but not speak equally of the significance and connotation of the posture, clothing etc... Although I now see this is also what others were interested in referring to in their statements. I saw it as an overview no? And not an absolute... Discuss further in class.. Perhaps unrelated but another form of reversal and context of that technique is found in a Diesel ad campaign I saw in Italy, circa 2001. They produced an entire “magazine” which positioned the idea of Europe as if it were Africa and Africa was Europe. Describing the poor orphans of Scandinavia, photo of blonde blue-eyed children, who need just a dollar a day for support. As well as photo spreads of nightlife activity in Africa emphasizing the wealth and extravagance of the partygoers. Again, the context of this technique using the reversal was being used as an ad campaign

In considering the "fruity analogue"

I was also troubled by Pollock's pronouncement of the "impossibility of effective reversal." The statement would seem more nearly true if it was first established that a "reversal" was defined strictly as some gesture towards the complete polarization of all of the many aspects of an image, rather than the way it should be defined: as a gesture toward the polarization of any (maybe even just one) of the many aspects of an image.

In the case of the Victorian print of the nude woman holding the tray of apples, it seems to me that the "failure" of the reversal print is not rooted in the fact that it "reversed" things, but in the fact that it reversed too many things. The original Victorian print may be a signifier, but it is a signifier made up of a number of other signifiers (the woman, apples, the pose, her "sickly smile," etc.). I agree with Susy's assertion that things might be different if the tone of the reversal image were "more embodiment" than "mockery"--instead of attempting to polarize so many of the elements of the original print (resulting in: the man, bananas, his wacky pose, his silly smile, etc.), the second image could have simply attempted to faithfully replicate everything except for the gender of the figure. Wouldn't this tactic create a telling image that didn't reek so much of the counteridentification that can just serve to "consolidate the potency of the signification rather than actually to rupture it"?

embodiment vs. mockery

I agree with m any points of Matt and Susy's points. But they did lead me to consider the following:I think there is a strong tendency among many (myself inclued) to Art-Direct rather than historically critique imagery -- and the Achetez des Pommes "binary reversal" was made in 1972, a time in which it seems (not sure, but..) quite a bit of mockery/invective humor/sexual pun was used to varying degrees in the realm of feminist critique.(And I do hope the SoCCAS symposia on May 20th -- the Comedic in Modern Art -- will perhaps even shed some light on humor in the contemporary context) http://www.soccas.org/. I agree that Matt's suggestions would improve the image -- but would they change it's historical signification? Would such subtlety have been, in fact. too little for the times? After all, the correlation of apples to bananas as used here has some differences that produce a new series of signifieds. Though both images refer to the formal similiarties between unlike objects, the apple has biblical significance in tems of womanhood and a historical one in terms of art (up to Cezanne and beyond)-- the banana as a "colonial discovery" seems to lack this privilage in Western Art. Therefore, the feminie appropriation of the banana as a tool for mocking genitals can be seen as nothing less than a formal, derisive metaphor. In this case of reversal, the banana suffers as the poorer fruit in terms of history and politics, seemingly condemned to the role of genital denotation. But isn't it still slapstick funny? I mean, come on! The wacky smile is over the top -- but it seems that this level of 'camp' (even before it was identified as being camp) has been an effective tool for pointing out political identity issues (again before there were any:) since the heyday of the court jester (but then, Alas poor Yorick!). Enough of Apples and Bananas. I think Kate's comments direct us back to the important issue of recognizing how the media itself has appropriated both (arguably) effective and ineffective sign reversal for the purpose of selling stuff. Desiel is perhaps the worst in my opinion. Look at us! We have art directors hired from grad schools who are hyper-aware of post-colonial theory and the injustice of late capitalism. Our awareness is Hip! Buy our Clothes! (then again, maybe I'll apply for a job ina few years...) Any thoughts?

And the winner is....

I am sure you are familiar with this list. However, with all of its indisputable authority and distniction from the realm of "fairy tale and self-fulfilling prophecy," it begs to be seen yet again with Nochlin's article. Click Here. Ms. Sherman has been slipping down the list since 2001; but post-modern photography has never posed much of a threat to cubism and pop-art. But do notice how drawing, painting, installation and the various manifestations of conceptual art duke it out for third place in our new millenium! I find it a bit of brainless fun to play with the statistics on here. For example, change SORT BY to Ranking Difference from Previous Year and GUESS WHO POPS UP? Marina Abramovic. You Go Girl! Who should I talk to about getting this set up for ALL UCSD grads, alumni and faculty? The various criteria we could apply to this is as diverse as the WACK show. Let's get on it!

Oops

Glenna, that is totally in the wrong posting spot! Get it together!

My 2 ¢

Though I'd rather read here instead of write (given the historical precedence and presence of the white male's dominance), I feel forced to enter into the fray here because you all are so completely, so utterly, so hopelessly wro... Oops, I did it again. Wrong diatribe. Sorry... Perhaps like others, I too reacted to Pollock's claim of the "impossibility of effective reversal" and to the impossibility of separating signifier from signified when it comes to images of women (=woman as image). Is it that Pollock overlooks examples that might challenge her open and shut case? Certainly things have changed since, or have they? Or is it that I automatically recoil at the word impossibility, simply unable to accept no? Or is it that Pollock suggests elsewhere in her article that there are "difficulties" involved in reversing (p. 134), effectively hinting of an opening, a possibility, and not an impossibility? She also states (p. 133) that it's impossible to challenge "existing imagery without an adequate theory of ideology and representation." So is this all that's missing, adequate theory? Doubtful... I'm a bit taken aback by Pollock's absolutist pronouncement that Nochlin's juxtaposition of Achtez des Pommes with an image of a naked man carrying a tray full of bananas is a "failure." And that Paula Modersohn Becker's Self-Portrait is also a "failure." Granted, that these may not be such a rebuke to Nochlin's and Becker's attempts as they are a statement of the structural obstacles to 'success.' Regardless, it seemed on the harsh side and hardly representative of an alternative feminist language... I can't help to be left with a lingering depression about how little has changed. Take a look at all the plastic surgery ads in the SD Reader (an easy target, I know) and the like -- wide scale evidence that women are trying harder than ever to be objects, to be defined as and by their bodies, to take in stride the notion of "woman-as-image", but now convinced (through the most effective sleight of hand) that this time they're in control, freely able to freely choose their own signified... Among many other topics, I think Pollock addresses something very important, something that should give us all pause -- namely the notion that effective subversion is rare, hard and fleeting at best. Most acts of rebellious subversion, of counter-culture, are adeptly converted into over-the-counter culture by all those sophisticated marketers just waiting for (or increasingly even jump starting) the next "subversive" trend to use and re-appropriate. Though I would love to be proved wrong. Perhaps the importance of Pollock's term "effective" gets ignored with the emphasis on the 'impossible'?.... I'm straying a bit here, but all of this makes me further question the effectiveness of lone artists. If change is what is desired then might greater good be achieved through other approaches and working methods -- eg., as artists in partnership with non-profits already located in the trenches for the long haul, or in long-term collaboration with communities? Or in a different career field altogether -- as community activists? Steven

Oh Steven, you have indeed

Oh Steven, you have indeed challenged me to a thougt! I must seek the counsel of my brave knights of the round table (they are all wanton female harlots and the table is conveniently shaped like a vagina -- I hope that does something to ineffectively reverse signification for a moment) I am hoping they can help me come up with something. For the time being I can only say that Linda Nochlin's banana photo is a frappe of farsical fun as far as I'm concerned! Let's go shopping...

See Griselda Pollock in person

When: May 20, Sunday at 2pm.... Where: Pacific Design Center, Silverscreen Theatre.... What: Looking at the legacies and potentials of feminism in relation to WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution. Advance tickets are required, no refunds. You can buy them online. They are $20 for non-members...however, if you come about 15-20 minutes late, the box office closes and you can just sneak in...I did it for the Linda Nochlin talk (yes, you missed Linda Nochlin, she was AWESOME).

role reversals and reappropriation

I think Griselda Pollock raises a simple but very crucial point: the inseparability of the signifier and the signified. The meaning/message behind an image of a nude woman holding fruit will always be slightly (if not severely) different from an image of a nude man holding fruit. These role reversals are problematic. On a related not, here's a quote from the text that I think is important to think about considering the recent zeitgeist of historical and contemporary feminist shows: "The appropriation of woman as body in all forms of representation has spawned within the woman's movement a consistent attempt to decolonize the female body, a tendency which walks a tightrope between subversion and reappropriation, and often serves rather to consolidate the potency of the signification rather than actually to rupture it."

space for irony?

While I agree that the relationship between the signifier and signified is thick, I question the "impossibility of effective reversal." In the case of the woman+fruit vs. man+fruit example, I wanted Pollock to further unpack the latter image. How would things change if Nochlin had made more efforts to 'naturalize' the man in the photograph, if the tone were more embodiment of the image it quoted rather than mockery? To this end, I wonder whether the stress on the inseparability of the signifier and the signified allows space for more layered semiotic readings. For example, with Paula Modersohn Becker's Self-Portrait-- who's to say that nature doesn't signify, or that irony isn't at play?

Test

This is a test. Just checking things out a little bit. I'll be back with more later and that's a fact. I had a dream that I was collecting feminist images and colonial post-cards and sticking them to a bulletin board on a pontoon boat in post-apocalyptic Southeast Asia last night. Help!