Realism and Perspective

There are a few ways that approaches and appreciation of realism of art had on politics. On page 146 it explained how social realism was embraced in the Soviet Union in 1932. Soviet leader, Josef Stalin mandated that all paintings must be a form of pictorial realism. It was dangerous to produce any type of abstract art at that time. Some artist was even exiled to Siberian camps if they were found producing such art. The reason why Stalin enforced this policy was to promote nationalism among the people that was unfamiliar with this style.

The term avant-garde means to describe movements at the forefront of artistic experimentation and leading the way toward major changes. In 1917, the Soviet Constructivist Realist Manifesto propose a geometric abstraction and objective form icons, rather then the pictorial styles. The Manifesto believe that by changing styles this will represent the new ways of the arts and modernize the Soviet Union. Another example of avant-garde was when artist Claude Monet's painting Impression, Sunrise came out in 1872. The term impressionism was introduced at this time. Impressionism is a artistic style that the artist emphasizes on light and color. With each painting made by Monet the lighting and colors of his portrait would look different depending on the weather and time of day.

During the Renaissance period artists actively pursued the development of techniques for specific drawings and paintings for the average spectator. The artists during this era realize and learned that they needed to develop a different perspective of their art for different spectators to identify with. We have to realize that every period of history has a different episteme.

Cubism is a style that purposely challenge the dominant model of perspective. The painters Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque introduced cubism by developing new ways of depicting space and objects. These paintings had spectators gazing in multiple ways. With these paintings you had to really view it in order to grasp the understanding and the meaning of what the artist is trying to get across. Realism can be tied into cubism because realism represents a style of art that is understood in a particular historic moment and to interpret people, events, and objects . Cubism is a representation of a style of art as well and it also express different ways to view space and objects.

Gazing

On page 119, I could only find one traditional convention I interpret from the reading. The image convention was the woman posing nude with a gorilla mask on her face. This was a great attempt to get peoples attention for woman artists rights. Especially male spectators. The gaze in this image was clearly the naked woman, but the image also got it's point across also with the caption below explaining the percentages of female artists in the Metro Museum of Art.

When John Berger wrote "men act,woman appear" he was trying to explain the nudity in the paintings which was predominately based on naked woman and male viewers. The image of women as whole sells and grasp the spectators attention. A good example of this is on page 125 with the Ralph Lauren ad. You have a man on top of a beautiful woman that is gazing at spectators. I would definitely say this catches quite a few viewers attention.

I believe I have a dominant-hegemonic approach towards the whole reading. I totally except the images that's been presented and understand there translation towards the spectators. I also like how the book used the movie Rear Window by Alfred Hitchcock on the example of gazing. The character in the movie named Jeffries had a broken leg and was confined to the wheelchair in his apartment. He ends up spending most of his time staring at the window of his apartment at various of people that walk the street, but the people on the street can't see him. This is a good interpretation of gazing and we as humans perform this act unconsciously at times.

Modernity and Modern

The difference between modernity and modern is that modernity is a term that scholars used in the eighteenth-century. They used that term when they was talking about certain historical,cultural, and political conditions relating to the Enlightenment. Modernity is also associated with industrialization, human intervention in nature, and mass democracy. The term modern means present or recent times. A German scholar Jurgen Habermas explained that modern is when a culture is at it's present existence and it starts to see itself as a product. A product that transitions from a old era to a new era.

One of the topics Foucault's study for discourse was the concept of madness. In the nineteenth century psychiatry science was improved and medical definitions of madness was formed. The mentally ill also was consider to be influence by "folly". This term means a benign way of thinking. Foucault defined madness through the discourses of medicine,law, and education.

On page 101 and 102 they talk about the relationship of Gaze and Spectatorship. These terms are a natural instinct in the human element. Any type of art we look at or film we see, were engaging in these practices. Page 102 explain some of the concept practices that we might experience through spectatorship and gaze. The name of these concepts as follows, the roles of the unconscious and desire in viewing practices, looking in the formation of the human subject as such, and looking is always a relational activity and not simply a mental activity engaged by someone. By looking at these concept practices we can have a better understanding of what happens in the process of looking.

Decoding Televison

There are several shows that are based on small claims court. You have abundance of these shows from Judge Joe Brown, Judge Alex, and Judge Judy just to name a few. Personally, one of my favorites to watch is Judge Mathis. He seems geniune and he's there to help people in need. When I watch his show I believe I take a hegemonic position. When I view Judge Mathis I get entertainment and plus a sense that someone cares about individuals.

On page 85, I admired Copper Greene cleverness by using a well-known iPod poster and used it as a campaign for the Iraqi people that were mistreated in Abu Ghraib prison. On the poster there is a man with a hood standing on a box with electrical wires attach to his hands. In the upper left corner it says iRaq instead of the slogan iPod.