The Male Gaze Made Manifest: Seeing and Subject matter in Tribuna of the Uffizi
Words by Ava Dance
Painted between 1772 and 1777, Johan Zoffany’s monumental work Tribuna of the Uffizi documents the Grand Duke of Tuscany’s canonical collection in oil. It naturalistically depicts both the art objects and those that admire them, as well as their interactions with the works. Yet this painting goes beyond visually recording merely what is tangible and physicalises an uncomfortable aspect of womanhood: the male gaze and patriarchal expectations of femininity.
Tribuna of the Uffizi (1772 - 1777)
The archetype of Venus is the shared subject of the depicted works that I will discuss: Knidian Aphrodite and Venus of Urbino. She is the Roman goddess of love, sexuality, fertility and ultimately femininity, according to the patriarchy, of course. Therefore, Venus is also representative of an incredibly narrow conception of what being female should look like. She is always caucasian and able-bodied. Her youthful body is defined by its voluptuous curves that suggest fertility, yet, hypocrictically, she is completley free of hair and strech marks, the very indicators of one’s sexual maturation and transition into womanhood. This limiting picture of femininity manifests itself in two slightly different ways in these artworks.
The Venus in Knidian Aphrodite is young and naive. She is hyperconscious of the male gaze of both the artist and viewer, concealing her groin area with her left hand and one of her breasts with the other. Aphrodite averts her gaze from the viewer, suggesting that she is deeply uncomfortable with the attention that she is receiving, and perhaps is new to the incessant male gaze that accompanies puberty. This, combined with the whiteness of the marble and therefore the suggestion of innocence and sexual purity, taints the work with an almost pedophilic tone (in addition to voyuerism, evidently.) Additionally, the smooth, pale medium intensifies the unattainable idea of ‘perfection’ that the patriarchy demands.
Knidian Aphrodite (Aphrodite of Knidos)
By contrast, Titian depicts a far more womanly (yet equally problematic) version of Venus. Returning the viewer’s gaze, Venus of Urbino seems to have depressingly accepted sexual objectification and harassment as part of life as a woman. She appears to play into this harmful narrative, tilting her head in a coquettish manner and displaying her attractive body for the male consumption and gratification of viewers, only concealing her groin from view. She is left with little choice but to do so as she inhabits an entirely patriarchal world (and will face consequences if she does not adhere to its expectations). Her hypersexualisation is intensified by the sexually symbolic bouquet of flowers that she clutches and the dominance of a rich and alluring shade of red in the colour palette.
Venus of Urbino (1534)
Unsurprisingly, the spectators of these works are solely white, aristocratic men. Clusters of them ogle at the works, especially Knidian Aphrodite. In the most disturbing detail, a man holds a looking glass up to the bottom of the statue, typifying the patriarchal treatment of women as inanimate objects as opposed to feeling, whole beings. The male gaze that these works cater for is captured precisely in this area of the painting, making its existence and omnipresence impossible to ignore or deny. Whilst it does not undo the misogyny that is so deeply embedded in this work and art history in general, this feminist reading is refreshing and empowering (although it was instead intended as a shameless show of male status and power as its purpose was to showcase the duke’s enviable collection, with its existence only furthering it).
Men ogling Knidian Aphrodite
Furthermore, the male gaze is reinforced by the way the men are depicted handling Venus of Urbino. They prop the painting up in mid air and appear to be discussing possibilities of its display. The act of curation determines the way in which an artwork is seen and perceived by viewers and, therefore, the male gaze is reinforced yet again by this undiverse and distinctly patriarchal curatorial body. White, upper class men are determining yet another layer of the way in which women are seen.
Men discussing Venus of Urbino
This work crucially illustrates that the artistic realm is entirely entangled in political and societal ideology, and its examination provides illuminations to everyday life. Zoffany unintentionally makes the male gaze a tangible and physical thing, meaning it is harder for it to be brushed under the carpet, or even worse, its existence denied and those who perceptively recognise it gaslit. By extension, therefore, the work is an important reminder that one can simultaneously admire the technical achievement of a work and critique its subject matter and implications, or any other aspect of the artwork, and that it is hugely important to do so. Art must not go unquestioned.
