Academic literature on the topic 'The female nude'

<p>A live nude female performer can occupy a powerful identity equal to a man because she willingly places herself in front of an audience. She commits to this state of profound vulnerability as a means of gaining ownership of her body that men by virtue of their power in society take for granted. The female body occupies physical space, unlike how a body image seen on a television or in a magazine does. The actuality of the live female nude creates a transformation from the purely sexualized body to an authentic female nude body. This authentic female nude body, via her control of her physicality, is a &ldquo;loud&rdquo; and often rejected body. The acknowledgement of her authenticity is an acknowledgement of her power and this is common ground on which the female audience member and performer can relate intersubjectively. On the surface, it seems the most effective solution to eliminating objectification and this obstruction of the female body would be to take focus away from her body. Yet paradoxically, female subjects have altered these culturally shaped identity norms of objectification through nude performance, liberating the hyper-sexualized projections attached to the female body and replacing them with symbols of innocence, creativity and power. </p>

Thesis (Ph. D.)--North Texas State University, 1986.<br>Typescript. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. 367-404).

Modernism is a plurality, not a singular concept. This project explores examples of Art Nouveau nudes to describe the particular expressions of the modern through varied and complicated allegorical bodies. The female nude as a nexus for ideals of gender, art, and beauty, is informed by and constructs the understanding of these ideals within society. Art Nouveau thus employed the nude to represent complex manifestations of modernity. Three diverse cases provide the subjects of each chapter. All explore modernism through objects and interiors, in public and private environments, and each connects the decorative arts with accounts of European modernism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The modernist movement, in these decades, is still predominantly understood through painting. This project draws its case studies from Paris, Glasgow, and Vienna, each a distinct cultural arena during the 1890s and 1900s: the sculptural furniture of François Rupert Carabin (1862-1932); the metalwork of Margaret Macdonald (1865-1933) and her sister Frances Macdonald (1873-1921); and the graphic motifs of Ver Sacrum, created by the artists of the first Vienna Secession (1897-1905). In conception and expression, these nudes articulated the diverse representational practices of different modernisms. They each embody drastically different histories, aesthetics, and social expressions. Their varied modernisms expose the prominent nationalism of Art Nouveau. Examination of these three very different cases expands and complicates current understandings of the nude, allegory, and the modern.

My thesis examines the event of Dr Sketchy's Anti-Art School, which has branches in over 120 cities worldwide. Dr Sketchy's combines the format of a life drawing class with burlesque performance, creating an event that focuses on both the performance and the creation of art by the attendees. Dr Sketchy's was begun in New York in 2005 by its creator Molly Crabapple, now an internationally recognized artist and popular alternative celebrity. I focus my study on the Christchurch branch of Dr Sketchy's Anti-Art School, founded in June 2010 by Audrey Baldwin, a performance artist and Fine Arts graduate of the University of Canterbury. In my thesis I discuss the way Dr Sketchy's Anti-Art School combines and compromises between the life drawing format and the burlesque performance, despite the differences and seeming incompatibilities between these two forms. I investigate Dr Sketchy's as a contemporary cultural performance which combines and to some degree inverts established genres of performance. I give a detailed history of burlesque performance and of life drawing within art education to allow a comprehensive comparison of the two traditions, particularly the way each has conceptualized the nude female body. I argue that the combination of the two forms allows Dr Sketchy's Anti-Art School to transgress the traditional boundaries of each format and introduce influences that would otherwise endanger the status of life drawing and burlesque performance within their respective contexts. I also argue that the nude within Dr Sketchy's Anti-Art School transgresses the traditional conception of the nude within life drawing by using burlesque as an acceptable reference for the transgressive elements of the show. The arguments put forward in this thesis are the product of extensive participant observation, interviews and literature reviews on the relevant art and performance traditions.

This dissertation examines two controversies involving paintings of the female nude by artists Debora Arango and Carlos Correa during a period of political crisis in Bogota (Colombia) in order to open the political to cultural analysis and thus shed light on scenarios of change in the 1930s and 1940s. Unpacking the controversies lends insight into the unique ways in which modernity, the body, its representations, sexuality, gender and politics came together in Colombia during this period. Such an approach also shows that modernity in Colombia involved shifts in religious and secular frames of sense-making and morality. This dissertation argues that the controversies and the female nudes provide a window into the Liberal regime's creation of culture as an autonomous sphere as part of its cultural program, which bridged high and popular culture, as well as on aspects of private life concerned with sexuality and gender. It shows how such changes registered in the lives of the artists and how the artists translated the changes they experienced into modes of pictorial expression. This dissertation argues that the demands of the aesthetic and the demands of politics during this period pressed on each other, resulting in the wide-spread perception of moral breach that came to a head in the "scandals of the female nudes." This dissertation thus sheds light on dimensions of both the political and the private during this period.<br>Because art and politics were thus entangled, this dissertation shows that, in this particular Colombian modernity, society was not polarized, that the private and the private overlapped, that issues of intimacy surfaced in the public realm, and that Catholicism was the idiom shared by men and women who were grappling with change. It shows that the cultural program of the Liberal regime was the immediate referent for criticism in these events and, through it, of the Liberal regime's reforms of education of 1934 and 1936. Finally, it shows that this modernity and its attendant anxieties were played out through the body in the public and the private realms, within, not against, the Catholic tradition, in unprecedented ways. This thesis demonstrates that politics and issues of sexuality and gender were entangled in the public sphere and converged in the female nudes, turning them into a major threat to morality within both religious and secular frameworks. By unpacking the controversies, this dissertation marks a seminal break with historical accounts that describe Colombia's as a failed modernity, its society as polarized, and debates over sexuality and gender as the product of politics. This dissertation also contradicts art historical writings that account for the production of images and the reception of art in this period solely in political terms.

At the nexus of the seemingly disparate art-theoretical topics of color and the female nude is a critical consideration of phenomenology in both one of its most basic senses—as the first-person experience of perceived phenomena—and as a larger philosophical position which, through its abstraction of perception to subject-object relationships, implicates the painted figure. Specifically, this paper conflates the phenomenology of color with the transcendental phenomenology of Edmund Husserl and Maurice Merleau-Ponty in investigating empathy. Structured as a dialectic, it establishes the most prominent views of both color and the female nude—the nude as a symbolic figure, color as perceptual experience—before delving into their various points of theoretical and art-historical intersection within these categories. This analysis ultimately forms the argument that color can be a powerful tool in reclaiming the female nude figure, stimulating emotive bodies that inspire empathetic viewers and intersubjective rather than objectifying, or abjectifying, dialogues.

Thesis (MA)--University of Stellenbosch, 2001.<br>ENGLISH ABSTRACT: A spectacle denotes an impressive or deplorable sight, and necessarily involves the power and politics of viewing. The female body exists as a sexualised object of these processes of looking within Western culture, not only in high art, but also in discourses such as medicine and science. In both art and medicine the female body has been treated as a passive object to be studied, analysed and classified. Power relations and patriarchal ideologies have played a great part in the resulting objectifying representations, firmly locating images of the female body within the realm of the spectacle. Bodily perceptions, in terms of the female body, have changed much, particularly through the reinterpretation of sexuality through feminist theory. Modem culture and technology have opened up many new possibilities for the redefinition and understanding of the body. Modem bodies seem to be under as much close surveillance and scrutiny as their nineteenth century counterparts. This study explores these ideas through a wide range of examples from painting, photography and performance art, and non-art objects such as anatomical objects and medical illustrations. Central to the construction of the body as spectacle, are issues of looking and viewing. Chapter 1 examines ideas around the gaze; the politics and processes of vision, objectification and fetishisation are explored in relation to the functioning of the medical and aesthetic gaze. The concept of spectacle is also elaborated upon in terms of ideas around the nineteenth century carnival and freak show, and in terms of societal taboos and transgression. Aspects of aesthetic and medical discourse focus on the display and scrutiny of the female body. Chapter 2 examines the way in which these discourses attempted to reveal the female body by rendering it in highly visual terms. The dominant ideologies informing both discourses played an instrumental role and resulted in representations that defined the female body in normative standards and ideals of beauty and health. Pornography is considered as a modem discourse in which the female body is defined and displayed as an object of scrutiny. Feminist theory challenged exclusively male representations of the female body and the subversion of traditional forms of representation of women is studied by examining the work of Annie Sprinkle and Cindy Sherman. Many representations of the female body by feminist artists are considered highly disturbing and transgressive, precisely because they traverse traditional and acceptable representations of it. The idealised nude forms the epitome of contained ideals of health and beauty, and the work of Orlan and Cindy Sherman is examined within these terms in Chapter 3. These artists' representations of the female body are in direct opposition to such norms, rather settling for an open-ended, unconfined and abject representation. However, such transgressive cultural images produced by women artists are often regarded as pathological acts, and dismissed in terms of deplorable spectacle. The research concludes with a commentary on the candidate's practical work, which in dealing with the representation of the human body explores some issues of visuality, spectacle and fragmentation.<br>AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: 'n Spektakel kan op 'n indrukwekkende of betreurenswaardige skouspel dui; gevolglik betrek dit die politiese en magseienskappe van besigtiging. Die vroulike liggaam bestaan as 'n seksuele objek van só 'n proses van besigtiging binne die Westerse kultuur - nie net in kuns nie, maar ook in diskoerse soos geneeskunde en die wetenskap. In beide kuns en geneeskunde, is die vroulike liggaam beskou as 'n passiewe objek vir bestudering, analisering en klassifisering. Magsverhoudinge en ideologieë het gevolglik 'n groot rol gespeel in die uiteindelike objektifiserende representasies, en gevolglik is die uitbeelding van die vroulike liggaam in terme van spektakel vasgelê. Liggaamlike persepsies, veral in terme van die vroulike figuur, het noemenswaardige veranderinge ondergaan - veral deur die hervertolking van seksualiteit deur feministiese teorie. Moderne kultuur en tegnologie bied verdere moontlikhede vir die herdefiniëring en begrip van die liggaam. Die moderne liggaam word onder streng bewaking en betragting geplaas - net soos sy negentiende-eeuse ewebeeld. Hierdie studie ondersoek dié idees deur die bestudering van 'n verskeidenheid voorbeelde vanuit skilderkuns, fotografie en 'performance' -kuns, asook objekte soos anatomiese objekte en mediese illustrasies. Kwessies van besigtiging is sentraal tot die konstruksie van die liggaam as spektakel. Hoofstuk londersoek dus idees rondom besigtiging - onder andere die politiese en magseienskappe, en die gevolglike objektifiserende effek daarvan - in verhouding tot die funksionering van die mediese en die estetiese blik. Die konsep van spektakel word verder uitgebrei in terme van die negentiende-eeuse karnaval, asook in terme van taboes en sosiale oortreding. Sekere aspekte van estetiese en mediese diskoerse fokus op die vertoning en besigtiging van die vroulike liggaam. Hoofstuk 2 ondersoek die wyse waarop hierdie diskoerse die vroulike liggaam in hoogs visuele terme uitgebeeld het. Beide diskoerse is gemotiveer deur dominante ideologieë, wat gevolglik 'n instrumentele rol gespeel het in die uitbeelding van die vroulike liggaam. Sulke uitbeeldings is dikwels gemotiveer deur standaarde en ideale van skoonheid. Gevolglik word pornografie in hierdie hoofstuk bespreek as 'n moderne diskoers wat georganiseer is rondom die vertoning en besigtiging van die vroulike liggaam. Feministiese teorie skep 'n positiewe ruimte waarin sulke eksklusiewe, manlike definisies en uitbeeldings van die vroulike liggaam uitgedaag kan word. Die omverwerping van tradisionele metodes van uitbeelding word hier ondersoek deur die werk van Annie Sprinkle en Cindy Sherman te bespreek. Die herdefiniëring van die vroulike liggaam deur feministiese kunstenaars word dikwels beskou as onstellend; waarskynlik omdat dit tradisionele en aanvaarbare uitbeeldings van die liggaam oortree. Die werk van Orlan en Cindy Sherman word in terme van sosiale oortreding in Hoofstuk 3 ondersoek. Die klassieke naakfiguur stel die ideale van skoonheid en stabiliteit voor. Hierdie kunstenaars se uitbeeldings toon egter 'n doelbewuste verontagsaming van sulke ideale, deurdat hulle eerder 'n oop, onstabiele en gefragmenteerde figuur uitbeeld. Oortredings van kulturele norme deur vrouekunstenaars word dikwels beskou as patalogiese aksies; en dit word dus maklik afgekeur as 'n spektakel. Die navorsing word afgesluit met 'n bespreking van die kandidaat se praktiese werk, wat die uitbeelding van die menslike liggaam ondersoek. Gevolglik word kwessies van besigtiging, spektakel en fragmentasie verder ondersoek.

Thesis (MMedSc )--University of Stellenbosch, 2011.<br>ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The present study investigated in particularly the specific nature of the supporting stromal layer located between the implanted human cyst and host murine tissue, which has yet to be reported. During an initial phase of this study, the particular light microscopic properties of the existing hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) stained experimental cyst was investigated, with regards to the presence or absence of specific morphological features, namely spongiosis, exocytosis, epithelial keratinization, epithelial thickness and hyperplasia, and the vascularity and fibrosis present in the stroma of these experimental sections. Subsequent analysis reported significant spongiosis, in addition to increased exocytosis of immune cells and epithelial keratinization in a number of cysts. Additionally, increased epithelial thickness and hyperplasia was reported in only 2 / 10 experimental tissues, whereas increased vascularity was observed in the stroma following analysis of H&E and Special staining, such as Verhoeff-von Gieson and Masson trichrome results. During the second phase of the study, immunohistochemical analysis with a particularly wide array of antibodies raised against specific human and mouse antigens had been applied. This involved automated immunohistochemical staining with mouse anti-human primary antibodies, in addition to manual staining with rabbit anti-mouse primary antibodies. Subsequent visualization was achieved by means of linking to biotinylated secondary antibodies, and Streptavidin-HRP incubation for standard visualization, followed by counterstaining with Hematoxylin. Maintained positive expression of cytokeratins 5, 13, and 14 was demonstrated in both control human vaginal mucosa and experimental cysts, whereas similar findings were not reported for cytokeratin 1, given the vast keratinization which was observed. Human collagen type IV and laminin of the basement membrane reported positive expression in 9 / 10 and 6 / 10 control human vaginal mucosa tissues respectively. In comparison, negative mouse collagen type IV and laminin was reported in most experimental cysts compared to positive staining in positive control mouse tissues. Immunohistochemical staining for human elastin, fibronectin, von Willebrand factor, and fibroblasts revealed maintained positive staining in all control human vaginal mucosa and experimental cysts. However, maintained expression of CD34 (endothelial marker), CD1a (langerhans cells), and human VEGFR-3 in experimental cysts was not demonstrated, compared to positive expression in control human vaginal mucosa. Subsequent analysis of murine antigens illustrated uniformly negative staining for mouse fibronectin, langerhans cells (CD207), and fibroblasts, in addition to negative staining in positive control mouse tissue sections. Furthermore, negative staining for mouse VEGFR-2 was reported in all experimental cysts; however strong positive staining of this marker in mouse kidney tissue had been reported. The findings of this study suggested that the exact nature of the stromal layer is of both human and murine origin. Furthermore, the tissue region located beneath the human vaginal epithelium is suggested to be of human nature, whereas the second distinct region located at the periphery of experimental cyst tissues, is suggested to be murine origin; however the findings of immunohistochemical analysis could not illustrate definitively the exact nature of the intermediate stromal layer, but could in fact demonstrate a mixture of human and murine tissue.<br>AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Die huidige studie het die spesifieke molekulêre en histologiese eienskappe van die stromale laag geleë tussen menslike sist- en muis velweefsel bestudeer, wat tans nog nie bekend is nie. Gedurende die eerste fase van hierdie studie is die besondere lig-mikroskopiese eienskappe van die bestaande hematoksilien en eosien (H&E) eksperimentele siste bestudeer, met betrekking tot die aan- of afwesigheid van spesifieke morfologiese eienskappe, naamlik spongiose, eksositose van immuunselle, epiteel keratinisasie, epiteel dikte en hiperplasie, en laastens die stromale vaskulariteit en fibrose. Gevolglike analise het daarop gedui dat beduidende spongiose, eksositose en epiteel keratinisasie gevind word in die eksperimentele siste in vergelyking met kontrole vaginal weefsel. Hierteenoor is die verdikking van die epiteel en hiperplasie in slegs 2 / 10 eksperimentele siste gevind, terwyl vermeerderde vaskulariteit aangedui is na gevolglike H&E en spesiale (soos byvoorbeeld Verhoeff-von Gieson en Masson trichrome) kleuringsresultate. Die tweede fase van die studie het die immunokleuring met verskeie mens- en muis spesifieke antiliggame behels, waarby die uitdrukking van verskeie mens antigene vergelyk is met dié van muis. As sulks is ge-automatiseerde immunohistochemie toegepas met muis primêre antiliggame, tesame met fisiese kleuring met konyn primêre antiliggame toegepas. Gevolglike visualisasie is aangedui deur middel van binding met sekondêre antiliggaam en Streptavidin- HRP, gevolg deur teenkleuring met Hematoksilien. Algehele behoud van positiewe uitdrukking van sitokeratien 5, 13, en 14 is bevind, terwyl sitokeratien 1 uitdrukking nie daarwerklik vergelykbaar is met dié van kontrole mens vaginale weefsel nie. Die uitdrukking van mens kollageen IV en laminien van die basaal membraan is verder bestudeer, en het egter positiewe kleuring in 9 / 10 en 6 / 10 van kontrole mens vaginale mukosa aangedui. In vergelykking hiermee kon die huidige bevindings egter net positiewe kleuring in 4 / 10 en 3 / 10 eksperimentele siste vir kollageen IV en laminien onderskeidelik, illustreer. Immunohistochemiese analise van menslike elastien, fibronektien, von Willebrand (vW) faktor en fibroblaste het op deurgaans positiewe uitdrukking van hierdie merkers aangedui in beide eksperimentele en kontrole menslike weefsel. In teenstelling hiermee is volgehoue uitdrukking van CD34 (endoteel merker), CD1a (Langerhans sel merker) en mens VEGFR-3 in ekperimentele siste egter nie illustreerbaar nie, in vergelykking met deurgaans positiewe uitdrukking van hierdie antigene in kontrole mens vaginale mukosa. In opvolging is deurgaans negatiewe uitdrukking van muis fibronektien, langerhans sel (CD207) en fibroblaste bevestig, terwyl negatiewe kleuring ook deurgaans in positiwe kontrole muis weefsel, bekom deur die disseksie van ‘n naakte muis, gevind is. Verder is ook negatiewe kleuring vir VEGFR-2 in alle eksperimentele siste gevind, terwyl egter sterk positiewe kleuring in muis nierweefsel as positiewe weefsel gevind is. Die resultate van die huidige studie het daarop gedui dat die stromale laag onderliggend tot mens vaginale epiteel van menslike oorsprong is, terwyl die periferale stroma onderliggend tot muis velweefsel, ongetwyfeld van muis oorsprong is. Laastens kon die spesifieke oorsprong van die tussenliggende stroma nie aangedui word nie, maar dat dit moontlik uit beide menslike- en muisweefsel bestaan.