Sexualization of signs in women's self-portraits (Case study: works of postmodern artists)

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Assistant professor, Department of Art, Tabari Institute of Higher Education, Babol, Iran

2 M. A. Student of Art Research,, Department of Art, Tabari Institute of Higher Education, Babol, Iran

10.22034/scart.2024.140617.1452

Abstract

The function of language systems that convey a message through signs is to stabilize reality and naturalize it, which is not devoid of ideology and layers of meaning, and the people of a society learn signs in the form of cultural conventions in order to receive the message. Image representation through the visual language system throughout history has created ideas and beliefs about all matters, such as gender and identity, and society has embraced them. Postmodern artists, who are always looking for deconstruction and defamiliarization, in their works criticize the naturalized beliefs in society through unconventional and unconventional representation. In this research, the self-portraits of postmodern photographers, who challenged the predetermined conventions of identity and gender by visual signs, were taken into consideration and analyzed based on Umberto Eco's point of view. The purpose of this work is to discover the layers of meaning and commonalities of the works and to deconstruct the dominant images of identity and gender in the present era. The studied sample is the self-portraits of three female postmodern photographers, Cindy Sherman, Claude Caon and Jillian Waring. The results show that photo reading is often an intersubjective affair and the quality of reading depends on the circle of readers. In addition, understanding the text is always a form of its denaturalization. The results also show that the discussed works are not only self-referential and they use codes that emphasize the gendered nature of the way signs are used in the representation of women.

Keywords

Main Subjects

Sociology of Culture and Art
Volume 6, Issue 3 - Serial Number 21
September 2024
Pages 14-25

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics