In 1929, at the age of 26, Brandt moved to Paris from Vienna and became an assistant to Man Ray where he learned many of the techniques Ray had been developing at the time. Determined to become an independent photographer, Brandt moved to England in 1931 so he could document the extreme social disparities of the pre-War years. One of his most famous works during this time was a photograph of a loose-coal searcher that emblematically captured the mass unemployment and social hardships brought on during the industrial depression in England.
Yet as the war was coming to a close, Brandt's style changed significantly, as he himself felt " Documentary photography had become fashionable. Everybody was doing it...the poetic trend of photography, which had already excited me in my early Paris days, began to fascinate me again." At this point Brandt began shooting landscapes, portraits and nudes, the last of which is our focus for today.
The photo pictured above belongs to a series of indoor female nudes made during the Fifties. Generally, in these photos Brandt made the room or space a significant interlocutor in the conveyance of the drama that for him was the female body. The same can be said for this photo--the distorted perspective of the room, coupled with the dim lighting directed toward the back end of the space as it illuminates the model, create a menacing atmosphere imbued with emotional agitation.
The physical distance between the viewer and the model, emphasized by the looming chair, hints at an emotional distance which the model conveys through her downward and resigned expression. Because she is so far and is not making any eye contact, the model's expression is difficult to interpret--is she sullen, contemplative, tired? Something that her expression and posture are not, is seductive. If we allow the theory of the male gaze to inform our interpretation, then we could say the model's aloof and enigmatic persona disrupts the male observer's desire to possess and assertively behold that which is the female nude. The tension arises as the actuality of possession gives way to an actual or perceived estrangement from the model.
While the model's equivocal pose could not be described as being actively closed off, it could not be viewed as being inviting. The silhouette of the model's breast caused by the shadow of her own arm alludes to the female sexuality, but again is obscured by a reluctance on her part to be exposed completely to the viewer. In this sense, the model does not act as a completely passive object to be subjected to the desire of the male gazer, but neither does she defiantly prevent the viewer from considering her female form and sensuality. Another "reminder" of her lacking sexuality is the way the chair in the foreground and the chair that she is sitting on echo the curvature of her figure, making me personally reflect on how I might similarly regard an inanimate object and a living woman.
One should not assume that Brandt exhibited efforts to control, subordinate and objectify the female nude in this piece as prescribed by the theory of the male gaze. But one can still consider the photographer's innate male desire to possess and control the female nude, and the possible psychic crisis in this photograph that emerges because of an unfulfilled attempt to do so because of the model's reticence and disinterest?
One thing that particularly strikes me about this photograph is how barren and lonely it feels. The walls are bare and there is very little furniture. The few chairs in the room are scattered about relatively isolated from each other. And since the curves of the chair echo the curves of the woman's body it gives an impression as if the room is (sparsely) populated with lethargic feminine specters.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I wonder about the model's position near the door. Does it give a sense of her being trapped? Is she in fact trapped in this room with the male gaze? And as Perry asks, does she escape this entrapment to some degree with her air of psychological removal?