Emily Knight | Contextual Studies

 

For my final remarks I just want to discuss my finds and what I have concluded since the beginning, with the addition of talking about how this translates into my graphic media portion of this project. I believe this time around this project had really developed and changed into something I was not necessarily expecting at the beginning. I began with a small discussion about how I wanted to discuss Masculinity and Femininity and the traits that come with them. But as I was researching and finding sources I discovered a whole new side to my topic that I had not covered before. Toxic masculinity and specifically in India was such an interesting topic of discussion and really entered me into a whole new conversation about masculine traits. It creates a discussion about how some men have almost taken the traits of ‘what it means to be masculine’ and taken them to the extreme. What happens when, as a man, you take the idea of being masculine to the extent that it begins to negatively effect...

Adding to my previous conversation about toxic masculinity in India, the subject of activism in India and women’s rights is another that can spark up some very interesting conversations about Masculinity and Femininity in India. In 2012 there were huge protests in New Delhi about women’s rights after a twenty three year old student was gang raped. Protests such as this were not uncommon however in this case the protest got to an intense and almost violent stage that the government imposed curfews for everyone. So many women and men too were pleading for more safety schemes to be put in place in order to protect women from tragedies such as this. The protection and overall system in place to protect women in India is undoubtedly broken and in need of serious evaluation.  Accusations such as sexual assault are not taken as seriously as they should be, when a lot of young women speak up about the assault they have endured sometimes close to nothing is done to help them or take down th...

"Boys Who Like Girls" is a Documentary discussing feminism in India and the toxic masculinity culture there and the gender roles that are expected, but are now being challenged. I wanted to watch this as it allows me to get a richer understanding of the topic I am discussing and actually have that understand come from the mouths of the people that live there.    At the beginning of the documentary we are introduced to Harish who is an Indian man in charge of the organisation MAVA (Men Against Violence and Abuse). He focuses on abolishing toxic masculinity and preaching the importance of gender equality in India. He wants young boys and men to lead a more brighter path where they will not only find themselves with better opportunities but also a more fair, accepting and respectful mindset.  Straight away in the documentary we are witnessing protests, men and women both walking with signs and hats chanting for equal rights. Both English and Indian people walking a picking s...

Roxana Halls is an English Painter who is well known for her work and her ideas in how she breaks down the stereotypes of femininity in a polite and almost comedic way. Similarly to Wiley’s work she understands the traditional representation of women’s portraits from years ago, women would not smile. Showing teeth was most likely an ugly trait and so Halls challenges this with almost every one of her paintings. She also puts a lot of time into the subject of women and food, the idea that a woman with a large appetite is not a feminine trait. The women in her portraits are all seen with big expressions on their faces, with large amounts of detail that represent both the beauty in their features and the flaws, which every women will have.   This particular piece above that Halls painted is from her collection called ‘Laughing While Leaving’ that shows a couple walking away from what we presume is their burning home. Along with their belongings and two cats they appear to be happy abo...

Kehinde Wiley is a an American Portrait Painter based in New York City, and is best known for his naturalistic portrait paintings of African Americans. I chose to talk about him and his work because I believe it relates so much to the topic in discussion about toxic masculinity, as well as the general topic of Masculinity and Femininity. Wiley’s paintings and portraits take figures and people and represent them in a different light to what would be expected just from their looks. Portraits like the one below is an example of Wiley trying to capture everyday African Americans but in a more positive light with beautiful poses. This is to challenge the idea of ‘normal’ portraits and now traditional ones are usually of rich white men and are also bought by rich white men. Wiley turns this around by not only being African himself but almost always paints African Americans. Therefore breaking down this ‘traditional’ outlook on what portraits are and how they should look. The figures he paint...