eye and gaze 05/12/2010 11:06 ΠΜ

The University of Chicago :: Theories of Media :: Keywords Glossary :: eye and gaze

eye and gaze

keywords cross references

Works Cited

Chandler, Daniel. "Notes on the 'Gaze,"

(1988) [20 February 2003]

Cook, Robert G. "Visual Perception," [20

February 2003]

Engberg, David. "The Virtual

Panopticon," [20 February 2003]

Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish:

The Birth of the Prison, New York,
Pantheon, 1977.

Lacan, Jacques. The Four Fundamental

Concepts of Psychoanalysis, trans.
Sheridan, Alan, New York: Norton, 1978

Lutz, Catherine & Collins, Jane. "The

Photograph as an Intersection of Gazes:
The Example of National Geographic, in
Visualizing Theory , New York,
Routledge, 1994.

Manovich, Lev. "The Mapping of Space:

In a culture dominated by visual images, most people use their eyes to obtain vast Perspective, Radar, and 3-D Computer
Graphics," [20 February 2003]
amounts of information without the need for direct or close physical contact. A human
recognizes the outside world through the ability of nervous systems which construct McLuhan, Marshall. Understanding
Media: The extension of Man, The MIT
internal visual representations of the outside world. The eye is like a camera in that it has
Press, 1999.
a set of lenses in the front (the cornea and the lens) that focus images on a light-sensitive
film (the retina) in the back [see photography]. The retina contains several layers of nerve Mulvey, Laura. "Visual Pleasure and
Narrative Cinema," in Screen, vol. 16,
cells that analyze visual information before it ever leaves the eye. Signals from the retina no.3, Autumn, 1975
are transmitted via the optic nerve to a way station in the core of the brain called the
Olin, Margaret. "Gaze," in Critical Terms
geniculate body, then to the primary visual cortex at the back of brain. Our image of the for Art History, ed. Robert S. Nelson
world is mapped topographically onto the visual cortex. and Richard Shiff, The University of
Chicago Press, Chicago & London, 1996.

It is important to note that the internal perception of visual media is not only a reflection Reed, Scott. "Working the Gaze: An
of its physical properties, but also the changes induced by its transduction, filtering, and attempt at clarifying Lacan's concept of
the gaze as object petit a," [20
transformation by the nervous system. [1] It is the brain, and not the eye, that is the true February 2003]
organ of visual perception. Given the brain's integral interpretive role in the construction of
Simons, Patricia, "Women in Frames:
any complex visual impression, it is necessary to be aware of how a human understands The Gaze, the Eye, the Profile in
his or her physical environment as a perceived environment. Renaissance Portraiture," in The
Expending Discourse: Feminism and Art
History, ed. Broude, Norma and
The term "gaze" is broadly used by media theorists to refer both to the ways in which Garrard, Mary D., IconEditions, 1992
viewers look at images of people in any visual medium and to the gaze of those depicted
in visual texts. [2] The "gaze" is a double-sided term. There must be someone to gaze and

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there may be someone to gaze back. To give the gaze is to perceive that one is looking at
an object. To set oneself at gaze is to expose oneself to view or display oneself. [3] Notes

Words for the agent of gazing are beholder, viewer, and occasionally spectator or
audience. Like a person, gaze also can be exchanged in a medium. Several key forms of
gaze can be identified in photographic, filmic or televisual tests, or in figurative graphic art [1] Cook, Robert G., "Visual Perception,"
based on who is doing the looking: the spectator's gaze, the intra-diegetic gaze, the direct <http://www.pigeon.tufts.edu/ecp.htm>
or extra-diegetic address to the viewer, and the look of the camera. [4] [2] Chandler, "Note on the 'Gaze',"
<http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/
Documents/gaze/gaze.html>
The antiquity of the discourse on gaze can be seen in such myths as that of the evil eye
and the gorgon Medusa, whose gaze could turn its object to stone. Folkloric [3]Oxford English Dictionary Online
"Gaze,"
representations of eyes sought to protect their wearers from the power of the evil gaze. In
<http:// dictionary.oed.com>.
the nineteenth century, the discourse on the visually perceptual object was centered on an
opposition between the optical and tactile senses. The tactile sense placed us in contact [4] Chandler, op. cit.

with reality while the optical sense was regarded as the sense of the intellect, the spirit, [5] See Olin, Margaret, in Critical Terms
and the imagination. Impressionists and symbolists were attracted by the fact that optical for Art History , ed. Robert S. Nelson
and Richard Shiff, The University of
perception seemed to unite the subjectivity of artistic vision with the objectivity of the Chicago Press, Chicago & London, 1996,
external world. It survived in the work of critics of the mid-twentieth century who used pp.208-214.
formal criteria to interpret such artistic movements as abstract expressionism. This [6] Reed, Scott, "Working the Gaze: An
discourse was continued, but replaced to a large extent by the term "gaze." In early attempt at clarifying Lacan's concept of
twentieth-century, German expressionism exploited the sense of power in images that the gaze as object petit a ,"
<http://web.nwe.ufl.edu/~sreed/
stared out at the viewer menacingly. The charisma of the gaze came to its peak in Hitler, eng6016/seminarxi.html >
who prided himself on his hypnotic gaze. Jean-Paul Sartre's almost paranoid treatment of
[7] Lacan, Jacques, "The Eye and the
" le regard " (the look) in his treatise on existential philosophy, Being and Nothingness , Gaze," in The Four Fundamental
portrayed the state of being watched as a threat to the self. [5] Concepts of Psychoanalysis , trans.
Sheridan, Alan, New York: Norton,
1978, p. 73.
A late-twentieth century interest in the eye and the gaze has been largely investigated so
far in terms of psychoanalysis. According to Jacques Lacan, human recognition of the [8] Olin, Margaret, op. cit., p. 215.

visual object is overlaid with mis-recognition. In "Of the Gaze as object petit a " Lacan [9] McLuhan, Marshall, Understanding
indicates some sort of outside observer; the imagery petit a is the lure for the subject's Media: The extension of Man, The MIT
Press, 1999, p. 41.
desire. [6] The embodiment of object petit a is what we may call the gaze. According to
Lacan, the subject's attempt to view the other must pass through the intermediary. The [10] Lacan, Jacques, op.cit., p. 93.
plane mirror provides a virtual image that covers up the fundamental lack in the real [11] Ibid., p. 94.
image. Thus, the gaze corresponds to desire, the desire for self-completion through the
[12] Manovich, Lev, "The Mapping of
other. "The eye and the gaze--this is for us the split in which the drive is manifested at the Space: Perspective, Radar, and 3-D
level of the scopic field." [7] In this permutation the gaze is the unattainable object of Computer Graphics,"
<http://www.manovich.net/
desire that seemed to make the other complete. However, for Lacan, it is important to
text/mapping.html#fu17>
understand that the eye and gaze, although split, are part of the same person. [8]
[13] Lacan, op. cit., p. 94.

Marshall McLuhan, in his Understanding Media: The extensions Man, refers to the tragedy [14] Chandler, op. cit.
of Narcissus caused by the misrecognition of his own image: "The Greek myth of Narcissus
[15] Mulvey, Laura, "Visual Pleasure and
is directly concerned with a fact of human experience, as the word Narcissus indicates. It Narrative Cinema," in Screen, vol.16,
is from the Greek word narcosis, or numbness. The youth Narcissus mistook his own no.3, Autumn, 1975, p. 9.
reflection in the water for another person. This extension of himself by mirror numbed his [16] Ibid., p. 11.
perceptions until he became the servomechanism of his own extended or repeated image.
[17] See Simons, Patricia, "Women in
The nymph Echo tried to win his love with fragments of his own speech, but in vain. He Frames: The Gaze, the Eye, the Profile
was numb. He had adapted to his extension of himself and had become a closed system." in Renaissance Portraiture," in The
Expending Discourse: Feminism and Art
[9]
History , ed. Broude, Norma and
Garrard, Mary D., pp. 39-57.
Lev Manovich notes that Lacan emphasizes that perspective extends beyond the domain of
[18] Foucault, Discipline and
the visible. Manovich points out that Lacan reminds us that an image is anything defined punishment: The Birth of the Prison ,
"by the correspondences from one point to another in space" [10] and the idea that New York, Pantheon, p. 155.
perspective is not only limited to sight but also functions in other senses defines the [19] Engberg, David, "The Virtual
classical discourses on perception: "The whole trick, the key presto!, of the classic dialectic Panopticon,"
<http://is.gseis.ucla.edu/impact/
around perception, derives from the fact that it deals with geometric vision, that is to say,
f96/projects/dengberg/>
with vision in so far as it situated in a space that is not in its essence the visual." [11]
Manovich argues that Lacan's clarification that the principle of perspective is not limited to [20] Foucault, op. cit., p. 25.

the visible helps us understand that the technologies of remote sensing function on the [21] Lutz, Catherine & Collins, Jane,
principle of perspective. According to Manovich, regardless of their lengths, all waves "The Photograph as an Intersection of
Gazes: The Example of National
travel in straight lines, and therefore points in space are connected by straight lines to a Geographic, in Visualizing Theory , New

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Geographic, in Visualizing Theory , New

point of reception (such as radar antenna) or recording (such as photographic camera). York, Routledge, 1994, p. 376.
[12] Radar, infrared imaging, sonar, or ultrasound are all part of what Lacan called [22] See Engberg, op. cit.
"geometric vision," perspectival vision which extends beyond the visible. [13]
[23] Ibid.

On the other hand, the film theorist Christian Merz made an analogy between the cinema
screen and mirror, arguing that by identifying with the gaze of the camera, the cinema
spectator re-enacts Lacan's "the mirror stage," [14] the moment when a child recognizes
its own image in the mirror as an idealized image of itself. In "Visual Pleasure and
Narrative Cinema," Laura Mulvey also made use of psychoanalytic theories of Lacan and
Sigmund Freud to explore the practices of representation and spectatorship in films.
Mulvey argues that cinematic viewing is the interplay between narcissistic identification and
erotic voyeurism. In his Three Essays on Sexuality, Sigmund Freud associated scopophilia
with the pleasure involved in looking at other people's bodies as objects. Mulvey argues
that cinema satisfies a primordial wish for pleasurable looking, but it also goes further,
developing scopophilia in its narcissistic aspect. [15] According to Mulvey, "pleasure in
looking has been split between active/male and passive/female. The determining male
gaze projects its fantasy onto the female figure which is styled accordingly. In their
traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their
appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote
to-be-looked-at-ness ." [16]

Many feminist art historians also have presented historical instances of the dominating
"male gaze" and the socio-cultural uses of the female body as signifier. For instance,
Patricia Simons explores the female profile portrait in fifteenth-century Florence. She
argues that the operations of the gaze in a "display culture" in which the presentation of
the female sitter with "an averted eye and a face available to scrutiny" served the needs of
a strongly male-dominated society in which brides and wives were visible emblems of
status and property exchange. For this reason, the portraits were not so much images of
human individuals as they were highly idealized "bearers of wealth," presenting a fixed
display of fetishized body parts, dress, and ornament to the appraising male eye. [17]

Michel Foucault related the "inspecting gaze" to power rather than to gender in his
discussion of surveillance. For Foucault, the asymmetry of seeing-without-being-seen in
the panopticon is the very essence of power. Jeremy Bentham envisioned the panopticon
or "all-seeing place" to provide complete observation of every prisoner. The panopticon
serves as a laboratory of humans, with data collected and collated through what Foucault
termed "the gaze": an inspecting gaze which each individual under its weight will end by
interiorizing to the point that he is his own overseer, each individual thus exercising this
surveillance over, and against, himself. A superb formula: power exercised continuously
and for what turns out to be minimal cost. [18] The faceless prisoners of this space are
held in darkness, illuminated only by roving spotlights that prevent them from observing
their observers, reinforcing Foucault's idea of a citizen who "is seen, but he does not see;
he is the object of information, never a subject in communication." [19]

The functions of photography can be seen in the context of Foucault's analysis of the rise
of surveillance in modern society. Photography promotes "the normalizing gaze, a
surveillance that makes it possible to qualify, to classify and to punish. It establishes over
individuals a visibility through which one differentiates and judges them." [20] On the
other hand, Catherine Lutz and Jane Collins combine Foucault's "inspecting gaze" and
Lacan's "mirror stage" to still photography. They argue that "mirror and camera are tools
of self reflection and surveillance. Each creates a double of the self, a second figure who
can be examined more closely than the original - a double that can also be alienated from
the self - taken away, as a photograph can be, to another place." [21]

The idea of "all-seeing" comes in the form of literal observation through cameras in public
spaces and electronic monitoring of workers. The view is that a society is being
constructed where all behavior will be sharply regulated through the fear of theoretical
observation by some oppressive entity. [22] "There has been much ballyhoo about the
liberating and decentralizing aspects of new media technologies like the Internet and

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ubiquitous computing, but the fact remains that new information technologies will be
every bit as effective for established organizations as they will be for garage e-zine
publishers. It still remains to be seen to what extent the new media technologies will in
fact increase the centralization of power by facilitating unprecedented monitoring and
observation." [23]

Phil Lee
Department of Art History
Winter 2003

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