The Male Nude: Turning the Gaze

While the female nude has long played a conspicuous role in western art, the genre’s symbolic scaffolding of gender hierarchy, and the accompanying sexualized objectification (if not exploitation) of women, have rendered in high relief our current culture’s questioning of gender roles and specifically the assumed dominance of the male (predatory) gaze.

The exhibition, The Male Nude: Turning the Gaze, aims to turn that gaze around and level the visual field through a full-frontal celebration of men’s bodies. It will feature a salon of erotic and non-erotic works in a range of media and styles that explore the compositions, postures, and role-playing within this flourishing yet still underexposed genre.