Facial expressions have always baffled me. I am able to 'read' the patterns in human behavior though so I'm good at profiling people.
I enjoyed this piece and could relate to a lot of your thoughts on gender and being an observer of the way it works and the way the binary is enforced. I don't have an internal sense of gender either.
Your interpretation also works, though, because the woman sitting for the painting is a paid model. She is in fact consciously trying to produce the expression she has been asked to show. (“Look proud. No, like you’re very pleased with what you see. Untouchable. Yes, like that. Now hold it.”)
Which still leaves us able to wonder why the painter asked her to look like that.
Facial expressions have always baffled me. I am able to 'read' the patterns in human behavior though so I'm good at profiling people.
I enjoyed this piece and could relate to a lot of your thoughts on gender and being an observer of the way it works and the way the binary is enforced. I don't have an internal sense of gender either.
Your interpretation also works, though, because the woman sitting for the painting is a paid model. She is in fact consciously trying to produce the expression she has been asked to show. (“Look proud. No, like you’re very pleased with what you see. Untouchable. Yes, like that. Now hold it.”)
Which still leaves us able to wonder why the painter asked her to look like that.