Landscape
Background: Both popular movies and advertising using the filmic/visual technique of presenting women in or as landscapes. This exhibit focuses on the varied ways in which the female body is produced as a landscape, whether a natural one or a commercial/urban one. The Ads: The variations of this trope include (1) women's bodies incorporated as natural landscapes (various ads), (2) women's bodies in urban landscapes (Ads 8 and 9), (3) women's bodies as landscapes presented for men to use (Ads 10-11, 21, 28). Discussion Questions: (1) What cultural values inform the trope of the body as landscape? (2) Why are women's bodies seen as forms of the natural landscape more often than men's bodies? (3) Can you locate similar ads in which male bodies are utilized as landscapes?
