Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Circulation of Cultural Energy: Swetnam & Speight

Two pieces of literature that we found that seem to go together with the painting, Venus with a Mirror, are Swetnam’s, “ From The Arraignment of Lewd, Idle, Froward, and Unconstant Women: Or the Vanity of Them Choose You Whether” and Speight’s, “ From A Muzzle for Melastomus”. In both of these pieces of literature each author makes an argument against or in support of the woman and her significance within society. Swetnams excerpt defends the negative stereotypes that are assumed about the woman from the patriarchal society of that time period. He portrays women as being lazy and willing to do anything at the detriment of a man. Swetnam continues to reinforce the notion that women are to be looked at and not heard. This argument ties into the painting, Venus with a Mirror, because the woman in the painting is doing exactly what Swetnam would say a woman should do. She is sitting beautifully admiring herself, while others admire her from a far. The painting captures the beauty and frailty of the woman. The woman is posed in a very demure position, which automatically displays her beauty. The fact that she is naked also plays into Swetnam’s beliefs that women are sexual creatures who use their sexuality to bring men down. Her being naked creates an alluring feeling for the man, which to its credit is very powerful in the hands of the woman.
In Speight’s piece, she argues that the woman has much more significance than just being the inferior figure to the man. She argues that the woman has her purpose and instead of being inferior should be equal to the man. Speight looks at gender in a means of equality, which banishes a lot of the gender roles that are assigned to men and women. A big part of Speight’s defense in her piece is the fact Swetnam’s argument is merely based off of emotion and ideals that have already been formed. Speight brings a new argument to the table, which supports equality of the sexes. After reading Speight’s piece, and evaluating the painting, we came to the conclusion that Speight would not be in support of this painting. One of the many issues that the writer would have with the painting is the fact that the women are only being displayed for her beauty. She is naked and a spectacle for men to look at and admire. The painting does not display the woman as being intelligent and independent of the ideals that the man has projected on to her. She is not being looked at as equal to the man but instead part of the existence for men. In men’s eyes this picture is the ultimate definition of feminity, however, Speight would argue that this picture is everything that she is fighting against when it comes to the role of the woman within Renaissance society.

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