Much of the way we can understand photography of the body must be related to the male gaze. The relationships, values, and assumptions on which the terms of sexual representation are based can be seen in the way the male looks at a female. In the words of Graham Clarke, Chim’s image of Bernard Berenson at the Borghese Gallery places such a relationship in a wonderfully subtle yet telling context. “This is a study on the act of looking, although filtered very much through the life-style of a refined and aesthetic patrician figure. The civilized encounter allows it to be places within the ambiance of fine art and the museum; but, Berenson apart, it also places it in terms of the male gaze and female passivity. The female precise here is seen only in terms of a frozen object. The male figure is free to roam the gallery in search of female images and female forms. It is, as it were, a feast for his eye.”
-Fans in a Flashbulb
