an exhibition of photography from Hong Kong at INDEXG gallery, Toronto, April 2010

by Evangelo Costadimas

We all have a voyeuristic streak in us whether we like to openly admit it or not. It is basic human nature to be curious but beyond mere curiosity, we are well conscious of what moral society expects of us when it comes to looking at others. It is inappropriate and in some places, illegal to ‘spy’ on others, particularly in a sexual context. Yet if presented with an opportunity to do it secretly most of us are more than likely going to take a peek. Even if we do not engage in regular voyeuristic activity there are times when we come to realize that we do derive pleasure from watching people.

Voyeurism is defined as the pleasure one gets from watching others, furtively or from a distance, whilst they are naked or engaged in sexual activity and usually, remain unaware of being watched.

Oddly, and despite the fact that such behaviour has been present in popular culture since ancient times, it wasn’t until the early 20th century that the French finally came up with a word for it from their own verb for seeing (voir).  Even more peculiar, is the fact that the English language had to borrow this word from the French due to a total lack of one from its own vocabulary, presumably because Victorian era English was too dignified to partake in immoral behaviour in any shape or form. All the while and for purely scientific purposes another term appeared, a word that was coined from the Greek language, “Scopophilia” or literally: the love of watching. In English, “Voyeur” as a word often conjures up images of lecherous old men and “Peeping Toms”. It is a word that carries connotations of perversion, immorality and for some, a mental disorder.

One has but to wonder if it was due to British sensitivity in the Victorian era that the term “Peeping Tom” was a much-preferred euphemism. Tom was of course none other than the character in the Legend of Lady Godiva, who watched her ride naked. However, Michael Powell’s 1960 horror film Peeping Tom, portrays a psychotic serial killer as a voyeur and is most probably the single largest contributor to our present day association of voyeurism, rightly or wrongly, to an unhealthy state of mind.

Despite all this, Voyeurism in Art, has been a very popular topic and appears often in the grand narrative with countless references ranging from ancient mythologies, to the painting tradition, literature, poetry and film. When narrating a voyeuristic scenario, the author/painter/film director draws in the viewer or audience, but at the same time turns them into accomplices. It is their complicity whilst watching which raises fascination and intrigue, for they too become voyeurs and through the depicted character partake in the voyeur’s erotic pleasure.

Laura Mulvey’s famous essay: “Visual pleasure and Narrative Cinema” is considered seminal work in the field of Feminism and film studies, in that it defines the notion of the “Male Gaze” and posits that the fascination with voyeurism in film is controlling, phallocentric, and patriarchal while the subject of the voyeuristic gaze is feminine and passive. Subsequently, a number of thinkers have challenged Mulvey’s essay as being focused only on the patriarchal domination of modern films (up to the 1970’s), having surreptitiously by-passed the fact that women are also present in film audiences. Many of these critics conclude that the Male Gaze could be adopted by both male and female subjects and some have surmised that the male is not always the controlling subject nor is the female always the passive object.

There are areas of Hong Kong that rank amongst the most densely populated in the world. Privacy, just as space, comes at a premium. There are thousands of people residing in low cost housing tenements that are built so close to each other that one can peer into their neighbours’ bedroom a mere couple of yards away. Looking and gazing at others is as unavoidable and as much part of daily life as watching television. Yet, by and large, Hongkongers are conservative and it is extremely rare to find any engaging in overt and utter exhibitionism. There have been a number of publicized cases of perverts being arrested and prosecuted for having used mobile phones to photograph or film women’s underwear by sticking their mobile phones below women’s skirts whilst riding escalators or climbing up stairs.

This is not just a Hong Kong phenomenon, Internet porn sites are rife with ‘up skirt’ videos from all over the world. But nothing compares to the climax of voyeuristic activity when a perfect storm of scopophilia hit the city during weeks after the Edison Chen scandal. Copies of photographs taken during his sexual exploits with a series of young starlets were discovered by a computer technician who was repairing the star’s hard drive. Somehow the images changed hands and surfaced on the Internet whereby they went viral through chain-emails and the blog circuit. This is exactly the type of scandal that causes mega waves. It rocked Hong Kong to the point where police announced that it was illegal to possess copies of those images on one’s computer, spurring a flurry of protests by freedom of speech activists.

With this exhibition, I would also like to question and perhaps challenge, some commonly held perceptions such as the idea that voyeurs are always controlling and male and that their subjects are always submissive and female. Furthermore, I would like to address the notion that some voyeurism targets might actually seek or derive pleasure in exposing themselves, which also leads to another interesting idea, that of the relationship between the voyeur and the exhibitionist. What happens when the so-called ‘victim’ is fully aware of being watched and is it still a gratifying experience to the voyeur once he or she becomes aware of this?

I would also like to challenge some old male-chauvinism stereotypes by presenting works that show how women view female nudity and how female artists present works relating to their sexuality, in some cases by posing in the nude themselves. I should make it clear that some of the works presented were created as part of each artists’ individual on going art practice and that each artist might or might not have intended to address any of the above listed concerns relating to voyeurism or exhibitionism. My curatorial practice is often engaged with story telling. As such, I am in some cases, re-interpreting the artists’ work and presenting it to the audience from an alternate point of view. In all fairness to the artists, I have asked for their permission and provided their individual artist statements to be made available to viewers.

Some of the female nudes that appear in this exhibition were made by female artists and in some cases such as Eva Chan’s “This is not a dream”, the photographic work also happens to be a self-portrait, what might at first glance appear as a nude woman sleeping on a red sofa, turns out to be a corpse.

What happens when, as viewers engaged in the act of voyeurism, we become aware of Christopher Cheung’s giant female eye watching us? Christopher’s work addresses issues of identity and constitutes a prime example of how his work is being presented in this exhibition in a different context.

Norman Ford’s “Crosswise: a redux of Newton, Mulvey and Burgin, with models” makes direct reference to Laura Mulvey’s essay, at the same time paying homage to Helmut Newton’s subversive mastery in perversion from his famous self portrait in front of a mirror with nude models and his wife, which has been a topic of much critical discussion and compared to works by Velasquez to Jeff Wall.

Artist Laleeskin’s beautiful monochromatic image of a female form is so enticing that we might forget we are peeking at a naked woman while she sleeps in the fetal position.

Matina Cheung portrays herself in various overtly sexual poses letting the viewer in for a look at her intimate moments with her lover whilst at the same time challenging viewers with what should be considered natural acts, in her aptly entitled series “Why this is always related to dirty in your mind?”.

Tsang Kim Wa’s “Majestic Hotel, Guangzhou, Feb 01, 2010” comes from a series of self -portraits lying nude in hotel room bathrooms, an ongoing diary that is deliberately imbued with ambiguity to match his/her persona.

Quist Tsang offers us a quiet and contemplative self-portrait in her bathtub soaked in subtle hues of chamomile and in stark contrast to her usual outrageously explosive colour palette. 

Siu Ding collaborates with Ada Hung staving off boredom by making exhibitionistic photos of herself for her hand made books, her latest series using checker backdrops of all sorts including these instant photos made in metro subway stations.

Lam Wai Kit’s collaboration with Ivan Lupi gives us an enigmatic look at part of her face seen through her compact mirror in her hand, whilst a creamy teardrop runs down her cheek.

Last but not least, Fanny Cheuk’s nude self portrait “Twin” was made after she woke up in the middle of the night suffering from a recent separation with her lover whose ghostly image is depicted as her alter ego superimposed to her own as a body double.