Why Theory Gaze
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Oct 12, 2025 Dive into the intriguing world of the gaze in psychoanalytic theory, where mastery comes into question. Discover how Laura Mulvey's perspective shaped film theory and why the gaze challenges rather than confirms authority. Ryan and Todd explore artistic examples from Holbein to Velázquez, illustrating the complex interplay of vision and desire. They uncover cinematic moments that expose the audience's unsettling alignment with morally dubious characters, leaving listeners to ponder the deeper implications of seeing and being seen.
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Gaze As The Blind Spot Of Mastery
- The gaze marks a blind spot in the visual field that disconfirms any claimed mastery.
- Lacan locates the gaze as the index of what cannot be reduced to the ruling perspective.
Vanishing Point Includes The Painter
- Perspective painting inserts the painter into the picture via the vanishing point.
- Lacan reads that inclusion as the painter's absence registered as a disturbance in the field.
Holbein's Skull That Sees You First
- Hans Holbein's The Ambassadors uses anamorphosis to hide an elongated skull that appears from a particular viewpoint.
- The skull functions as Lacan's example of the gaze as an object that 'saw you before you saw it.'
