Undressing the Gaze

Towards healthier expressions of desire and vision

To counter the toxic effects of the male gaze, research and theory suggest shifting from object-to-subject, from spectator-dominated to relational seeing. Strategies include: designing media that centre other gaze perspectives (female, queer, non-binary), fostering visual literacy so viewers recognise and reject objectifying frames, and creating practices of mutual looking—where desire is shared, reciprocal, embodied. For fashion, art and representation this means staging people as active rather than passive, reclaiming public space for agency and plural desire, and privileging the experiential over the performative