“Don’t keep pulling me … I’m not just an object, I am a person …” These were the words uttered by Paula Yates in the Channel 4 documentary about the late TV presenter that aired last week.
Though the footage came from the 1980s, Yates’s words showed me not only how little has changed, but how accepting – and perhaps immune – we are to how badly the media treat women. From Monica Lewinsky to Britney Spears, there are countless examples of women having been publicly shamed and abused. This made me think about the presentation of women in European painting, and the volume of work in our galleries that we accept as beautiful nudes, but are in fact glorified depictions of violence against women.
