Gazing on invisible men: Introducing the gallery gaze to establish that (in)visibility is in the eye of the beholder at Westminster Menswear Archive

Abstract

The Westminster Menswear Archive, housed at the University of Westminster held an exhibition in 2019 entitled ‘Invisible Men’. The purpose of this show was to “shine a light” on men, or more accurately menswear which had been hitherto neglected by scholarship and exhibitions featuring dress (Groves and Sprecher, 2019). This article draws on research conducted at this exhibition to ask anthropological questions as to the nature of menswear both in the gallery space and beyond. Fundamentally this will question the invisible nature of menswear and whether such invisibility really exists. In order to accomplish this, this article will suggest a new theory of the gaze that exists in the gallery or exhibition space – the gallery gaze – and use it to provoke analysis of the ethnographic material presented. This article acknowledges a distinction between intellectual, semiotic and symbolic invisibility but suggests a different approach, arguing for an (in)visibility of progressive degrees.

Turning around the camera: Self-portraits of an anthropologist on Instagram

“…Twice a year, the Instagram network is flooded with images of men in astonishing pieces of tailoring, typically captured in a high-fashion editorial style of image often posed to look like they are simply captured in the street talking to colleagues or walking between events. This has become such an identifiable form of image and event on the social and fashion calendar of menswear that the Instagram dandies I work with (see Bluteau, 2022b) -and those aspiring to be -who are not invited or unable to access this space emulate the style of image when they travel as a means of enriching their digital selves.…”

“…Figure 2 adds activity to the image, which both figuratively and literally pushes the clothed body into the background. This adds a playfulness to the images, particularly when placed in the context of a set of similar images, and adds life to a digital (clothes wearing) self that can at times feel more mannequin than man (see Bluteau, 2022b). Ice cream was particularly chosen to highlight the juxtaposition between the grown-up world of tailoring and the playful nature of travel and experimenting with colour.…”