Iconographic signification is the product of historical repetition. The gender associations of certain figural dynamics are an example of this. Michelangelo’s ‘David’ and Titian’s ‘Venus of Urbino’ are both the product and the provider of limiting and particular gender roles in visual culture. They provide a high renaissance iconic fulfilment of a historical continuum that was largely unchallenged until the 20^th century.

For Michelangelo’s ‘David’ read the archetypal male: Tall, erect, vertical, active and heroic. The fulfilment of Vasari’s male dominated aesthetic, a worked under pinned by a power of ‘desegno’, that supposedly masculine trait of intellectual rigour.

For Titian’s ‘Venus of Urbino’ read the archetypal female. Most depressingly a type seemingly formed by its opposition to the male, not through autonomy. Here we have the horizontal, the reclining, the submissive eroticism; the receiver of the male gave.

The relationship between reality and art is not as simple as the one way mirror people believe. Art also feeds back into society. The formation of such clear gender principles in visual form is obviously the product of limiting social modes of gender engagement. The product of a species which needs to have clarity and order so finds it easier to create a two way hierarchy between the sexes.

Art does not just reflect this back to us. It helps imbed the notion more firmly into our consciousness, leading us to believe the artificially constructed ideals as being intrinsic facts of the human condition. When you have as iconic models as those of Titian and Michelangelo, which remain celebrated through history, than it is very hard to shake of the constrains of such an image. Art is both formed from what we have made ourselves and both helps mould us. It is a far more active agent of social power than many people give it credit for. In this case it is still a shackling influence we are trying to escape from.