Female Sensibility

Directed by Lynda Benglis

As two heavily made-up women take turns directing each other and submitting to each other's kisses and caresses, it becomes increasingly obvious that the camera is their main point of focus. Read against feminist film theory of the "male gaze", the action becomes a highly charged statement of the sexual politics of viewing and role-playing; and, as such, is a crucial text in the development of early feminist video. "This video is Benglis's emphatic response to the notion of a distinctly feminine artistic sensibility and to the belief in a necessary lesbian phase in the women's movement—ideas that were often debated in the early 1970s." —Susan Krane, "Introduction", Lynda Benglis: Dual Natures (Atlanta: High Museum of Art, 1991) -http://www.vdb.org/titles/female-sensibility