by Ava Sherwood-Rogers
He, the walker
Flânerie is a mode of observation. It gives way to a vivid stream of consciousness translated into writings, images, and artistry. It is the act of dawdling, idly, through an urban environment, observing the crowd whilst being part of it like a spy, looking out from within. Flânerie was, and is, a treasured creative practice for many; especially the surrealists, as the street becomes extraordinary through serendipitous happenings. In its infancy, surrealism was a novel method of forcing inspiration. The word was coined by French poet, Guillame Appollinaire, and used in a preface of a performance by Les Ballet Russes of Erik Satie’s ‘Parade’ in Paris 1917, a collaborative production - with music by Satie, scenario by Jean Cocteau, costumes by Pablo Picasso and choreography by Leonide Massine. Their goal: to create something devoid from the ordinary. This ethos upheld surrealism as a modern school of thought and the term gave a practice to an act of subversion, socially and politically, that used the imagination as a path to discovery (instead of pragmatism). The philosophy grew through the revaluation of poetry as a literary instrument that could harness this exploration of the unconscious. Men such as Charles Baudelaire and André Breton harnessed their status in this field and sequestered the artistic practice of wondering aimlessly for one type of surrealist: the Flâneur - a dashing young gentleman whose wealth and education allowed him to explore the new urban arcades of 19th century Paris. This caricature has been persevered throughout history as the celebrated bohemian artist and, given the traditional patriarchal dominance within the arts, has shaped how women exist within the public domain. The female version, the Flâneuse, has only started to emerge with Janett Wolf’s essay, The Invisible Flâneuse which spearheaded discourse exploring actuality of such an existence. Previously, it was thought that women could not experience the shackless escapades of flânerie. If they were to be freely on the street, they were streetwalkers, prostitutes, ladies of debauched demeanour because a woman's place was at home, behind closed doors. Domestic tasks do not take place on the street and therefore, if a woman inhabited the street, she was out of place, or most importantly, moving into the next. A woman's existence in the public domain was never permanent - it was transient.
She, the city
London is a city born from movement. It is made up of 32 boroughs - each holding organic communities and energized experiences, like the organs of a body, bringing it to life. There is some wilderness amongst the cultivation. It is commonplace to rest on the greenery, taking refuge on the luscious grass of St James Square, where the swollen city sounds become almost obsolete, or wind down on the surviving patchy turf of London Fields that have been scorched by the long summer sun. However, the concrete is our lifeline, giving the population their ability to move freely around it, with ease of step, solid and reliable. It is tempting to call London she, for anyone that experiences London knows her intimately. She’s a vessel that we get to use; passive in its structure but active in its inertia. The busses are her veins, the tube her arteries, transporting the life keeps her going steady. Her tensions fluctuate, neighbourhoods confuse her rigidity but the energetic flow is comfortably cushioned in one's faith that she is, was and will be, the body that holds life. You could compare her to many other cities, for all encompass the same pace of life. When one walks a city, they traverse a journey of streets, each with their own names. The semantics of street names is important in experiencing a sense of belonging in London. Here, street names fall into three categories: descriptive, possessive and topical—which of these is chosen is largely based on the date it was built. The earliest street names were largely descriptive, but after The Great Fire of London in 1666, possessive names were popularized. Noble landowners developed estates and gave their own names to their streets. The patriarchal structure of pre-suffrage society concealed the existence of a powerful and public female figure. Officially, the possessive genre encapsulated a category of ‘great men’ names that were second choice to Royalty. In London today, of 200 streets, 30% are honorific, and just 10% are named after women. This is a trend not just in London but across the world. We are bombarded by masculine influence via street signage and semantics which, quite literally, hangs over us wherever we travel. To me, I relate to this. It is comparable to our experience of body politics. That is why it is tempting to call London she, or her—it analogizes the objectification of the city's body as a vessel for patriarchal exploitation.
I, the Flâneuse
I, the Flâneuse, simply exist. My first interaction with the idea of the Flâneuse was through the denial of her existence. Scholars such as Griselda Pollock and Janet Wolf make arguments against the female version of the flaneur for a woman on the street was an object of spectacle, not of detached observation. Perhaps this scrutiny is necessary when considering a revisionist take women and society in the past but to deny her existence is somewhat farcical. It is not hard to conceive that women exist on the street, but it is hard to digest that we are subject to reason - why do we wander? Or exist outside of menial domesticity? Men are not subject to the same reasoning. To exist somewhere, anywhere, as a man is expected. They are somewhat blind to the masculine architecture. Narrow sidewalks, coarse corners and darkened alleys tantalize the flaneur’s journey, intrigued by who may subvert them. As a woman, one is laden to subversion, it is how we exist in the patriarchy. There is a constant conformity to social roles and relationships necessary for us to take part in practicing our freedom. Take for example Vivian Maier, a nanny whose raw and intellectual photographs of the street established her as one of America’s favourite artists, posthumously. She is the perfect example of the Flâneuse. Walking was her creative practice.The epitome of the female role, the nanny, allowed her to wander, incognito, through the streets of New York and Chicago. A woman whose gendered facade was necessary camouflage for her artistic agency, she was permissible to the male gaze and therefore, suited the public domain's patriarchal architecture. Maier exercised intelligent trespassing. I first came across this term when reading about Virginia Woolf’s musings on the female experience of walking. A Room of One’s Own (1929) documents the intersections of gender, place and space when visiting the grounds of Cambridge University: “It was thus that I found myself walking with extreme rapidity across a grass plot. Instantly a man’s figure rose to intercept me. Nor did I at first understand that the gesticulations of a curious-looking object, in a cut-away coat and evening shirt, were aimed at me. His face expressed horror and indignation. Instinct rather than reason came to my help, he was a Beadle; I was a woman. This was the turf; there was the path. Only the Fellows and Scholars are allowed here; the gravel is the place for me. Such thoughts were the work of a moment.” Here, Woolf views her gender as her crux. Her indoctrinated fear is an experience women widely experience in cities, in which architecture and the psychogeography of a city warn them they are not welcome. That prevalence of a patriarchy embeds an insecurity in how we interact with the street. The phantomization of women buries our presence as transient and permeable. If one believes they are not allowed to be somewhere, then it is implied that one does not have the freedom to exist everywhere. Questioning our presence is the first step in undermining our value.
We, the street
Camouflage would not be necessary if the street felt comfortable. The feeling of belonging is nurtured by relatability and, if we had more places and spaces dedicated to female figures or experiences, our existence would be proven and celebrated—actions intrinsic to deconstructing the patriarchy. Sadly, renaming streets is a whimsical prospect and a process that raises even more questions about the intersections of identity, society and politics. We can, however, claim the practice of flânerie. Women have always been wanderers. But the ones that wander are excluded from history . History that is made up by the man, for the man. The more we observe, the more we explore, the more we digest, the more we insert ourselves into a domain that should include us. People make up a street. Without street wanderers, the paved land becomes hollow and devoid of its purpose, like a bare skeleton - lost of softness. We should reinsert our presence in a city’s skeleton by exploring. We should linger in weird places, questioning what serendipitous happening will occur if only but wait. We should travel without direction, get lost in its veins and brush up with unexpected people. We should take shelter outside, revel in losing oneself in a crowd and aim to find comfort in public. Document how this feels, take photos of your travels, map out your routes, note your encounters, draw what you see, paint what you hear. Flâneusing around London has made the city mine. My aimless walks and endless wanderings have mapped out the city's body for me. I feel included in its make up. We have to reduce the seduction of domesticity by rejecting its inevitability - instead, we should use the street for traditionally domestic endeavours. These do not have to be guerilla tactics, the most powerful moments of protest can occur through the most mundane of tasks. Perhaps, start with having coffee sitting on the curb, observing whilst imposing a presence. This accumulation of experience can be used to interrogate the lack of female representation within the public domain. If we use flânerie as the artistic endeavour that it is, narratives of the female experience become relatable not just to those who are women, but all those who walk the street with us, for a street connects us. The more we create an understanding of the world, the more the world can understand us. So, walk the street, observe different spaces, explore new places and wander, simply, to exist.