The Female Nude as allegory or symbol
There is a long tradition in art of using the human figure to personify particular virtues or themes - allegorical art. Within this history, we can find many examples of the nude female form.
Justice
Collins
Inclination
(innate ability)
Gentileschi
Summer
Doubek
What are we to make of these?
Do they need to be female? Do they need to be nude or partly clothed?
Probably not.
So (bearing in mind that one of the artists - Artemisia Gentileschi - is herself, a woman) do they use art as a vehicle for making a spectacle of women's bodies?
I suspect that we are concerned about questions like these (in a way that we are not with men) because so often women's bodies have indeed be presented as commodities. Given that the world of art has been dominated and controlled by men up to the present time, we ought to maintain this kind of vigilance in our love of art.
But what happens when women paint the female nude?