Have you ever noticed the pictures hanging on the walls at the Buca di Beppo in Claremont, CA? Last Friday evening a friend and I opted to endure a ridiculous hour-long wait and make Buca our restaurant of choice (I must have really had a craving for homogenized Italian food and clamorous environments).
Once we were seated, we waited for what seemed like another hour for our food. This, however, was actually a good thing. It gave me a little time to observe. In the midst of my eyes glazing over from low blood sugar, I began to look around to admire the schlocky Italian décor and the splattering of pictures that adorned the walls. Upon further examination, I could see that most all of them were classic reproductions of female Italian sex symbols scantily clad in some sort of compromising position. To my left was a picture of a naked woman holding two large watermelon halves in front of her breasts. To my right was Sophia Loren in all her cleavaged glory while Gina Lollobrigida bent over to reveal hers. These were just a few. The walls were covered with similar content. But, the most disturbing picture (and ironically the largest) was the one blaring right in front of me. In this picture, a slick, dark-haired man and a voluptuous woman are sharing an enormous plate of spaghetti (paralleling the portion sizes touted at the restaurant, I'm guessing). She is looking away in disgust as he is putting a piece of spaghetti down the middle of her cleavage. She clearly is not embracing his act as a sensual one, but seemingly much more violative.
As I absorbed the atmosphere, I was reminded of the pervasion of female objectification and it disturbed me. Nowhere could I find any pictures of men in compromising positions being ogled (or groped). It wasn't like I could conveniently change the channel either, my food had arrived and I was committed. Sure, I could have gotten up and walked out, but then I would have missed observing others observe these pictures (or their pretend or real oblivion to them for that matter). I won't be going back, however, unless to interview people on what they think of them.
I know Buca is supposed to represent an Italian authenticity. If promoting the prevalence of patriarchal dominion in Italian culture and elsewhere is their objective, then they are effective. If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, then the deluge of these pictures speak volumes about the beholder.
