The Femme Fatale: An Analysis of the Archetype’s Remediation From Visual Arts to TikTok

Abstract: The purpose of this essay is to investigate how cultural symbols are influenced during their remediation to social media platforms. As a case to explore this, this study delves into an examination of the remediation of the Femme Fatale archetype from the visual art tradition to the social media platform TikTok. This thesis aims to explore the remediation of the Femme Fatale archetype from the visual arts tradition to the social media platform TikTok. TikTok has rapidly increased in popularity in recent years, boasting over one billion international users. TikTok's short-form video-sharing platform allows users to sample content from various mediums (such as art and film) and adapt it to the platform. This relationship between content curation and user engagement highlights the importance of exploring Femme Fatale's remediation process on TikTok, mainly how content from the visual arts tradition is portrayed on the platform. This will be achieved by utilizing a feminist perspective, exploring how the remediation process impacts gender role stereotypes and power dynamics within the Femme Fatale archetype. The study will employ remediation as a theoretical and analytical framework. Furthermore, to incorporate the feminist perspective, the concepts of male gaze and performativity will be embedded in the analysis. Thirty TikToks were sourced for analysis and explored through the framework of remediation, the concept of male gaze, and the concept of performativity. The study concludes that the remediation of the Femme Fatale results in a loss of original narrative. The research highlights how TikTok’s participatory culture enables the ongoing performance of the Femme Fatale. Moreover, the majority of the content on the platform reveals a narrative of the Femme Fatale through surface-level aesthetics, allowing for its commodification, which emphasizes visual appeal over in-depth narrative, aligning with traditional tropes found in previous mediums. The study contributes to a further understanding of how the remediation process can influence cultural symbols previously embedded in the tradition of visual arts through social media platforms' medium-specific demands on content creation.