BIDDEFORD — Gender as it is presented in media, from visual art to film and multimedia, will be the topic of a discussion tonight at Engine in downtown Biddeford.

The panel discussion, “Then and Now,” is free and open to the public, and is just one of an ongoing series of events held at the nonprofit arts center surrounding gender, identity and culture.

“I think there are some incredibly overlooked things that happen in media,” said Tammy Ackerman, executive director of Engine. “The messages about how women have been portrayed have not been very positive.”

The panel will feature discussions led by Kristin Lindsley, an assistant lecturer in business at the University of New England, and Jessica Roscio, assistant curator at Danforth Art Museum School in Framingham, Massachusetts.

Discussions will focus on women’s and men’s roles in society as explored through different forms of art and media.

Ackerman said she is particularly interested in how women are portrayed in video games and the potential implications of an oversexualized virtual landscape.

“If you’ve ever played or seen anyone play ‘Grand Theft Auto,’ you might be appalled,” Ackerman said. “So how does that impact our young boys who are the primary audience for that kind of message? Is there a connection? I don’t know. They’re being desensitized to these things in a virtual world.”

Inspiration for the panel came from the art exhibit currently on display at Engine, “That’s What She Said,” a collection of photo series and other works by Portsmouth, New Hampshire- and Kitterybased artist Nancy Grace Horton, whose work was the highlight of the May Saco-Biddeford Final Friday ArtWalk at Engine.

Horton’s exhibit focuses on the sexualization of women and the ways in which gender is discussed in popular culture, and aims to create a conversation about what it means to be male or female as it is seen through art. Horton will also be present at the panel.

While Horton creates photographs, Roscio studies them. Roscio, who became known to Ackerman through a mutual colleague at Boston University, was asked to present part of her work surrounding gender identity experimentation through late-19th century photographs.

“I hope the audiences are able to see this long history of using visual art as a vehicle for gender identity experimentation,” she said.

Roscio said much of her work has focused on the photography of Alice Auesten, an early female photographer from Staten Island, and Frances Benjamin Johnston, another pioneering female photographer and photojournalist, both of whom toyed with gender before it became popular to do so.

“One of the things I’ve always focused on is that, ever since its inception, photography has been a medium that is accessible to women,” Roscio said. “Women often used the camera in very powerful and subversive ways and had full control over it. You often see depictions of the ‘new woman’ in the 1920s, but that actually happened decades earlier.”

Part of Roscio’s portion of the panel will focus on how gender in photography has both changed and stayed the same in the past 100 years.

Ackerman isn’t sure what the panel will accomplish, but she mostly hopes to inspire action regarding gender issues through engaging discussion.

“I hope they (the public) take away some food for thought, and hopefully that food for thought transforms into some action,” Ackerman said. “I’m not sure what that action is, unless it’s simply getting involved with youth in the community to model positive behavior. That can take any number of pathways.

“I hope not all people that come are from our tribe. I hope other people from the community will come and be interested in the topic as well. It’s always nice when someone we’ve never seen walks through the door and has that conversation. And they can even have a counter view. It makes for good dialogue.”

“Then and Now” will begin at 7 tonight at Engine, 128 Main St. A cash bar with beer and wine will be open for visitors.

— Staff Writer Alan Bennett can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 329 or [email protected].