Susanna in the bath - after Giuseppe Cesari

In keeping with classical iconographic tradition, the two old men are positioned on the same side of the canvas, and in a different space from Suzanne. Suzanne conceals her nudity from the inquisitive eyes of the perverse old men by interposing an abundance of hair, which takes the place of her clothing. Shielding herself from the eyes of the old men, she gives herself up to those of the spectators on the canvas, perfectly fulfilling the founding contradiction of the scenic device: the spectator looks at what he shouldn't see; Susanna is delivered to him at the very moment when she virtuously withdraws from the eyes of the old men, who nonetheless metaphorize the spectator on the canvas.    
The space of the bath, delimited and circumscribed by the architectural factory against which Suzanne is leaning, constitutes the space of the scene itself, or restricted space. The restricted space is indeed the space towards which the gazes converge, the perverse gaze of the old men and the supposedly virtuous gaze of the spectator.    
Behind the factory, on the right, the place where the old men are, i.e. the open part of the garden, defines, constitutes the vague space, the space from which the focal object of the performance, the scene itself, is viewed.    
Between these two spaces, the vague space where the old men are and the restricted space where Suzanne is, a parapet carved in bas-relief redoubles in stone the screen of hair interposed by Suzanne. The screen separates, and at the same time articulates, the vague space and the restricted space. It's hard to guess what the bas-relief represents. Just above Suzanne's knuckle, a woman kneels at the feet of a young (hairless) man, whose arms are outstretched towards a group of bearded men in discussion. The bas-relief may represent Susanna's judgment and the intervention of young Daniel.    
What's certain, in any case, is that this low wall, which spatially materializes the prohibition of the gaze (the old men are behind the low wall because they're not allowed to look at Suzanne naked), at the same time carries representation: the screen is contradictorily an instrument of blindness and visibility.