Evaluative Plane

We already know that the three said planes named as semiotic, iconic and contextual planes provides vision and
idea of what the art conveys based on the signifiers and signified. These concepts provide more value on texture,
line, color and the creative aspects depicted in the work. The last plane to be discussed is the evaluative plane.
Evaluative plane or known as axiological plane is the study of artwork based on how it interacts on the viewer and
providing dialogic relations towards the art. Towards this perspective, values is the main viewpoint to understand
the art. The analysis of these values will link the artwork towards reality where the viewer can somewhat relate for
example social issues.

The axiological plane has to do with analyzing the values of a work. After the understanding of the work is the
difficult task of evaluating it. Often, it is facile to say that evaluation involves the two aspects of form and content.
But this division is theoretically conservative because the two are conceptually separated. It is semiotic analysis
involving the basic semiotic plane the iconic plane and the contextual plane that shows how meaning is produced
through the interrelationship of the Signifiers (material features) and signified (concepts, values) in the unique
pictorial sign that is the work of art. At all points, meaning is anchored in material form Again, empirical, physical
fact is value laden and value ensues from material fact. Thus, the first consideration in evaluating would be to what
degree the material basis of the work conveys meaning or particular intellectual/emotional contents.

The evaluation of the material basis of the work (form) reckons with standards of excellence in the use of the
medium and its related techniques. Some questions may be posed. Is the medium (which includes surface. Ground.
Or material block, instruments, tools. Pigments calling for appropriate techniques) used with a high degree of skill?
Is the particular medium chosen in view of the semantic potential of its combined properties which is realized in
the completed work? With respect to medium, the viewer/critic rejects the traditional hierarchies laid down by the
19th century academies in which oil on canvas and sculptures in marble were valorized over other media. For all
visual forms, whether paintings, prints, posters, illustrations, cartoons, and comics have their standards of
technical excellence to which a work may be on par or below par. Understanding and evaluating the technical side
of the work requires a familiarity with and sensitivity to the properties of medium. Thus the viewer/critic should
devote time to researching on and observing art-making, even doing exercises of his or her own. At the same time,
one makes allowance for the transgressing of conventional processes and norms in the quest for new creative and
expressive resources. The usual consideration of form also touches upon the principles of organization which are
traditionally identified as rhythm, harmony, balance, and proportion. However, one has to bear in mind that these
tencts were laid down by the 19th century European academies established by the royal courts to preserve the
hierarchic order based on unchanging principles. In their philosophical framework, the classical ideals of harmony,
balance, and proportion were not only aesthetic values but also socio-political values divinely decreed as “in the
nature of things. The problem is that these values, while they retain a continuing but limited validity, are often
erroneousiy absolutized as the be all and end-all of art itself. Meaning may suffer in the interest of these values
when. In fact. The validity of their application is only relative to the semantic requirements of the work.

As has been stated, the meaning of a work is a complex of concepts, values, and feelings which derive from reality
and have a bearing on it. Because of this, the evaluation of a work necessarily includes the analysis and
examination of its axiological content constituted by values which become fully articulated on the contextual plane
although these had already been shaping on the basic semiotic and iconic planes. And since values are expressed in
the work which holds a dialogic relationship with reality, the assessment of these values is a necessary part of
critical evaluation. It then becomes possible that the values of the artist and the viewer do not quite coincide or
may even be contradictory. Of course, there exists a whole range of attitudes on the part of the viewer/critic to the
work from full espousal and enthusiastic endorsement at one pole through degrees of appreciation and
indifference growing towards annoyance and to vigorous rejection at the opposite pole.
It becomes clear that on one hand, the artist is not or should not be a mere technician but expresses a view of life
in his or her work. On the other hand, the viewer/critic is also not a mere technical expert confined to the analysis
of the elements, techniques, and processes alone. The mature viewer or critic is one who must have after long
expression and experience, arrived at the formulation of his own value system, his or her view of the world and
humanity which he or she has come to feel deeply and strongly about. As the artist enjoys artistic independence.
The critic/viewer also enjoys a measure of autonomy For, to be sure the critic is not an appendage of the artist or a
promoter ar publicist, but one who vitally contributes to the dynamic dialogue, interaction, and debate in the field
of art and culture as these intersect with other human concerns, among them the nolitical, social, and economic.
The viewer/critic as also the artist should, places a value on the capacity of art to influence and transform society.
An underlying premise then is that the viewer of art, in particular the art critic needs to have thought out fully his
own values or the guiding principles by which he or she lives as a total human person. The artist likewise creates
his or her art not as a fragmented human being or purely technical specialist. but as a total thinking and feeling
individual If the critic simply describes and appreciates the work's technical excellence (if it is indeed worth
appreciating on this level) and stops short of making value- judgements, then he or she is a formalist critic who
isolates the work from its larger social environment-in which case, she or she divorces art from life and its concerns
and promotes the condition of art feeding upon itself. But when the critic makes evaluations of the work relative
to his or her own philosophy and vision of life and the world, he or she is only fully realizing the dialogue between
the work and the viewer, after completing the process of semiotic reading, understanding and contextualizing the
meaning of the work

Since art directly or indirectly conveys meaning and seeks to influence one's ideas and values in subliminal ways,
then it is but an essential role of the viewer/critic to be able to recognize these subtle devices and assume the
prerogative to articulate and evaluate them in relation to his own world view. As the critic/viewer fully recognizes
and respects the prerogative of the artist to express his or her ideas and feelings, the former also reserves the right
to agree, disagree, or have reservations in relation to his own values and view of the world. It is to be pointed out,
likewise, that it is possible for a critic to truly understand and appreciate a work viewed in its socio-cultural context
without necessarily espousing its ideas, in the same way that one can appreciate a zen work of art without being a
Zen Buddhist oneself. But in contemporary art produced in the context of our time and place. the expression of the
critic's dissenting view is not to be construed as a manipulative strategy or an imposition on the artist but as only
bringing out the oppositional stance in the dialogic relationship or art and viewer, art and reality. Indeed, the
responsible viewer/critic must draw from a rich fund of knowledge and humanism. The Filipino art critic may
uphold nationalist values in art reflecting national identity and the people's interests vis-a-vis foreign interests that
seek to maintain their domination in all fields. The democratization of art may be promoted in themes that
enhance the sense of human dignity especially of those engaged in basic production and that espouse their
liberation from exploitation. Democratization can also be in the use of popular forms and mediums that make art
accessible to the larger number. There is likewise a liberative thrust in themes that espouse the cause of traditional
minoritized sectors, such as women and children, animism and non-Christian ethnic groups. The critic may uphold
the role of art as an emancipating influence rather than as pure commodity or decoration catering to elites

But what if, as may often be the case, interpretations of the work by different critics do not coincide or are
contradictory? Does this mean then that our critical process is unreliable? There may be a general consensus on
the hasic semiotic and iconic planes or in the analysis of form, but differences may lie in the contextual and
axiological analysis. This is because in all societies riven by opposing interests such as ours it is only to be expected
that artists and viewers/critics adhere to different value systems which affect the way that they look at art. In the
long run, these differences which are basically ideological stem from the different positions, that is their class
sympathies and affinities, that artists. critics, and people in general take in a society's relations of production
Thus, after the critic/viewer has gone through the three planes, the semiotic the iconic, and the contextual it is
possible to determine the semantic focus and parameters of the work and, from these, project its horizon of
meanings, its boundaries and limitations, its semantic implications and ideological orientations, its progressive or
conservative tendencies with respect to human development. The critic thus arrives at a sharper understanding of
the work of art which, while it has a semantic core has parameters that are fluid and continually being expanded
and modified. Art projects a horizon of meanings relative to both the artist and the critic/viewer in terms of
intellectual background, emotional maturity, and cultural range in the humanly enriching dialogic experience of
art.

Artworks in Evaluative Plane

The Third of May 1808

Francisco de Goya

It depicts an execution, an early event in the Peninsular War between France and Spain.

 No attempt to find transcendence

 No sense that the sacrifice of life will lead to salvation
 Wears yellow and white; heraldic color of the papacy
Peninsular War (May 2, 1808)

 The citizens of Madrid rebelled against the French occupation

 After that, the French crashed the city and trampled the rioters
 French army shot hundreds of Madrid citizens
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peninsular_War
The victims and killers are anonymous

 Bloody and disfigured corpse

 They both shares the fate of death
 Victimization of mass murder
  Nobility is replaced by futility
 Indiscriminate killing of civilians by french soldiers
 Painting of the massacre
 Terrified civilians facing a firing squad
 Reflects extrajudicial killing issues in Philippines

Parisian Life

Juan Luna

A woman who was believed to be a prostitute was the subject of the male gazes.

 Interior scene in a café with a woman seated with three men on the far left
corner
 Portrays social norms, gender politics and national issues.
 The prostitute was regarded as “ the site of absolute degradation and
dominance, the place where the body became at last an exchange value.”
 The three men shows masculinity domination over women in nationalistic roles
 Sexual Corruption and Moral Disintegration
Women in France
Women are threat to status quo. Women in Paris are known to do domestic duties such as
housekeeping, meal preparation and child caring. Those are considered respectable woman.
If they go beyond their duties, they are considered prostitute infecting men with disease.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_France
Juan Luna
Juan Luna killed his wife, Maria de la Paz Pardo de Tavera, due to jealousy and accused of
cheating on him

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Luna