Unit II Approaches in Reading Visual Art

UNIT II: APPROACHES IN READING VISUAL ARTS
Lesson: Ways to Interpret Visual Arts
This lesson provides students varied perspectives on how to interpret visual arts which
could help them in forming sound and meaningful interpretation of the artworks.
Learning Outcomes
At the end of the lesson, the students must have:
1. explained the different critical approaches in reading visual arts;

2. determined the appropriate approach in reading a particular visual art;
3. applied the approaches in various samples.
Lesson
Approaches in Reading Visual Arts
Semiotics. Semiotics is concerned with meaning; how representation, in the broad

sense (language, images, objects) generates meanings or the processes by which we
comprehend or attribute meaning. For visual images, or visual and material culture more
generally, semiotics is an inquiry that is wider than the study of symbolism and the use of
semiotic analysis challenges concepts such as naturalism and realism (the notion that images or
objects can objectively depict something) and intentionality (the notion that the meaning of
images or objects is produced by the person who created it). Furthermore, semiotics can offer
a useful perspective on formalist analysis (the notion that meaning is of secondary importance
to the relationships of the individual elements of an image or object). Semiotic analysis, in
effect, acknowledges the variable inter-relationship[s] between images or objects, the
individual and other factors such as culture and society.
Semiotics is the study of signs and signifying practices. A sign can be defined, basically,
as any entity (words, images, objects etc.) that refers to something else. Semiotics studies how
this referring results from previously established social convention (Eco 1976, 16). That is,
semiotics shows how the relationship between the sign and the ‘something else’ results from
what the society has taught.
The meaning we attribute to the sign relates to cultural ideas that we have learned, and
may or may not be aware of. Further, Alex Potts wrote that images and objects are not only
mediated by conventions, but meaning is largely activated by cultural convention (Potts 1996,
20).
Thus, semiotics is concerned with the nature and function of language (be it the
relatively ambiguous status of visual language) and the processes by which meaning is
generated and understood. Semiotic analysis acknowledges the position, or role, of the
individual in terms of a challenge to any notion of fixed or unitary or universal meaning and
therefore subjectivity can be engaged dynamically with the image or object. A significant way
that subjectivity is acknowledged is in the fact that our perception, or reading, of images and
objects can be revealed as socially conditioned. Central to semiotic analysis, in this respect is
the recognition of how visual and material culture is coded; the social conventions which link
signs with meanings. Insofar as visual and material culture is coded, meaning is not intrinsic to
the image or object and therefore not self-evident (
http://www.arch.chula.ac.th/journal/files/article/lJjpgMx2iiSun103202.pdf ).
Formalism. The formalistic approach directs that art be analyzed by reviewing form and
style. Elements like color, shapes, textures, and line are emphasized, while the context of the
work is de-emphasized, and made a secondary characteristic—at times taken completely out of
consequence. The assessment of a piece of artwork is based purely on the artist’s skill and not
on the choice of subject matter, with the value based primarily on the use of elements with
little regard for the viewer’s perception of the context.
Much of the basis of formalism as an evaluation theory is founded on Plato’s Theory of

Forms, developed on the idea that everything, whether tangible or not, has a form. Modeled
after his “Allegory of the Cave,” in which characters viewed shadows as the reality instead of as
outlines or doubles of the true forms. Plato explained that—to the characters in Allegory, those
WERE the forms in their perception.
The growth of expressionistic, and later, surrealistic art, in the early 20 th century,
supported the line of thinking which indicated that a skilled artist could prove his or her artistic
abilities in color, medium, and the combinations found in the work (namely, paintings) beyond
whatever the subject matter was. Viewers would be drawn to the work no matter is the
context.
Formalism as a critical stance came into being in response to impressionism and post-

impressionism (especially the painting of Cézanne) in which unprecedented emphasis was
placed on the purely visual aspects of the work. In 1890 the post-impressionist painter and
writer on art, Maurice Denis, published a manifesto titled Definition of Neo-
Traditionism where he emphasised that aesthetic pleasure was to be found in the painting
itself not its subject. This became one of the most widely quoted texts in the history of
modern art:
“Remember, that a picture, before it is a picture of a battle horse, a nude woman, or
some story, is essentially a flat surface covered in colours arranged in a certain order.”
(https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/f/formalism)
L ’art pour l ‘art (art for art’s sake) truly epitomizes the formalist way of thinking, and
Abstract artists defended their work, maintaining that they should be judged and valued based
on their basic attributes. They asserted that, following the ideals of formalism, art should be
valued outside of its’ ability to tell a story, recall an experience, provide a statement, or inspire
feelings in the viewer. This allows for growth in Abstract art creation, where artists no longer
felt the pressure to explain their works based on any set standards or sensibilities.
One of the most well-known proponents of formalism in more modern times was
American writer Clement Greenberg, supporter of Abstract Expressionism. He believed fully in
the detachment of context and subject matter from the form of art, and disallowed the idea
that there were other considerations (i.e., popular culture, political sentiment, or media
influence). He firmly believed that Abstract Art was the truest expression of art, as the observer
would not understand the subject matter of the art itself, and only the artist’s true use of color,
medium, and space showed through.
One artist who personified the theory of Formalism was Jackson Pollock, a popular
Abstract Expressionist artist during the 1940’s – 1960’s. His famous work, Convergence (1952),
exemplified the avant-garde and radical artwork of the time, where artists created freely,
outside of established guidelines and emphases. His unusual methods, oversized canvases and
use of non-traditional materials (using knives and sticks in place of brushes), was welcomed in a
growing taste for abstract art (https://www.sybariscollection.com/art-history-briefing-
formalism-art/).
Feminism. Feminist criticism look at art as a reflection of the artist’s values and
attitudes towards women. It is concerned on how art reveals these subconscious ideas to show
how women have been marginalized or discriminated economically, politically, socially and
psychologically.
Feminist criticism is also concerned with less obvious forms of marginalization such as
the exclusion of women writers from the art canon which gave the tendency to underrepresent
the contribution of women artists.
Feminist criticism began in the 1970's as a response to the neglect of women artists over
time and in historical writings. This form of criticism is specific to viewing art as an example of
gender bias in historical western European culture, and views all work as a manifestation of this
bias. Feminist criticism created whole movements in the art world (specifically performance
based art), and has changed over the last few years to include all underrepresented groups.
Ideological criticism. This approach is most concerned with the relationship between
art and structures of power. It infers that art is embedded in a social, economic and political
structure that determines its final meaning. Born of the writings of Karl Marx , ideological
criticism translates art and artefacts as symbols that reflect political ideals and reinforce one
version of reality over another.
Psychoanalytic criticism. It adopts the methods of "reading" employed by Freud and

later theorists to interpret texts. It argues that literary texts or art works, like dreams, express
the secret unconscious desires and anxieties of the author, that a literary or art work is a
manifestation of the artist’s or author's own neuroses. One may psychoanalyze a particular
character or subject within a literary or art work, but it is usually assumed that all such
characters or subjects are projections of the artist’s or author's psyche.
One interesting facet of this approach is that it validates the importance of artistic work
as it is built on a literary or artistic key for the decoding. Freud himself wrote, "The dream-
thoughts which we first come across as we proceed with our analysis often strike us by the
unusual form in which they are expressed; they are not clothed in the prosaic language usually
employed by our thoughts, but are on the contrary represented symbolically by means of
similes and metaphors, in images resembling those of poetic speech" (26).
Like psychoanalysis itself, this critical endeavor seeks evidence of unresolved emotions,
psychological conflicts, guilts, ambivalences, and so forth within what may well be a disunified
literary work. The author's or artist’s own childhood traumas, family life, sexual conflicts,
fixations, and such will be traceable within the behavior of the characters in the literary work.
But psychological material will be expressed indirectly, disguised, or encoded (as in dreams)
through principles such as "symbolism" (the repressed object represented in disguise),
"condensation" (several thoughts or persons represented in a single image), and
"displacement" (anxiety located onto another image by means of association).

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UNIT II: APPROACHES IN READING VISUAL ARTS

Lesson: Ways to Interpret Visual Arts

At the end of the lesson, the students must have:

1. explained the different critical approaches in reading visual arts;

Approaches in Reading Visual Arts

Semiotics. Semiotics is concerned with meaning; how representation, in the broad

Much of the basis of formalism as an evaluation theory is founded on Plato’s Theory of

Formalism as a critical stance came into being in response to impressionism and post-

Psychoanalytic criticism. It adopts the methods of "reading" employed by Freud and

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