Tuesday 10th February 2015. Reading Images
All forms of translation/symbols etc have all been agreed on by society.
Language is the second system of representation.
The first element is the signifier and the signified is the corresponding concept which it triggers. The relationship between the two are fixed by our cultural code which isn’t permanently fixed.
Black in western society mean dark, evil and forbidding. Perceptions changed in the 60’s due to a phrase ‘black is beautiful’. If meaning changes historically, we must employ a process of interpretation.
Ethical reference points e.g. Nazi sign owned by a culture because of what happened historically.
Roland Barthes was a French literary theorist, philosopher, linguist, critic and semiotician. His ideas explored a wide range of topics but centred on two different levels of signification, ‘Denotation and Connotation’. These are terms used to describe the relationship between the signifier and its signified. He broke images down in structures. What you should do is think about what it means/denotes. We can’t help but look for meanings.
Denotation- literal meaning. What is pictured? e.g. a photo of a child is a photo of a child. No matter how the child is photographed, it still represents a ‘child’.
Connotation- meaning of it within a culture. Ethical issues and society is sue, not allowed to do that. How it is pictured.
Lighting, framing, focus etc are examples that can change a meaning of the way we look at an image. For example a black and white or sepia photograph of a child could connote the concept that it is old and something from the past. The reader is reliant because they are having to use their knowledge to look further into the image.
Denotation- Red rose
Connotation- symbol of passion and love
Above is an image of ‘The Arnolfini Wedding Portrait’. This image holds a lot of disguised symbolism.
The denotation of this image is that it is an image of a man and woman on their wedding day. He holds her hand and she holds up her ruffled dress. There what looks to be their pet dog looks on in the foreground.
The connotation of this image is if you look closer into it you notice hidden meanings beyond the denotation. If you look in the middle of the man and woman you see a candelabra with only one candle in it. This refers to christ as a single light. The pet dog symbolises faithfulness and fidelity. Fido a generic pet name for a dog- latin for faithful. Having the shoes to the left and them in bare feet suggest they are standing on holy ground. Behind the man and woman is a mirror which reflects the setting. It is decorated with the 10 scenes from Passion of Christ. As you can tell this is a very religious painting when you look deeper into it at the connotations.
From a man lifting his hat has different levels of meaning. The first level being the fact the man has lifted his hat. The second being when someone lifts their hat it means more than physically lifting it. The third level can be seen as from a man raising his hat tells us about his personality, national, social, educational and cultural background. Wearing a hat indoors can be classed as disrespectful but for Jews is is respectful. The deepest level is intrinsic which is the deepest way of looking down at it on an image.
Nicola Murphy 