Thursday, August 31, 2006
Symbols in art
1- Clouds mean rain, a falling barometer means that a storm is coming, a twister in the sky means an approaching tornado: one is a sign of the other. These relations exist in nature and were discovered, not invented by humans. On the other hand, a bell ringing means the end of class, the word “cat” means a certain species of domesticated quadruped. These relations are conventional. 2- In art, what is it that makes a thing a symbol? It is something represented in the artwork (an object, an action, or a pattern of objects and actions, or just a color) that does the symbolizing? How does A become a symbol of B? 3- The cross is a symbol of Christianity (a conventional token of suffering) but this is a historic and religious convention. On the other hand, the sun seems like a natural symbol of life and strength; a river brings forth the idea of eternal change and flowing, and so forth. In these cases there was no agreement (convention) as to what would stand for what; the relation is too obvious. 4- According to philosopher Nelson Goodman one can virtually make any A to stand for any B, provided one can justify the link -an important premise for an artist. 5- Here are some examples of how virtually anything can be a symbol for something else: animals, parts of the body, abstract characters, artefacts, plants, etc. A circle → the cosmos (in Shamanism); a triangle→ perfection; an ant→ industry; the ape → loyalty and devotion (ancient India); the arch→ the union of earth and sky (ancient Greece); the human beard→ wisdom, strength and virility (Semitic religions); blood→ a tantric image of fertilization (Vedas); ying/yang→ positive, negative (Ancient China); A and ω→ beginning and end (ancient Greece); the dog→ watchful guardian (ancient Egypt); Moby Dick→evil. 6- So, to further problematize the issue: What would Duchamp's Fountain stand for?
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I think that as an artist, it is virtually impossible to escape symbols. It's almost automatic in the creation of a work of art. On the otherhand, I feel that viewers also look for symbols in works of art as well. I agree with Nelson Goodman's statement that "one can virtually make any A to stand for B, provided one can justify the link." Symbols can also have different connotations depending on the generation people live in. I think that it takes an incredibly strong movement or person to change the meanings symbols have. Symbols also move people, they can inspire, they can change the way we think and perceive.
Symbolization of “Sybilozation”
Twenty-two thousand years ago people, physically not different from us, used Lascaux cave for their installation of symbols for animal and people and object, some that we recognize and some anthropologist can’t identify and therefore call them ritual objects.
As the last Great Ice Age receded around sixteen thousand years ago, the people that made the cave paintings and hunted the migrating herds adapted themselves to a more sedentary existence. The great innovation of the age was agriculture which allowed people to live in villages and later in cities and they now decorated their kitchenware, tools and temples instead of caves. Civilization led to surpluses which nurtured trade (or some times looting a pillaging was preferred), and the need to record these transactions or kills went from putting simple notches on wood or bone objects. (d'art?) Examples can be found as far back as twenty thousand years ago.
Around six-thousand years ago, between the Tigris and Euphrates River, the area now known as Iraq, clay symbols called calculi were used to record volumes of grain for inventory and debt. The shape of the piece represented the concept of a quantity and a measure. A small cone was a single measure of cattle or grain, a sphere represented ten measures, a large cone sixty measures and a large truncated cone represented thirty-six hundred measures. This was obviously before the invention of counterfeiting because it obviously wouldn’t be difficult to chip off the top of a large cone and gain sixty times the profit.
The calculi were followed by clay tablet marked by a stylus marks representing calculi. When the sounds of language became associated with the written symbol by the Sumerians and the Egyptians writing became a way to transmit knowledge and fundamentalist religion. Soon these inscriptions graduated from recording business transactions to correspondence, literature, (like the Epic of Gilgamesh), kingly decrees and eventually news services, like FOX (in keeping with the king’s official story at all cost).
Symbolism is the basis of our ability to communicate, to build, and to interact with others and is also the basis of art. But the symbolism in art is wired to aesthetics in a different way than language is tied to civilizations. (The exception being poetry and perhaps lyrics which seem to be wired to the same part of the brain as visual art, after all they often are verbal visualizations or metaphorical associations.) Symbolism needs a commonality to make the jump from symbol to the observer. Depriving this predictability al la David Hume may upset the message from the artist, but the message is always interpreted by the observer and filtered through their cultural and personal sensibilities. Nelson Goodman at least encourages some hope for maintaining some symbol to message causality. Without causality, the universe can become meaningless (or lawless) in a Nietzsche kind of way. Immanuel Kant proposed that people have innate assumptions about causes. I’ve been told that to assume is to make an “ass” out of “u” and “me”, and to point out to Nelson Goodman that there is surely more than one shade of “grue.”
I believe that art and symbols are all up to interpretation of the viewer. One person can believe that a particular symbol means one thing where as another can change the symbol’s complete meaning. Perfect case in point, the Nazi’s swastika. With the spread of Buddhism in China and Japan, the swastika means prosperity and long life. After Hitler’s use of the swastika, it now has a negative meaning associated with it and there are many people that can only associate the swastika with what the Nazis did in World War II. As for Nelson Goodman’s statement, I agree that almost anything can be considered a symbol as long as it can be justified by the person/artist. I think that all humans react to symbols through their own personal experiences, therefore, symbols can have multiple meanings depending on the person’s own translation of the symbol. There are thousands and thousands of symbols today and it is impossible for one specific symbol to have only one meaning.
I had went ahead an answered this under the Charo Post since it coincided with her presentation, however I'll go ahead and post it here as well.
It was also very ironic that we had Charo as a presenter the same day we explored symbolism. My mother would always tell me that the image of teeth falling out of a mouth, symbolizes death, and oddly enough, I have had many reoccurring dreams where my teeth are very loose and start to fall out. I haven’t yet really had to deal with death in my life, so I’m not sure what these dreams mean. However this symbol seems to be so strong, that I recall it often. I’m not sure where it comes from, I have to ask my mother, however I believe it is born out of Dominican, Voodoo folklore. Being raised on a mix of superstition and Roman Catholicism, my interpretation of symbols and elements may be quite strange to some. This also goes to show you how broad the spectrum of symbolism can be, and how you culture can shape you to see different connections in objects that may have no significance to others.
A symbol can be defined as: a word, phrase, image, or the like having a complex of associated meanings and perceived as having inherent value separable from that which is symbolized, as being part of that which is symbolized, and as performing its normal function of standing for or representing that which is symbolized: usually conceived as deriving its meaning chiefly from the structure in which it appears, and generally distinguished from a sign. (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=Symbol)
It seems that we are, yet again, dealing with a question that has no concrete answer. Therefore, I'll rephrase the question in a way that seems more approachable, atleast for myself: Rather than asking what is a Symbol in art, let's ask, What is symbolic? Well in that case, it is simple. Anything that has a personal effect on someone, something that causes the same reaction/sensation is symbolic. A symbol is anything that has a prolonged and recurring change on a person.
Personally I believe symbols are rooted in culture. A woman holding a cross, dressed in white for me evokes feelings of utmost respect. I was raised a Catholic...Call me superstitious, but I thoroughly believe that signs/symbols are everywhere. Our lives are governed by them, our existance shaped by their impact, because everytime we see "X" we feel "Y"...Symbols, I dare say, are like equations. Automatic and soluble. Yet complex enough that they can take ages to decipher.
Symbols are our attributions of human emotions to the material world around us. They are our way of communicating, sharing, experiencing, processing the world.
My favorite symbol that Charo explored was the Voodoo Goddess Yemaya. I have recently become very interested in Haitian art since traveling to the country with project Medishare. Yemaya is a huge figure in Haitian art. She can be seen all over the country depicted in art galleries and alleyways. Yemaya has her origins in the Voodoo religion, which give her more dimensionality as subject matter. I love that as a symbol she has a history as well as other Voodoo symbols associated with her. As a multifaceted symbol, Yemaya could create countless dynamic compositions.
It was commented in class that symbols can become limits, when a particular artist is too closely indentified with them. This however, can be turned to the artist's advantage, when they become used as a marketing tool--such as Wegman's dogs, numerous Warhol symbols (soup can, Monroe portraits, etc.).
I was most interested in the youtube news excerpt linked here where a representative of a Canadian Jewish organization talked about banning the display of Nazi symbols. It sounds good, but I wonder if people who advocate this type of legislation have considered that the display of these symbols acts as a warning device? Isn't it good to have a visible indication of who and how many people are taking up this kind of ideology in order to stop it?
I dont think that amost anything can be a symbol. In order for something to function as a symbol in art it has to be something that the observer will pick up on. If the observer doesnt know what a certain object or color is supposed to symbolize, then its symbolism is lost and might as well not exist at all. And although the artist may have created each object with a certain symbolic meaning to him/her, if nobody else realizes it then it seems more of an interpretation than a symbol. Merely saying that something is symbolic does not make it so. With regards to Duchamps fountain, if it is a symbol of anything, it symbolizes the obsurdity of repositioning a urinal and passing it off as art.
There are so many symbols in this world and the meanings are unique to the artist/viewer. What might be a symbol or meaning to one person/artist can have a completely different personal meaning to the viewer based upon their own experiences. Tattoos come to mind for personal symbols, using the body as a canvas.
Also symbols do not necessarily need to be identifiable objects - color too can mean things, such as Van Gogh using the color yellow in most his paintings (chairs/floors/sunflowers) as a spiritual symbols for the sun.
I personally use the symbol of a clover for my business identity on my business cards to represent my company Clover Innovations Printing and hopefully to have good luck!
There are so many symbols in this world and the meanings are unique to the artist/viewer. What might be a symbol or meaning to one person/artist can have a completely different personal meaning to the viewer based upon their own experiences. Tattoos come to mind for personal symbols, using the body as a canvas.
Also symbols do not necessarily need to be identifiable objects - color too can mean things, such as Van Gogh using the color yellow in most his paintings (chairs/floors/sunflowers) as a spiritual symbols for the sun.
I personally use the symbol of a clover for my business identity on my business cards to represent my company Clover Innovations Printing and hopefully to have good luck!
We all know that "clouds mean rain" or that "a twister is an approaching tornado" because we are used to relate things.
Symbols play a very important role in art because its a way of communicating things to others. According to Dan Brown in his book (The Da Vinci Code), people have changed some symbol's meanings. I cant really say that I agree to that, because there are some symbols that have been carrying their meaning for thousands of years!!.
For me symbols can be interpreted in many different ways, depending on what you think or believe. Signs are different from symbols and I think that we can have our own way of using symbols but signs may have the same meaning for all of us.
Lisette: Do you think that (after the horrors of Nazism) the symbol of the swastica has remained the same?
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