Lecture 2, IVC
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Transcript of Lecture 2, IVC
Images, Power and Politics
“Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.” ― Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince
Seeing vs. Looking
What is the difference?
• Seeing= process of observing, involuntary, passive
• Looking=conscious consideration, active interpretation
Thomas Struth, Art Institute of Chicago II, Chicago, 1990Chromogenic print mounted to acrylic
Looking vs. Seeing
Seeing: a process of observing and recognizing the world around us in a somewhat arbitrary way as we go about our daily lives.
Looking: to actively make meaning of that world with a more involved sense of purpose and direction. Through looking we negotiate social relationships and meanings. Looking is a practice much like speaking, writing or singing. Looking involves learning to interpret and it involves relationships of power.
Seeing vs. Looking:Looking Closer
Role of Representation
Representation – “the use of language and images to create meaning about the world around us”
-Sturken and Cartwright, Practices of Looking, p. 12
Henri-Horace Roland de la Porte, Still Life , c. 1765, oil
Role of Representation – “Seeing” a Still Life
Mimesis = imitation
Rene Magritte, The Treachery of Images (This is not a Pipe), 1928-29
Interpreting Visual Codes and Conventions
Henri-Horace Roland de la Porte, Still Life , c. 1765, oil
Role of Representation – “Looking” at Still Life
• Pictorial realism before photography
• Contains symbolism• Simple peasant life in
France during 18th century
• Transience of earthly life (fruit, flowers, drink will be eaten or wither and die)
The Myth of Photographic Truth
Myths - the hidden cultural values and conventions through which meanings are made to seem universal and given, even though in reality they are specific to certain groups. (e.g. beauty & thinness)
Roland Barthes – 20th Century French Theorist
Positivism – a philosophy that emerged in the mid-19th century that holds that scientific knowledge is the only authentic knowledge. What are some good examples of this belief today?
DNA
Surveillance photo of suspected Boston bombers
Denotative vs. Connotative Meaning
Word Presentations
Denotative – literal, explicit meaning
Connotative – meanings informed by the cultural and historical contexts of the image and the viewers’ knowledge of those contexts and its personal significance to them
Robert Frank, Trolley Ride—New Orleans, 1955, gelatin silver print
Case Study: Denotative vs. Connotative
Case Study: Denotative Meaning
Robert Frank, Trolley Ride—New Orleans, 1955, gelatin silver print
• Black and white photograph
• Medium value contrast• City Trolley in New
Orleans, LA• Viewed at mid-level
from side• Three registers
(horizontal bands)• Variety of passengers
seated• Most engage
photographer’s gaze• Appear separated by
race• Children sit at center
Case Study: Connotative Meaning
Robert Frank, Trolley Ride—New Orleans, 1955, gelatin silver print
• Racial segregation in American South during 1950s
• Tension & heightened emotional state
• On verge of change due to civil rights activism
• Brown vs. Board of Ed (1954) overturned segregation in schools
• Montgomery bus boycott 1955-56 (Rosa Parks)
• Trolley as symbol for passage of time or movement toward change
• Children in the middle may signify future resolution of differences?
Images and Ideology
Ideology - set of broad values and beliefs through which individuals live out their complex relations to a range of social structures (p. 21)
Barbara Kruger, Untitled (Your Body is a Battleground), 1989
Newsweek vs. Time depictions of O.J. Simpson, 1994
O.J. Simpson with Heismann Trophy, 1968
Case Study: “#If they Gunned Me Down”
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/13/us/if-they-gunned-me-down-protest-on-twitter.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&version=LargeMediaHeadlineSum&module=photo-spot-region®ion=photo-spot&WT.nav=photo-spot&_r=0
Michael Brown via Facebook
Art of Persuasion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7nrByig01Q
Norman Rockwell, Freedom from Want, 1943Oil on canvas
Vanessa BeecroftWhite Madonna with Twins2006