My last post today!
"I sometimes see [stuff] as representation in the centre with symbolism on
the one hand and decoration on the other", Gombrich would say. In this
context, the project, his unpublication, ‘The Realm and Range of the Image’
would lead to a turn away from ‘symbolism’ to focus on ‘representation’
, which, from a systematic point of view, was unfortunate because to
talk fully about representation would indeed involve a discussion of
symbolism, and this should concern the aesthetician. (But cfr. Grice on "Mr.
Puddle, our man in Æsthetics").
Interestingly, in an essay proposal sent to Neurath for Thames and
Hudson, Gombrich states that a number of essays have been written on
pictures as a mode of expression, as creative activity or aesthetic
experience.
Without necessarily questioning the fruitfulness of this approach it
may be asked
whether the time has not come to investigate the realm of the image as
such.
The studies of I. A. Richards in Cambridge (and cfr. Gombrich's weekly
Oxford pieces) and the development of the semantic approach, seem to
hold
out the promise that ultimately even the analysis of aesthetic values
cannot
but benefit from a clarification of these primary matters.
It was in the course of preparing that essay that Gombrich published
that review Morris’s Signs, Language and Behavior, where he invoked the
image
and a general iconology. But Gombrich notably rejected the simplistic
Peircean notion (that Grice found 'krypto-technical) of the eiconic
sign
on the
basis that the very idea of iconicy is up to question.
The iconic image is built up of non-iconic elements and Gombrich
alleges
there is hardly an image that is purely iconic. We are always, rather,
confronted with an admixture of symbols and conceptual signs. Does the
decrease of the conceptual and conventional image in art mark an
increase in ‘
iconicity’? Is the primitive manikin, complete with ten fingers and
toes, less iconic
than the patch of colour which may denote a gondolier in one of Guardi’
s
paintings?
Here again many difficulties may be avoided by concentrating less on a
morphological classification of signs (which Grice also criticised in
Peirce's somewhat arbitrary krypo-technic taxonomies) than on an
analysis of their
interpretation. Guardi, for example relies on the addressee’s capacity
to
read ‘iconicity’ into his sign.
The contextual, emotional or formal means by which this type of
interpretation is evoked or facilitated — in other words, the relation
between objective iconicity and psychological projection — would have
to
form one
of the main fields of study of a descriptive semiotic of the image.
Perhaps it will show what Grice, Sibley, and Warnock analyse as ‘seeing
’
owes a lot to the history of a learning process through which a
socially
coherent 'viewer' is trained to respond in a given manner to certain
abbreviated signs. Once the addressee’s attitude rather than the
objective
structure of the sign is moved into the focus of attention, even more
problems relating to the concept of‘iconicity arise.
Is God the Father in an altar painting, or Justice in a courtroom, to
be
regarded as an iconic sign (of God or Justice) or as the visual
equivalent of a caption? The answer clearly depends on the attitude and
beliefs of the addressee.
It even seems that certain classes of allegorical imagery derive their
appeal from the fact that their degree of iconicity remains
indeterminate. They are neither regarded as mere ideograms of rational
concepts not as
iconic representations of a visible reality but rather as the visual
embodiments
of some suprasensible (or as Grice preferes eschatological) entity.
Gombrich was aware of the inadequacy of the notion of the iconic sign;
a
notion of interpretation linked to projection; a notion of a visually
trained addressee and the role of that addressee’s attitudes and
beliefs
towards the ontological status of the depiction. Gombrich alerts
theorists such as Morris to the importance of an awareness of
iconological research and
he alerts historians to the problems that they would face in pursuing a
conceptual approach to their study. Morris’s ambition had been to
create
a unitary approach to the humanities but, Gombrich argues that this is
an illusion. Morris's empircist semiotic does not rest on what he
called ‘the
practical semiotic' which was a product of the work of an
iconologically
sensitive philosopher, the rather. "The work of such pioneers in the
study of the
symbolic aspects of the image as A. Warburg and E. Panofsky are
absent",
but then you Kant have everything.
Gombrich’s various essays (some may dislike 'various') are concerned
with
the status and origin of the "iconic sign" and Gombrich develops the
argument of the Morris review, mentioning in passing ‘Icones Symbolicae’
. Gombrich discusses he notion of representation as being grounded in
substitution, thereby picking up Gomperz’s earlier discussion, giving it
a modern twist
by incorporating a critique of the notion of image as abstraction. In
fact, Gombrich later regretted that he had not made sufficient
distinction
between two and three dimensional imagery.
Is it quite correct to say that a hobby horse consists of features
which
make up the ‘concept’ of a horse or that it reflects the memory image
of horses seen? No, because this formulation omits one factor: the
stick.
If we keep in mind that representation is originally the creation of
substitutes out of a given material we may reach safer ground. The
greater the wish to ride, the fewer may be the features that will do
for a
horse. But at a certain stage it must have eyes. At the most primitive
level, then,
the conceptual image might be identified with the minimum image — the
minimum,
that is, which will make it fit into a psychological lock.
Gombrich is operating with the language of the conceptual image, which
effectively returned him back to Gomperz’s analysis of naturalism. To
move forward Gombrich would need to make use of Bühler, if not Popper.
The hobby-horse is a three-dimensional object, while the picture of the
hobby-horse is a two-dimensional image inviting recognition of a
three-dimensional object. The picture invites the recognition because it
offers the
hobby-horse’s
distinctive features. But the stick became a hobby-horse not because of
its visual features, which could later be supplemented to look more
like
a horse, but because it was an object that afforded riding. A bare,
unadorned stick will do the job. We should, in this context, take note
of Bühler’s observations concerning both the index field and the
behavioural context
of utterances, the deictic field (Ziegfeld), which is constituted by
deixis. The stick does not picture a horse but becomes one because of
its user’s
behaviour. The child imagines herself as riding a horse. The index
field
is behavioural and the deictic element is the child prancing around on
the horse. The stick by itself is not a horse. It needs the child’s
riding
behaviour to become one. (For the record, Umberto Eco accounts for the
hobby-horse in
terms of a theory of pseudo-iconicity in virtue of the stick's
linearity: linear objects come in different lengths, weights and
structures (string
is linear when it is held vertically). The child needs a stable object
that he can ride. More importantly, it is the surrounding activity
which
defines the assigned use).
Gombrich usually (and rapidly) switches between three-dimensional
objects and two-dimensional surfaces. Following Bühler, one asks ‘what
is the
field?’ and ‘what is the notation?’ Are we looking at imagery ‘defaced
’? What
are we looking at? What would have been the addressees's and
uttererer's
expectations and anticipations?
The bulk of Gombrich's "Symbolic Images" was was important because it
was
not until later that Gombrich adopts Bühler’s relational model and
extendshis range of interests beyond the work that he had earlier
accomplished with Kris. It was not as systematic as the earlier
proposed
text on Secular
Iconography. The introduction, ‘Aims and Limits of Iconology’, consists
of a set of crucial reflections. Yet Gombrich, unlike Grice, had a
deeply rooted aversion to theory construction. Brunswick and Tolman
applied the
idea of abstractive relevance to features of the environment that would
be
biologically important to the organism.The 'Preface' opens with a
critical examination of Panofsky’s first,
pre-iconographical, level of analysis and attacked the idea of ‘
representational meaning’.
It looks quite plausible to speak of various ‘levels of meaning’ and to
say, for instance, that a figure has a representational meaning -- and
that this representation can be referred the god Anti-Eros, which turns
it into the illustration of a myth, and that Anti-Eros (or "Antero" as
the
Italians call him) is here used as a symbol of Charity. But on closer
inspection this approximation to meaning breaks down on all levels. As
soon as we
start to ask awkward questions the apparent triviality of
representational meaning disappears and we feel tempted to question
invariably the need
invariably to refer the utterer’s form to some imagined significance.
Some of these forms can of course be named or classified as a foot, a
wing, or a bow, but others elude this network of classification. The
ornamental monsters around the base no doubt are meant to represent
marine creatures, but where in such a composition does the meaning end
and
the decorative pattern begin? Some say that the problem created by this
example is that
Gombrich uses the monument in the Picadilly fountain, rather than a
statue or painting to address the topic of ‘the elusiveness of meaning’
.
Given the notion that one may approach visual imagery in terms of its ‘
distance
from a text’ — from images illustrating a specific text to images
illustrating no text at all — how should one to approach a sculpture
placed in a
decorative setting? If one thinks instead of a picture within a frame, it
is not
obvious that one is obliged to extend the meaning of the picture out to
the frame.
If Gombrich truly wants to offer a critique of Panofsky’s notion of
representational meaning he should have perhaps offered a better
example. He should have followed Gomperz’s example and started with the
iconoclastic controversy, which centred on the problem of calling an i
mage of God an
image of a man. What precisely was the status of an image of Christ?
Gombrich attempts to settle the question of meaning by using Hirsch’s
"Validity in Interpretation", particularly his arguments that the
meaning
of a text is the utterer's INTENDED meaning (alla Grice) but this
fitted
uncomfortably with his observation that ‘images apparently occupy a
curious position somewhere a realm wheere are intended to CONVEY a
meaning (Grice's non-natural), and the things of nature, to which we
can only
give a meaning (a natural meaning). He could have referred back to Bühler
’s Organonmodell
to explore further the notion of ‘appeal’ and apply it to the case of
Veronese’s Feast in the House of Simon. When the utterer (Veronese) was
interrogated about its figures it became clear that many simply had an
ornamental purpose and to talk about their symbolic significance was
beside the
point.
Gombrich’s use of Hirsch may cause (as it did) some irritation, for he
does not further the performative dimension of utterances: one utters
something to do a particular job and the analysis should start by
asking
for the nature of the job to be done. This fits with Gombrich’s
collection of essays, "The uses of Images", as per Veronese's ingenious
reply:
Q. Did anyone commission you to paint Germans, buffoons, and similar
things in that picture?
Veronese:. No, milords, but I received the commission to decorate the
picture as I saw fit. It is large and, it seemed to me, it could hold
many figures -- Unamenismo e Simbolismo.
Rather than violate the decorum proper to The Last Supper, Veronese
simply
changes the painting’s title to "The Feast at the House of Levi". The
moral of this story is obvious: it is just not the case that every
figure in a picture necessarily had any meaning beyond its
compositional significance
(In Grice's simpler terms, Veronese simply DIS-implicated himself).
The casual idea of the brief for the Piccadilly fountain led Gombrich
into the larger question of the difference between iconography and
iconology. After all, Panofsky had described iconology as the study of
‘Intrinsic
meaning or content, constituting the world of ‘symbolical’ values’
controlled by ‘History of cultural symptoms or ‘symbols’ in general
(insight into the manner in which, under varying historical conditions,
essential
tendencies of the human mind were expressed by specific themes and
concepts.’ Somewhat minimising that, Gombrich declares ‘by and large
we mean by
iconology, since the pioneer studies of Panofsky, the reconstruction of
a programme
rather than the identification of a particular text.’ In one fell
swoop,
Gombrich demolishes the relevance of Cassirer’s notion of the symbol,
which Panofsky had adopted in his scheme.
The problem is plain. Gombrich is aware of the difference between two
different 'usages' of the word ‘symbol’.Gombrich believes that the very
pleasures of the symbol hunt have tended to obscure the fact that the
vast majority of monuments do not present a
riddle. We all recognize the Statue of Liberty without benefit of
iconological study, just as we know that if she held a different
'attribute' (as Panofsky pretentiously calls it), a balance instead of
a torch, say, we
would call the woman"The Statue of Justice", and we hardly need a
caption at the base of the statue that reads, "Statue of Liberty"
(Although perhaps
"Presented by the French" in exchange for the Eiffel Tower" might do).
The symbol here would be the mark of identification, not different in
principle from a label or a tag -- Grice's 'caption'. This is indeed
the
sense of the term we often use when we speak of mathematical symbols or
of the symbols used on road signs as per Grice's New Highway Code he
invented
while lying on his tub. But if iconology were only concerned with the
identification of labels, its psychological interest would be slight.
But is it? Well, not if we follow a different usage that insists that a
symbol is more than a sign, whatever 'more' may mean in this context.
This clash over aesthetic "terminology" that has much bedevilled
discussions is partly due to a divergence of philosophical traditions.
The extension of the term 'symbol' to cover any kind of sign can be
traced back from
Hobbes to Peirce, and has led to such coinages as symbolic logic -- that
Grice worshipped. Against this expansionist tendency, the German and the
French
successors (even if Gombrich visited Oxford) stressed the religious
connotations of the term and wanted it restricted to those special kinds
of signs which stand for something untranslatable and ineffable. It is
difficult
to adjudicate between these usages, but we think it might be worthwhile
to
examine the restrictionists' case in the light of psychology. One of the
advantages of iconology is precisely that it should provide material for
such a conceptual analysis.
For it is in iconology that the rationalist and agnosticist (Omar will
like this) will have to grapple with the symbol that is called 'more
than
a sign' because it is felt to be profoundly fitting. Given the
importance
that Panofsky had attached to iconological analysis in the ‘deep’ sense
and
the fact that Gombrich had chosen to cite Bühler in an explanatory
footnote,
it has disappointed some that Gombrich had not had more to say on the
subject at this point.
Bühler argues that different resources are used to render the strength,
resoluteness and beauty of the goddess of justice than are used for the
attribute of justice itself. It seems to me that this is an approach
towards a
proper definition of the concept of symbol within the framework of
sematology. This is an observation that Gombrich applies brilliantly in
his essay on Stanzio’s "Stanza della Segnature" in Rome. If we take
Sanzio's
personification of Poetry, or better still his ravishing drawing for
that
figure, from one point of view it is a pictorial sign with the obvious
and
enumerable attributes of the wings, the lyre and the book. But this
vision not only
signifies "numine afflatur", it also displays or expresses it. The sign
limits are blurred.
The upturned gaze may still be a conventional sign for inspiration,
carried by the tradition of art from ancient times, but the tense beauty
of the figure is Sanzio's own, and not even he could quite transfer and
repeat
it, for it may well be that the finished image is a little less
convincing as
an embodiment of the Divine "afflatus" though it has an added laurel
wreath.If we now refer back to Bühler’s original argument we can see that
the two notions of the ‘symbol’, one logical and the other Romantic, are
grounded in a difference between their utilitarian values. For Buehler
said that
if we let us take note of the following point about the modern history of
the
concept of symbol, the romantics loved the concept of symbol and lavished
a
plenitude of meaning upon it that comes quite close to the wealth of
meaning contained in the idea of an "image or likeness" of things
On the other hand, Buheler also remarks, the logicians (one could almost
say for "professional" reasons, but won't, because Grice was a
gentleman)
advocate emaciation and formalization of the content of the concept so
that in the end nothing was left other than the arbitrarily agreed
coordination of something or other as a sign to something or other as
the signified.
In addition to the mention of these two easily understood motives, we
need
only add a word about the broad circle of applications of the concept,
and
then we have extracted everything from the history of the concept of
symbol
that concerns us.
In addition to the signs that are called "symbolic", and which have a
representational value, are there not also symbolical actions to be
encountered
everywhere, and are not certain unique things such as kings' insignia
(for example, the Crown of St. Stephen, the Imperial Orb) also
"symbols",
whether of the rights and dignity of sovereignty itself, or of their
bestowal and possession? Of course that is the case, and the list of
applications
is by no means meant as exhaustive. One observation that can be made
here is
almost amusing, namely how the difference of "taste" (since Geary was
concerned about Baumgarten's idea of a science of principles for this)
between romantics and non-romantics also becomes evident in this domain.
The one party regards an action as symbolic inasmuch as it is removed
from real purposiveness and cut off from any clearly physical effect,
precisely because it is no longer genuinely effective, but rather a
"merely
symbolic" gesture. Yet another will call the same action symbolic because
after its emancipation from lower (say animal) purposiveness it has
taken on a
higher human function and now stands before us as an allegory, or because
the
legally binding character of an act or some other import it has depends
on its "symbolic character". It would be otiose to write an apologia for
the one
or the other motive of definition. After all, there will always be
romantics and non-romantics. They perhaps must simply try to understand
each other, and agree to disagree.
It is not difficult to revoke the concession that there are two concepts
of symbol. If it were easy to revoke it, the same difference of
mentality
would come to the fore somewhere else on some other topic. On this line
of analysis Stanzio’s drawing (or 'design', as he would prefer) of
poetry
took on a ‘higher human function’ than mere signification and it is
appropriate for Gombrich to analyse what that higher human function might
have been.
To say that the drawing is EXPRESSIVE of its content while the painting
fails in this respect is to misinterpret Bühler’s Organonmodell.
Gombrich's philosophies of symbolism refer to the Renaissance Platonic
versus Aristotelian approaches. Nobody who has looked into Renaissance
texts concerned with symbolism
can fail to be both impressed and depressed by the learning and
ingenuity
expended on applying the techniques of exegesis to a vast range of
images. The temptation is indeed great for the "modern" iconologist to
emulate this
technique and apply it. But before we yield to this temptation we should
at least pause and ask ourselves to what extent it would be appropriate
to
the task of interpreting the all pictures or images.
Apart from the obvious use of symbols, to be found where they are
appropriately located, Gombrich warns that there is no evidence that ‘
applies this doctrine to pictorial signs; or rather that they ‘were
commissioned to be
painted’. One must distinguish between possible habits of thought amongst
addressees and the brief the utterer was given. And, one might add, one
must give due weight to an utterer adopting a traditional mode of
depiction. It
would be quite inappropriate, indeed, to regard every Annunciation as
freshly born out of an utterer’s mind, concerned with the latest
theological
controversy.
With this methodological warning by Gombrich in mind, one must approach
an
essay like Gombrich's ‘Botticelli’s Mythologies’ with some degree of
caution. It was intended to demonstrate his commitment to Warburgian
work
and at rhe same time offer a show piece of iconological analysis.
Although new
evidence subsequently came to light concerning the location of the
Botticelli's paintings, Gombrich's essay still raises important
questions
— what is the relationship between image and text? What is the
significance of
stylistic affinities between the paintings under consideration and other
paintings? How does style affect meaning? Not least, how does a magical
approach to the use of visual imagery affect its users’ expectations? If
Botticelli’s
paintings are to be treated as symbols, in the deeper humanly
significant
sense, Gombrich's point was to demonstrate the multiplicity of meanings
made possible by neo-Platonic habits of exegesis. The "Primavera" (never
mind
"The birth of Venus") was shown to be a symbol with a particular
expressive significance and an equally significant appeal: the image
functioned in a
highly specific constellation of patrons’ interests and skill. In
hindsight the "Primavera" is a perfect example of a sematological
analysis
exploring an image. It also establishes the artistic values explicit in
the
painting by drawing connections with other related artworks of the day
through
visual comparison and an appeal to nuance.
From an explicitly semiological/sematological point of view the essay on
Sanzio's Stanza della Segnatura brings in another focus to the fore.
Gombrich makes an explicit reference to Bühler’s principle of
abstractive
relevance. No sign or symbol can refer to itself and tell us (or show
us)
how much it is INTENDED to signify. All signs have a characteristic
which Buehler
called 'abstractive relevance '. For example, the 24 letters of the old
Roman alphabet signify through certain distinctive features but in
normal
contexts their meaning is not affected by their size, colour or font.
But
the same is true of the images which interest the iconographer, be they
coats
of arms, hieroglyphs, emblems or personifications traditionally marked
by
certain ‘attributes’.In every one of these cases there are any number
of features which are
strictly speaking without a translatable meaning, and only a few which
we
are intended to read and translate.
But while we can easily identify those in the case of codified signs,
the
limit of significance, what Buehler called the ‘sign limit’, is much
more open in the case of symbolic images. Take the personification of
"Causarum Cognitio" on the ceiling of the Sanzio's Stanza. Care has been
taken for
us to know the meaning of the books she holds, for they are inscribed.
Nor
need we doubt that the decoration of the throne was intended to signify
an aspect of Philosophy—the many-breasted Diana stands traditionally for
Nature. Now, Vasari, a modern, yet not so modern iconographner, also
tells us in
some detail that the colours of her garment, from the neck downward, are
those of fire, air, earth and water, and are therefore symbolic.
Vasari may be right, but what of the garments of the other
personifications? He does not tell us, but even if he did, we could
always ask further questions. Are the configurations of the folds
significant? Are the
positions of the fingers? A careful observation of Sanzio’s painting of
Causarum
Cognitio reveals that Sanzio himself had encouraged the addresee to give
a symbolic reading to the colours of the lady’s cloths as they were also
inscribed with stars, marine creatures and plant forms. These features
would have provided the motivation for a symbolic reading, which was
evidently not
simply Vasari’s idea. While some have drawn attention to Theology’s
green, white and red garments, which they say were the colours of the
Theological Virtues, Vasari did not feel similarly inclined. There is
apparently
nothing in Vasari's writings to suggest that he would attach any
symbolic
significance to folds and fingers. As Bühler’s model demonstrates,
significance is directed: it is an appeal. In this instance Gombrich’s
use of Bühler’s
principle of abstractive relevance was almost casual, for Gombrich
somewat minimises the contribution that the stars make to the pictorial
field.
Having made the connection to Bühler, Gombrich throws the problem of
interpretation open again as the information imparted by an image is
inherently different from that imparted by a text. As we know from the
popular
expression ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’ (McCreery may be
provoked by that?). But though it is obvious that the limits of
signification are
"invisible" when looked upon from outside, as it were, when we are
confronted with any particular image, the situation changes dramatically
when we look at
the problem from the other side, when we consider a text which is to be
translated into an image.
The reason is simple. The particular will always slip through the net f
an abstraction, however fine we may make its meshes. It is because
abstraction is discrete and painting continuous that the painted
allegory
cannot but have an infinity of characteristics which are from this point
of view
quite devoid of meaning. Of course what is allegorically "meaningless"
(alla
Grice, Meaning) is not, thereby, without "significance" of some other
kind. The image may be, for example, a pictogram. In his Bodonyi review,
Gombrich characterises late antique art as pictographic. He thinks that
if it was
somewhat devoid of skill it nevertheless is a form that satisfied its
addresseee. Gombrich considers the history of the distinction that can
traced between a symbol and an allegory. The allegory was felt to be
translatable into a caption once its 'convention' were known, the symbol
to exhibit that
plenitude of meaning that approaches the ineffable -- almost alla
Wittgenstein.
But the same study also suggests that historically speaking the
distinction is falsely drawn. Personification is not simply viewed as a
pictograph denoting a concept by image rather than by label. It is
rather a true
representations or an embodiments of some superior entity which was
conceived as the denizens of the intelligible world. It is here, again,
that the
intellectual tradition embodied in Sanzio's "Stanza" met half-way.
Indeed the orator who selected these universals as objects of praise
could appeal to the visual imagination to clothe them with flesh and
blood.
If we turn our minds back to Bühler’s model we must probe Gombrich’s
argument more closely. Symbols have representational, expressive and
appellative dimensions. The sign limits were not blurred. Sanzio's
drawing simply has
a different expressive force from his painting. Following Bühler one may
say that an image has an expressive dimension but that is within the
context of its production. Both the utterer and the addressee would have
deemed
the use of Sanzio's drawing’s characteristics in the painting
inappropriate
to its setting. The painting had some of the majesty that the mere
drawing
lacked (But Italians Renaissance aestheticians would have the drawing
(or
design) any day -- it's the basis of 'it all'. Gombrich’s artistic
sensitivities however are those of a twentieth-century observer -- a
'very' modern iconographer, unlike Vasari, who is just 'modern' (rather
than 'ancient',
like Pliny was).
In this context, Gomperz’s observation becomes pertinent. In Gombrich's
modernity the centrality of the subject of art was replaced by the
importance of the 'utterer': Sanzio. Gombrich’s essay on "Tobias and the
Angel"
demonstrates the importance of "genre: in establishing the meaning of a
sign. Renaissance men themselves distinguished between "icons": there
were
"imagini", which were images of the saints and suchlike, and "storie",
which were narrative episodes. These were different genres and they
occupied
different discursive fields. "Tobias and the Angel" seem to be a
"storie". But --
and Geary finds this surprising -- it is in fact an "imagine". This ends
up
having a fundamental consequence for the addressee's recovery of the
image’s
historical appeal -- "if any", Geary adds -- He can be sceptical at
times. A close scrutiny of the image will reveal the peculiarity of the
physical
contact between Tobias and the Angel. The two figures, but especially
the
Angel, hold each other’s hands very strangely ("True, the angel had
wings
to deal with,' Geary adds realistically). But the crux of the argument
is It
is not as if Tobias holds the angel’s hand. Rather he uses his hand to
indicate that he is linked to it. With a warning that ‘the study of
meanings cannot be separated from the appreciation of forms’, Gombrich
here draws
attention to the competing demands of symbolic clarity and realistic
representation.
In representing the imagine of the archangel Raffaello, Sanzio had to
display him before us in full view like any saint represented to receive
the prayers of the faithful. Here we can still discern the hieratic
formula
of the symbolic. Tobias, on the other hand, was from a different world.
Incidentally, one has to be careful: the paintings in the Stanza della
Segnatura were "symbolic images", surely, but it would not seem
appropriate to call
them "allegorical" paintings to some as they had no narrative content.
In
the painting of Tobias and Raffaello, Sanzio was not restricted by the
requirements of devotional art. Tobias' part in the "storie" was to
stride along confiding himself to the archangel Raffaellol's help-mate.
In his person
the new realism could be given free play. The problem was how to fit
the two
-- the archangel Raffaello and Tobias, a mere mortal -- *together*, hand
in hand. It is important to remember that in the mind of those who
ordered
and painted the picture this framework of references was not a matter of
(Popperian) rational thought. To them meaning and effect were still
inextricably entwined.
Thus, Sanzio's image does not merely ‘represent’ a symbol. It partakes
of its meaning, and hence of its power. It helps the donor to enter into
communion with those forces of which it is the mere "visible" token.
There are echoes in this essay of Gomperz’s formulation of the problem
of
representation. The picture as image of something (‘Abgebildetes’) and
the picture as the source or vehicle of an image (‘Abbildendes’)
represent two distinct
conceptions. They must correspond to two completely distinct complexes
of
psychological elements. As far as the facts of the visual perception and
association, the sensual qualities of the picture, there is no
difference
in what occurs in either of these. Its colours and surfaces are
completely
identical for the iconoclast and the worshipper. The difference is also
not possibly due to the fact that the worshipper consciously associates
other
ideas, 'vorstellungen’, with the subject matter of the image in a sort
of
amalgam of associations, 'assoziation von vorstellungen'. The
iconoclast
might equally well be reminded of the deity itself by its mere image and
yet
this does not make him an image worshipper.
When one sees a boy playing on a hobby horse, I might myself be reminded
of a real horse. This does not mean that the stick has become a reality
to me to the extent to which it has for the child. The function of the
image
does not involve a tangency of parallels, but rather a co-mingling of the
image and its subject matter (‘ein Ineinander von Abbildendem und
Abgebildeten’). Such an interpenetration cannot be the result of a mere
addition of
the conception of the visual subject to that of the visual object (‘dem
Abbildenden von dem Abgebildeten’). If this difference of psychological
elements cannot be explained as a difference in conceptions, it can only
be due to a difference in psychological elements not attached to the
subject of
sensual impressions and yet still essentially properties of our conception
of the object.
To put it more simply, the addressee, who to all intents and purposes
adopts an iconoclastic position, sees a representation of the archangel
Raffaello but the Christian addressee sees the archangel Raffaello in
the
figure of Azarias, in a way analogous to seeing an actor play the role
of Giulio
Cesare. Bühler would have described it in terms of a difference in the
mind set. An essay in ‘Icones Symbolicae’ Gombrich approaches the
illusionist
image via the doctrines of neo-Platonism. Nevertheless, it still sits
comfortably in the problems discussed by Gomperz and Bühler and the
Warburgian fascination with "denkraumverlust", the ‘tendency of the
human mind to
confuse the sign with the thing signified’. Its interest for the
conceptual
analytic philoso-pher comes from the schema that it adopted to discuss
the functioning of the image.
The three ordinary functions of images may be present in one concrete
image ─ a motif in a painting by Hieronymus Bosch may represent a broken
vessel, symbolize the sin of gluttony and express an unconscious sexual
fantasy on the part of the utterer but to us the three levels of meaning
remain
quite distinct. As soon, however, as we leave the ground of rational
analysis we find that these neat distinctions no longer hold. We surmise
that in
magical practices the image not only represents the enemy but may take
his
place (the very word re-present still has this dual meaning). We surmise
that
the ‘fetish’ not only ‘symbolizes’ fertility but has it. In short, our
attitude to the image is inextricably bound up with our whole idea about
the universe. This schema, of representation, symbolization and
expression
recurrs frequently in Gombrich’s unpublication on the realm and range of
the image. When we look at Gombrich's essay ‘The Visual Image: Its place
in
Communication’, we notice that he openly used Bühler’s model but gave it
a twist.
Iconographers have been at work for a long time analysing the various
functions of the prime instrument of human communication. Without going
into details we can accept for our purpose the divisions of
communication as
proposed by Karl Bühler, who distinguished between the functions of
expression, arousal and description. We may also call them symptom,
signal and
symbol, if we like. Translation is always a tricky business and it is
very
important to capture the sense of the original. Bühler uses the term
'darstellung', representation, as having reference to what the sign is
about, which may
be an object. It is the symbolization achieved by an utterance and is
not
a description. Thus, the utterance ‘Help!’ (or "Ach", since Geary was
mentioning it) is, for example, not strictly a description. It is
precisely because it is not a description that it is transferrable to
other modes
of representation, as, to use Grice's example, a dramatic hand-wave as
the
hand appears from the surface of the lake. It is a symbol that is an
object of
thought or feeling.
Yet it is overly simplifying the expressive function to refer to states
of mind (or soul) such as anger or amusement. The expressive function is
intended to indicate the utterer’s position in relation to the objects
or
states of affairs referred to. It is an adopted stance. Finally, arousal
is not merely intended to refer to a psychological state but on a call
to
behaviour that could be theorised as interpellation in an almost
Althusserian sense (in Ideology and Interpellation), where the
individual is engaged by the
addressee to participate in an imagined realm. By virtue of his general
anti-Cartesianism, Buehler constantly focusses on the social matrix in
the genesis of sense and by no means allowes the essential determinant
of
sense or meaning to be confided to a private mental or soul act. Thus,
Bühler
insists on the primacy of the social and hence publicly "observable"
(alla Wittgenstein, via criteria which display manifestations) data for
laying
the foundations of a theory, combating in this way Husserl’s tendency to
explain all differences in meaning by differences in acts of meaning,
themselves
accessible to some sort of introspective process. Throughout all Bühler’
s
work, the central and ever-recurring thesis is the irreducible social
matrix of
meaning in both the human and nonhuman spheres. Social life -- a form
of
life, for Wittgenstein -- is characterised first and foremost by a
mutual
steering or guiding of its members, involving the ‘set’ (Einstellung)
of
one individual or group of individuals toward another.
In ‘Icones Symbolicae’ Gombrich adopts an approach to the communicative
endeavour that harks back to his work with Ernst Kris. Later, he
somewhat
drops that to emphasise the "ecology" of perception, the causality of
the
environment spelled out by Bühler’s student Brunswik. And in "Symbolic
Images" Gombrich devotes a section of his introduction to psychoanalysis,
though
denying its utility to an analysis of symbolic meanings. In ‘The Visual
Image’ Gombrich takes again Bühler as suggesting that ‘the visual image
is supreme in its capacity for arousal, that its use for expressive
purposes
is problematic, and that unaided it altogether lacks the possibility of
matching the statement function. But The fundamental unit is the
utterance, not a statement. Consequently all of the very interesting
things Gombirch has
to say about the relationship between the image, the code, the caption
and
the context is useful, if slightly misplaced. A captions is typically
given in museums and art history books. One does not find them underneath
pictures in use in churches, public buildings or private houses unless
they
have been placed there for the benefit of foreign tourists -- as a
caption in
German for "The Statue of Liberty" on Liberty Island. Although Gombrich
uses Bühler, in respect of the mind or soul set, the relational model
and the
principle of abstractive relevance, he adapted the meaning of the
Organonmodell. Bühler’s model raises some very interesting questions
indeed when used with historical insight.
At this point we come full circle back to Gombrich and the fundamental
question of the nature of representation: more precisely, the symbol as a
point of interaction between the sign, its utterer and its addressee. If
we
remember Bühler’s emphasis on limiting ‘the dominance of the
representational function', we can see why Gombrich should have stressed
the importance of
mind or soul set: the attitudes and expectations of utterers and
addressees. The uttererers are, of course, the meaning-makers but one
shouldn’t forget the circumstances of production. Our own mind or soul
set insists
on the production of an individual and identifiable person but, as
Gomperz had
pointed out, this is a relatively restrictive idea and an older idea
would see it as a crafted object produced for a patron.
One is then entitled to ask how the utterer was intended to satisfy the
patron’s expressive needs, usually a Medici. Unlike a verbal statement
or
caption uttered by an individual to achieve an effect with reference
back
to that expressive individual, a crafted object is produced by an
exercise
of skill in response to a demand.
The utterer is an agent for the patron. More recently, when the notion
emerged of the utterer as distinctive creator in his own right, the
utterer's "workshop" (think Warhol's Factory) could become an agent for
the artist
himself. In contemporary practice, the utterer (such as Kosuth) becomes
an agent sometimes for the curator. Within this context the question
arises
concerning the exercise of power and wealth and how these were
concretely
mobilised by this, or by that.
But the keywords remains: sematology.
Cheers,
Speranza
REFERENCES
Gombrich, The study of symbols.
Gombrich, Aims and limits of iconology.
Gombrich, Topos and Topicality.
Gombrich, Patrons and painters in Baroque Italy.
Gombrich, The mastery of Raphael Sanzio.
Gombrich, Art and Psychology.
Gombrich, Reflections on the history of art
Gombrich, The Essential Gombrich.
Gombrich, The imgage the the eye.
Tolman, E. C. and E. Brunswik, `The Organism and the Causal Texture of
Environment', Psychological Review, -- for the hypothetical character of
all perceptual processes.
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