hello and welcome to another video on art appreciation so this subject has been offered by commission on higher education or chad here in the philippines for college students and this is part of the general education curriculum now a common concern among students is on the interpretation of an artwork so they often ask is there such thing as a correct interpretation now we are going to learn that today as we are going to tackle the essay written by alice guillermo who is an authority in terms of art criticism the title of that essay is reading the image where she tells us the four planes of analysis but we are going to deal with that uh later on now unlike the study of literature we're in as early as our childhood days in our elementary or grade school were in we could already tackle short poems or analyze easy short stories and fables or narratives but with painting or sculptures perhaps our training may be insufficient because in our childhood days we were just having our watercolor or sketching basic drawing shapes but as to the analysis that is now the task of college students that is the challenge for you so fortunately we have this essay written by alice guillermo and she gives us concrete guidelines on how to interpret an artwork basically images in general like they can be from advertisements in social media or print ad as well as paintings so stay with me as we are going to tackle reading the image by alice guillermo and hopefully you can succeed in your art appreciation subject so we will now begin with our discussion of reading the image by alice guillermo i am your facilitator karthilyn c adajar alice guillermo was a recipient of the palanca awards several times she is a renowned writer researcher art critic and professor so she shares to us guidelines in analyzing or interpreting images so they can be paintings they can be ads in social media or even from print ads she begins her essay by telling us that when we approach an artwork when we analyze it we have to put it in context and related to society as well as history and we have to know the basic documentary information of an artwork like the title because the title can give us a hint on what the artwork is all about or sometimes the title can just be a way of naming the subject or naming the painting like for example tom wesselmann he has a series of nude paintings and he titled all of them the great american nude but how to distinguish one from the other he would just give them numbers so later on i'm going to show you one of his paintings so that's the title and then we also need to know the date of the work why is this so sometimes the artist can be influenced with what's going on around him and it may be based on a historical event or it can be based on a current event of the time when the painting was made so we need to know the date of the work and of course the name of the artist so for example we have here the fruit gatherer and it's done or completed in 1950 and made by fernando amarsolo and we also need to know medium and technique so here we have the skill of the artist so if it's a painting what did he use is it watercolor is it oil that's why we can oftentimes read from labels oil on canvas but of course nobody's limiting you if you have your paper there like a page in your notebook and then you only have your pencil or your pen then you scribble start sketching so the medium there is pen or pencil on paper so as simple as that and for sculptures he would use the hammer and then the chisel and what what is the medium so it can be wood it can even be marble so for example michelangelo he was already very skilled when in terms of stone cutting when he was still a child because he grew up with a stone cutter so his nanny was married to a stone cutter and yeah as early as his childhood days he could already cut stone so when he was in his 20s he already made pieta so that's medium and technique now when you say dimensions or measurement so the size of the artwork so spolarium or may 3 1808 by francisco digoya can occupy an entire wall in a gallery whereas mona lisa it's quite small it's like poster size so you see uh it's it's important to know that because if it's a large painting um we can truly appreciate an artist in terms of the making of the details um he's very intricate but it's not also saying that if the artwork is very small the artist did not devote time in making it it doesn't follow but we need to know how big or how small an artwork is then when we talk about provenance yeah location of the artwork where is it now in what museum or gallery but when we really talk about provenance um we ask the question to whom did the artist pass the work after making it so did he give it to a friend or was it immediately sold to a certain gallery what was it first in a private collection until now it's now exhibited in a gallery so that's provenance so so in this example i was at the national museum of the philippines so the first painting that you see as you enter is the spoolarium and you see there the details another thing that you see inside the national museum is a gallery where you see paintings during the japanese occupation like for example this one by diosdado lorenzo rape and massacre in hermitage so when i was in that gallery it's like i was really shocked and it's like you could feel what the early filipinos felt or experienced during the time of the japanese occupation so this is another one by dominador castaneda doomed family and if you take a look at the medium it's oil on lavonite so love on it is like a plywood but you have the darker color um lavonite used to be um the walls of like houses in the 70s so that's what's used by castaneda in this painting lavonnet and alice guillermo proceeds by telling us that if we have to understand an artwork we have to do our research read a lot so go to the library or surf the net why because the meaning of an artwork can grow with time as viewing it becomes a process of continual discovery so meaning to say their interpretation in the past may not be the same as what we have now or we can add to that interpretation based on research so for example we have this creation of adam by michelangelo he completed it in 1512 so we can see it in the ceiling of the sistine chapel but in 1990 one doctor named franklin meshberger wrote his interpretation or analysis claiming that the background outlining god and the angels resembles the human brain but you see prior to 1990 nobody said that even the biographer of michelangelo was basari did that right that okay the interpretation is that it's the human brain nobody said so but it was only much later in this century so you see the meaning of an artwork can grow with time [Music] so interpretation is not absolute so this is a line this is a long sentence coming from the essay so where do we get the meaning of art so guillermo says that it's a complex of intellectual emotional and sensory significations which the work conveys and to which the viewer responds bringing in the breadth of his cultural background artistic exposure and training and human experience in a dialogic relationship with the artwork so you see that i wrote in bold letters the key words okay so um she's saying that if you have an artwork it's like a dialogue between you the viewer and the artist so the artist has something to say in his artwork and for us to interpret or give meaning to it we bring in many things our background when we have this training in art what we have learned in the past we we have that in us already and then we put that as we interpret an artwork also what we feel something that's in our emotions you see it they're not second life emotional what we feel sensory and of course we also bring our background our our culture so you see uh it's a complex thing that's why we cannot say that there is an absolute interpretation because our interpretations may vary because we have different backgrounds but is there such thing as uniform interpretation we will go to that in a while so what is alice guillermo telling us so we have to remember those key terms so again an artwork is a dialogue between the artist and the viewer and we bring our background as we interpret an artwork so depending on our education our training what we have felt what we have experienced in the past we bring them as we analyze an artwork that's why she says that there is this horizon of meaning a work may accommodate several meanings so she then proceeds by telling us about the four planes of analysis basic symbiotic iconic contextual and evaluative so we'll go through each one when we say basic symbiotic plane or the word semiotic it's the study of science so there are signs there are symbols incorporated in an artwork and these symbols carry a certain meaning like colors for example they bring meanings or when you have lines okay but then how do we say okay this line means this okay or this um horizontal line this is the meaning okay where do we get these meanings okay so we'll go to that so we consider you know the lines and then the colors when we talk about basic symbiotic plane and when we view an artwork and we give our analysis the images that we see should be interrelated should be viewed in a highly relational manner and not isolated or compartmentalized so when we give our interpretation for example in this painting done by angela pasquale it is titled like we see a flower okay and below the flower there are two women holding hands you have to relate so if you have a flower how will the flower relate to the two women holding hands and what is that red color that you see at the center some students will say it's a wine glass okay if it's a wine glass how will it relate to the flower how will it relate to the women that's the reason why alice guillermo wrote there um when you analyze it's not isolated or compartmentalized so you relate the images to one another so she mentions two sources of meaning where do we get meaning okay so the first one is psychological and physical or sensory experiences which are commonly shared so because these are commonly shared wherever you are in the world it is possible that the interpretation can be uniform because all of us experience day and night pain and pleasure hot or cold okay so because of that it's possible that we can have a uniform interpretation as far as basic symbiotic plane is concerned okay another example when we have the painting may 3 1808 by francisco digoya he made it in 1814 but the actual event took place on may 3 1808 so the spanish government commissioned goya to make a painting out of that happening that massacre to remind the spaniards of the valley of patriotism but the real event happened in the early morning but goya used the night time as he's setting in this painting why because then the night time brings in or gives us the connotation of sadness something that is gloomy melancholic so it adds to the theme of the painting like okay so the next element is line so according to her orientations of line derive their meaning from the positions of the body our bodies so for example this painting by tom wesselmann great american nude number 36 so you have a woman lying on the bed because you have this horizontal position it is closely associated with sleeping and resting so just like our body when we go to sleep it's horizontal position so that is the meaning that is brought by this type of line whereas if you have the vertical line patas you have the meaning strength and stability so you have the example the oblation by guillermo tolentino but in this monument of bonifacio you can see that you have a mixture of several lines so for bonifacio it is vertical line and we know that vertical line means strength and stability but if you take a look at the katiponeros look at their lines it's diagonal and diagonal line connotes action or movement so if you recall the diagonal line there denoting movement so the second source of meaning [Music] the social cultural conventions of a particular society now this time it can vary because it depends on the society where you are from so for example the color yellow we have heard the song a folk rock song by kenny rogers coward of the county and you have the line there his mama named him tommy but folks just call him yellow so yellow in that song is actually covertis so tommy is considered a by the people in their place because he does not fight back um he was always recalling what his father told him promise me son not to do the things i've done walk away from trouble if you can so when tommy was growing up he was always reminded of that line coming from his father so when somebody bullies him or yeah ridicules him he does not fight back but one day when his girlfriend was gang raped he decided sometimes you have to fight you gotta fight to be a man so see the color yellow there is used to mean cover this being a coward but how come in the philippines yellow now means democracy or carries the meaning democracy freedom okay so actually it's again contextual okay cultural social cultural um it has to do with the song thai a yellow ribbon okay so i have another video on that explaining why why the aquino administration use the yellow color so you see it depends on the culture where you are in the society where you live so that's the second source of meaning so the color black for example it's for morning in western or western influence societies so when we are here in the philippines we can either use black or white so that's cultural in contrast no so when we say black is for morning but at the same time it can also be a symbol of elegance class and sophistication so the first photo there you have audrey hepburn in breakfast at tiffany's the iconic film or you have your k idol korean idol lee min ho in his black suit and the late princess diana in her little black dress so you see black is a symbol also of elegance so it depends on where and when it is used so for white the color of mourning in many asian societies similar to us here in the philippines we wear white when you have the funeral but you know never read right because families will be offended why are you wearing red in a funeral or in a wake so again it's cultural so white for weddings you have baptism and we also have the white flag to indicate that yeah we are surrendering and you have the the birds not the white birds for say peace what about red no so it it's a color of love now when we are in love yeah we draw the red hearts but it can also be the color of seduction but also a color of violence bloodshed so yeah you have the images there from squid game and then below you have the paintings polarion dominant color is red so showing as bloodshed so you see colors carry different meanings and when you assign a meaning to a color again you have to consider the context so after the basic semiotic plane is the iconic plane so in the iconic plane we look at the image itself so in this painting done by juan luna titled parisian life the focus is the woman who is in the foreground so one luna here employs perspective so the object or the image that is nearest us has a bigger image compared to those at the back the three men at the back so when we talk about iconic plane you focus on the image itself so take a look at the woman the way she sits is she sitting comfortably or is she in an awkward position and ask why if it's awkward why and what about her gaze is she looking at us and what about the men they seem to be talking about the woman so that's basically iconic plane just take a look at the image and the relationship of the image to ask the viewers is the image looking at us or is the image looking at another character in a painting so that's iconic plane next is the contextual plane so according to alice guillermo it's possible that our interpretations are the same for basic symbiotic and iconic but in the contextual and the fourth one evaluative here interpretations can vary because we belong to different societies so in the contextual plane you put the work in context you always see its relationship to society and here knowledge of previous literature mythology history would be an advantage because you are going to relate the artwork to those things so a broad knowledge of a society's history and its economic political and cultural conditions past and present is an advantage because you are going to relate the work to these things so if you have not read at all so there will be something that's lacking so it entails a lot of reading activities so knowledge of national and world art and literatures mythologies philosophies and different cultures and worldviews references and allusions to historical figures and events so for example we have this painting diana bathing by francois boucher so um at that time artists were yeah somehow forbidden to paint the female nude but the artists said ah we are not painting a female nude or women we are painting women we are painting goddesses so it was like an excuse for them to paint the female nude but as the one interpreting the work if you have no idea who diana is so you cannot write anything you cannot make a criticism or analysis under the contextual plane because you have limited knowledge so that's the meaning of this now when you say contextual plain previous knowledge of these things would be an advantage so we know dayana or our team is goddess in roman and greek mythology so if you don't know who they are if you haven't read that before then you cannot relate to the work that's what is guillermo is saying because the artist um can have references and allusions to historical figures and events then lastly is the evaluative plane so as an art critic find out what is considered as a value in your nation and is it depicted in the artwork or you can even ask what are the underlying social issues conveyed in the work like we have here basa ansa sanhuan so it's one of the paintings that won in a contest and son who won okay san juan this feast of saint john the baptist so if you're a catholic yeah we celebrate that every june so it's something that is valued in our country so try to see what is the value that is presented in the work or when you take a look at ads always consider that ads are there these images are there to promote the product to sell the product so what value is being promoted so you have commercialism consumerism so if you see the perfume ad how does it relate to the legs of the woman and the man who is at the center so interior framing so the man is framed by the legs of the woman so if you are going to interpret that image how are these three related perfume legs and the man so it's somehow suggesting that as a woman if you're going to use that perfume you are capable of trapping the man because of your scent but is it really true does it follow probably so that is what you have to see so um your teacher might be giving you paintings to be analyzed but also ads and because ads are included in the essay of alice guillermo because this essay is applicable to images so any image that we can encounter and we have to apply the four planes of analysis so in conclusion alice guillermo said that yes there can be varying interpretations especially that we have different cultures we live in different nations and every nation has a culture or even a small community it has a particular culture so it's yeah it's possible that there are varying interpretations just like for example when you have this nowhere when this was exhibited no politism by medellin so it it was controversial i think it was early 2000s so um when your teacher gives you a painting or an ad to be analyzed always give your proof so do not just say okay this is the color and this color means that but the question is why and what's the function of this line to the entire painting and how is this image related to the entire painting and how do we relate this to society so that's under contextual plane and what values are presented in the artwork those are the four planes of analysis emphasized by alice guillermo in her essay and we have to use these four planes when we analyze images so thank you very much for joining me in this video and i hope you are going to succeed in your art appreciation subject if you haven't subscribed yet to my channel please click the subscribe button and also the bell icon so that you are notified in all of the videos that i upload so thank you very much once again for joining me i hope you will be successful and you will get a passing grade in your art appreciation class bye