Séminaire/présentation d'Ewa Olszewska, M.A., de l'université Adam Mickiewicz, Poznan, Pologne
If art could speak, what would it say?
I am a doctoral student from the Faculty of English of the University of Adam Mickiewicz, in Poznan, Poland. My primary academic interests lie within the field of cognitive linguistics, specifically in the Conceptual Metaphor Theory. Since art has always been close to my heart I decided to study it from a cognitive linguistic perspective - the results of which I would like to share with you during my presentation.
Art, just like many other kinds of human communication, is a complex and multifaceted process which takes place at the crossings of modalities. My project focuses specifically on the verbo-visual communication of modern art, where language helps to frame processes of perception and conceptualization of art (cf Barthes 1977). After O’Toole (2011), the project assumes that a fundamental set of systemic choices is made throughout the course of an artwork’s creation. Together they form a universal map of an artwork’s semiotic space, and as such, they may render parallel interpretations in viewers’ readings. In other words, on the basis of a shared semiotic code, the viewer may respond to the choices of an artist.
My primary aim for the talk is to present my model of analyzing discourse of art which I like to call a Multimodal Critical Analysis of Discourse of Art (MUCADA). Then I would like to compare some of my findings with the data I gained from a study I have recently conducted. And lastly, I will briefly discuss challenges I’ve stumbled upon — and how I plan to resolve them in the future.