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Chapter 1, Part I- Art as representation (p. 19 – 33)
Art, imitation, and representation (pp. 19-26)
Plato – Moral critique of arts. Epistemic critique of arts (copy of a copy).
Aristotle. On moral critique- Catharsis (p. 19) – the purging of the emotions. On epistemic
critique, thinks we learn about human affairs from the arts, such as what is likely to happen
in certain counterfactual scenarios.
Both agree that drama is essentially simulating human action and that painting and dramatic
poetry and sculpture are also kinds of copying. Dance and music were part of drama and
poetry for them, so they did not counterexemplify the claim that all art is copying.
So for them, x is art only if it is an imitation in the sense that it simulates something (note
that this is consistent with some imitations not being art).
This theory was hugely important in the 1700s just as “fine arts” became a recognizable
category (p. 22, cf. Charles Batteux’s book of 1774). Importantly, imitation was used as the
thing in common painting, poetry, dance, music, drama, and sculpture. Had to tell a new
story about music since it was not grouped with poetry and drama in the same way they
were for Greeks (p. 23). Theorists argued that it could imitate the human voice and natural
sounds like birdsong.
Through the 19th century this theory did describe high art fairly well.
But- German expressionism, cubism, action painting, abstract expressionism, and
minimalism all departed radically from imitation. Moreover, some of these (such as
minimalism) reminded us of artistic traditions not covered by imitation and hence excluded
from counting as high art: carpets, pottery, Islamic wall patterns, illuminated texts, quilts,
furniture, jewelry etc. These things can be quite beautiful, and one of the things modern art
did was reclaim the idea that high art can be beautiful for its own sake. Likewise with music,
which never really fit well in the imitative theory.
Finally, it never really covered literature well. Words don’t perceptually simulate what they
are about. But this is why the Greek theory is updated to just hold that artworks must
represent something.
Representational theory (p. 25) gets literature.
x is a work of only if x represents y (where y ranges over a domain comprised of objects,
persons, events and actions) if and only if (1) a sender intends x (e.g., a picture) to stand for
y (e.g., a haystack) and (2) the audience realizes that x is intended to stand for y.
But still problems- architecture such as cathedrals and state buildings, orchestral music,
some abstract painting, lots of modern dance etc., and traditional decorative art.
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The neo-representational theory of art (26-33)
Neo-representational theory (p. 26) says that an artwork must have a subject about which it
makes a comment:
x is an artwork only if it is about something.
Gets Duchamp’s readymades (pp. 27-28). Big point is that aboutness is a broader notion
than representation. A movie can be about something without representing that thing. Maybe
it represents the consequences of the thing it is commenting on.
Argument (and counterarguments) to the conclusion that being about something is a
necessary condition for art (pp.29-33)
1. All artworks require interpretations.
2. If anything requires an interpretation, then it must be about something.
3 Therefore, all artworks are about something.
Problems- deconstructive art. But there is a response to this (p. 30). What about expressive
properties, e.g. the Pentagon expresses strength. Perhaps there is a kind of aboutness here.
But (p. 31) these responses aren’t really that convincing. The neo-representationalist either
has to say that expression is a kind of comment on what the art is about, or that the art is
about the expressed emotion. Carroll (p. 31 last two full paragraphs) considers the latter, and
shows this to not be compelling. But he doesn’t consider the former. Perhaps some
expressive artworks are about existence, and via the expression of emotion comment on
existence. Blues certainly works this way.
Second problem, couldn’t some decorative art merely be about stimulating aesthetic
pleasure? Can some things just be beautiful without being interpretable?
Part II
What is representation?
Pictorial representation (pp 33-39)
Even though the representation theory fails to provide necessary or sufficient conditions for
art, it is still the case that much art is representational. Thus to understand an awful lot of art,
we must understand the notion of representation. Since much visual art (paintings,
photographs, movies, TV programs, videos, etc.) is paradigmatically representational, it is a
good place to start.
Traditional approaches to pictorial representation pp. 34-39)
Plato thought that painting was analogous to holding a mirror to the object.
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Resemblance theory (p. 34)
X represents y if and only if x resembles y appreciably.
Arguments against the resemblance theory (pp. 35-36 that it is not sufficient for
representation, 36-38 that it is not necessary for representation)
To show that resemblance is not a sufficient condition for representation is to show that x
can resemble y without x representing y. But this is clear. Consider two of the same kinds of
car. Also note that resemblance is symmetric in that if x resembles y then y resembles x.
This is not the case with representation. Again, resemblance is reflexive in that things
resemble themselves (Carroll claims this, though it is a little bit odd).
Maybe stipulate that x must be a visual design. But this shows another weakness, what
visual designs most resemble are other visual designs, not objects in the world that they
represent!
O.K. So say that x must be a visual design and y not a visual design? But this again fails
because some pictures do represent other pictures. Postcards of movie scenes, and
photographs of paintings.
Not a necessary condition (p. 37):
1. x represents y if and only if x denotes y.
2. If x denotes y, then x might not resemble y.
3. x represents y.
4. Therefore, x denotes y.
5 Therefore, x might not resemble y.
6. Therefore, x represents y and x might not resemble y.
7. Now, suppose that resemblance is a necessary condition for representation.
8. If resemblance is a necessary condition for representation, then it is not (possibly) the case
that x represents y and that x might not resemble y.
9. Therefore, it is not the case that x represents y and x might not resemble y.
10. Therefore, resemblance is not a necessary condition for representation.
Note that line 7 is assumed for reduction ad absurdum, and the contradiction is between
lines 6 and 9. Line 2 follows from thinking about cases of successful representation such as
a tack representing an armor division on a military map, or words representing things.
Illusion theory (p. 38)
X represents y if and only if x causes the illusion of y in spectators.
Note that something can cause an illusion of y without itself resembling y. So a picture
might make a person think of y even if the picture objectively resembles another picture
more.
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Unfortunately though, this theory is even less plausible. (1) In the overwhelming majority of
cases nobody is really fooled by art, and (2) if successful representation really fooled us in
this manner it would make no sense to praise a work for being realistic, for if the illusion
theory were true we would be fooled and think we were seeing the thing itself. Finally, in
order to look at photos and pictures correctly, we must learn to see through the surface
distortions, often consciously so. But if we were really fooled into thinking we were looking
at the represented things, we would not need to do this.
The conventionalist theory of pictorial representation (pp. 39-42)
This theory really builds off of semiotics research into the way signs work. One shibboleth
of this field is the supposed arbitrariness of the denotation relation between signs and things
they denote. This is pretty clearly true for linguistic signs. Nothing intrinsic to the word
“dog” determines that it denotes dogs. It is a social convention that it denotes dogs instead of
cats.
But we should not conclude too much from this. However, some people have, giving rise to
the following.
Conventionalist theory of pictorial representation (p. 40)
x pictorially represents y only if x denotes y in accordance with some established system of
established conventions.
The reasons for this (p. 40-42): (1) the failure of the resemblance and illusion theories
(Carroll notes on page 45 that this would only be relevant if resemblance, illusion, and the
conventional theory were the only options, (2) the wide variety in styles and kinds of
pictorial representation across cultures and history (e.g. frontal eye Egyptian faces versus
Renaissance perspective, Japanese landscapes, German Expressionism, Cubism), (3) the
supposed fact that indigenous people are initially unable to make sense of photographs, and
(4) the way the very notion of “realistic” depiction itself changes culturally (Giotto used to
be considered highly realistic, and now David is considered much more so; Picasso claimed
his cubist paintings would be seen as realistic some day).
A neo-naturalist theory of pictorial representation (pp. 42-49)
Much of the discussion of this section concerns why the conventionalist theory is wrong: (1)
representational art travels from culture to culture effortlessly (think of Bollywood cinema,
our ability to recognize Bison in prehistoric cave paintings or Assyrian bas reliefs, Japanese
painters learning to paint more realistically from a Western anatomy book, television around
the world, etc.; from all of this and a consideration about other possible sources of confusion
it is clear that the story about indigenous people not recognizing photographs is almost
certainly false), (2) developmental psychology shows that two year olds who have never
seen pictures are able to recognize the objects in the picture without effort, (3) the many
ways in which mastery of pictorial representation is not at all like linguistic mastery
(compare learning a first language with the developmental psychology of recognizing
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pictures and compare learning a second language with recognizing pictures from another
culture; in both cases the language learning is hard and takes years of work and the picture
recognition is instantaneous and takes no effort), (4) there are breakthroughs in
representationalist painting, such as perspective and use of shadows, that everyone regards
as leading to an objectively more realistic painting. On this fourth one, the conventionalist
will argue that the standards for being more or less realistic are themselves conventional and
determined by arbitrary social norms. But this fails to explain how people from radically
different cultures can agree on their assessments of different styles being more or less
realistic.
All of this shows that pictorial representation is not merely conventional. The fact that all of
this crosses cultures so easily, requires no training to grasp (unlike learning a second
language) provides strong evidence that humans have the innate ability to recognizes it when
it succeeds and fails.
This leads to the neo-naturalist theory of pictorial representation:
A visual design x pictorially represents y (an object, person, place, action, event or another
visual design) if and only if (1) x has the intended capacity to cause a normal percipient to
recognize y in x simply by looking; (2) the relevant percipients recognize y in x simply by
looking; (3) x is intended to denote y; and (4) the relevant percipients realize that x is
intended to denote y.
Carroll is not very clear about why he includes (3) and (4) here. The closest he comes by
noting that clouds can cause recognition of objects that they are similar to without denoting
those objects. But (1) would take care of that since clouds aren’t intended to cause the
recognition. But even this we need to be careful about, say that the face of Jesus appeared by
accident on a piece of toast, but then this piece of toast is held up as a holy relic for
centuries. Does Carroll’s definition entail that the toast pictorially represents Jesus or not? It
is not at all clear! Who gets to do the intending? Carroll doesn’t say.
The important thing is that this is compatible with the resemblance and illusion theories, but
does not entail them. Psychologists will figure out what the actual causes of such recognition
are, and nothing in the definition a priori determines that it cannot be resemblance or
illusion. However, given the considerations presented earlier in the chapter it is almost
certain it will not be.
Representation across the arts (p 49 -53
Carroll defines representation in this way:
x represents y (where y ranges over a domain comprised of objects, persons, events, and
actions) if, and only, if (1) a sender intends x (e.g., a picture) to stand for y (e.g., a person),
and (2) an audience recognizes that x is intended to stand for y.
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This isn’t a very informative definition, because “stands for” is just as confusing a term as
“representation.” But the important and interesting part of this section is what Carroll goes
on to do, characterizing four different kinds of representation.
1. Unconditional representation-Obtains by triggering an audience’s innate representational
capacities, getting audience to recognize x in the artwork by the same capacities that allow
audience to represent x in nature. Includes: pictorial representation, standard dramatic
representation and scupture, very rarely music (e.g. representing birdsong)
2. Lexical representation- In order to recognize that x stands for y the audience must know
the relevant conventional codes. Includes: literature, some aspect of Romantic ballet (e.g.
drawing a circle around your head means you are pretty), Indian mudras.
Note that many cases are mixed between unconditional and lexical representation, e.g. we
unconditionally recognize the fire engine because it is red, but it is red because of an
antecedent social code.
3. Conditional specific representation- This one is a bit confusing. In many cases we only
recognize the representation because we already know what is supposed to be represented.
Carroll’s example is poison being put in the King’s ear in Hamlet. One only recognizes the
actors’ movements to represent poisoning because one expects a poisoning.
4. Conditional generic representation- “the spectator is able to determine or recognize that x
stands for y on condition that she knows that something is being represented” (p. 52).
Examples: if we know that a piece of music is supposed to be representational then we
might know that certain phrases denote water. In the game charades, you regard your own
teams actions as conditional generic representations, and the motions of players of the other
team as conditional specific representations.