Semiotics: Arbitrary vs Iconic

Yesterday I actually came away from a lecture feeling like I had learned something. The lecture was about semiotics, the study of the production of meaning using sign systems. Being a photographer I am happily accustomed to a cheeky little image analysis being conducted for my sketchbooks and also for discovering the reasons why images are taken in certain ways and what they represent. In this lecture there were elements I had already learnt but it was more extensive and insightful. When reading an image there are a few formal elements that need to be considered:

• Context: Where? Who made it? What does this reference to?

• Content: Subject matter. Genre- so if its a certain specialism of photography it could be documentary, landscape,  portraiture, fashion, environmental, photojournalism etc.

• Form: composition, colour, texture, tone, scale, line, space- this makes up the physical existence of the image.

These formal elements are used to strip down the image and really investigate what about it gives you the impression of its meaning. A sign must have 3 characteristics:

• Must have a physical form
• Refer to something other than itself
• Must be used and recognised as a sign

In the lecture, the tutor used a rose as the object, the sign. And when a man gives a woman a rose (the signifier) it signifies his feelings for her. Thus the rose becomes a sign and love is signified. The tutor then gave the man a potato to hand to the lady, this changed the whole concept of what is trying to be portrayed. Why do we associate a flower with an emotion? Is there a direct link? Is it:

• Arbitrary- no natural link or relationship between the signifier and signified so the signifier is taken from convention. Meaning we create a meaning through generations of association. We almost grow up with these ideas as they are passed down.

• Iconic- There is a definite link that is naturally made.

Well, initially I thought perhaps it was iconic but I couldn't come up with a good reason why, why would a rose represent love? In some countries a potato may be more complimentary and useful than a rose. It inevitably is arbitrary, its something we have created to make love tangible. Even love is something that was created to make our emotions seem more important. When you look back on history, and think when did they first start coming up with this idea that love was something that could be described and held and given and broken? And all I could think was that it came from artists, painters and sculptors way back when humans began really depicting themselves and seperating from the rest of the animal kingdom. As early as the classical antiquity where Greek and roman art and literature flourished. It is Greek mythology that influenced many artists, these stories of great gods and goddesses that ruled the skies in control of the human races emotions, influencing and controlling them. It was a way for people to romanticise about an otherworldly control that these beings had over them. Why not? What would the world be like without love, hate, lust, war, sex, deceit, betrayal? Pretty tedious.

The Three Graces, 1504-1505. Raphael

This oil painting is from the Italian renaissance art movement painted by the Italian painter Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (Raphael). Using the techniques learned earlier you can start to break down the meaning. The apple represents fertility, youth, beauty. This is arbitrary as the link is something that has been created, it is an associated link. Why is it used here? Well the three women could represent the different stages of womanhood. On the left, the young adolescent, concealed by the fabric and arm of the middle woman conveying innocence and vulnerability. The woman to the right is adulthood, she is more mature and ripe, flourishing. The middle woman is the older, more accomplished, protecting the others like a mother. She too is more matured and her body is more defined and adult. The apple is the signifier and connotates youth and age which is signified throughout the painting. Until next time...