From Sequence to Scenario. the Historiography and Theory of Visual Narration
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From Sequence to Scenario. The Historiography and Theory of Visual Narration Gyöngyvér Horváth Thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of East Anglia School of World Art Studies and Museology 2010 © This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with the author and that no quotation from the thesis, nor any information derived therefrom, may be published without the author’s prior, written consent. Abstract When visual narratives first became the focus of study in art history in the late nineteenth century, they were believed to be such a strong phenomenon that they effected the formation of styles. Today, visual narratives are regarded as significant forms of knowledge in their own right, appearing both within and beyond the artistic context. Between these two ideas there is a century-long story of historiography, an almost unknown tradition of academic writing. One of the major aims behind the research presented in this thesis is to trace this tradition: to show the main trends, ideas, persons and methods that formed this particular discourse. In the first part of the thesis, two fundamentally different traditions are identified: one where narratives were regarded as illustrations and one which treated them as elements of a visual language. Special attention has been devoted to the ideas of two scholars, G. E. Lessing and Franz Wickhoff. This is because Lessing’s ideas had particularly strong and lasting effects, and Wickhoff’s ideas were visionary and exemplary. The second major aim of the thesis, relying on this historiographical survey, is to expand our concept of visual narration as it has been dealt with until now. The second part of the dissertation thus proposes that this concept should be expanded in three different ways: first, a definition is presented for sequential or formal, and perceptual narratives, and a perception-based explanation is offered to demonstrate their raison d’être . Second, a notion of a scenario-type pictorial storytelling is introduced. This includes an attempt to draw into analytical focus not just the story presented by the image but the story of the image too. Third, aiming to overcome concentration on episodic narration, a referential system is elaborated and its usage is demonstrated by means of a statistical analyses. Thus, in general, this thesis aims to illuminate certain crucial aspects of storytelling when understood in a broad sense: time and narration, the types of narrative images, and the domain of visual narrativity. 1 Acknowledgments Many people, institutions, and friends helped me to complete this thesis. First and foremost, I would like to mention Professor John Onians who initially invited me to the School of World Art Studies and Museology. As a supervisor he was a continuous source of inspiration. His encouragement, guidance and criticism was invaluable, his amazing intellectual freedom will always be an example to follow. Dr. Margit Thøfner, my other supervisor also contributed in a fundamental way to my academic development. She kept me focused on the thesis, challenged, corrected and encouraged; her generosity in sharing ideas is exceptional. Furthermore, I would like to express special gratitude to Professor Sandy T. Heslop, my interim supervisor for his stimulating remarks, Professor Stefan Muthesius for his continuing encouragement, and Elisabeth de Bièvre for her support and wisdom. I must also thank all the staff and students at the School. Thanks to the wonderful discussions among the participants of the Research Seminars, these meant much to me. Many thanks to Beverley Youngman and Lyn Marsh who helped me remain in close contact even when I was far away from Norwich and the UEA. The support from the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design in Budapest, my workplace in the recent years, has also been important. I want to thank to colleagues and students, who kept in touch and accepted electronic management and advising over the periods I was in England. I would also like to thank László Tóth, a former student of mine at the Moholy-Nagy University, who helped me with the design of the diagrams in Chapter 7. My dissertation research and writing was generously supported by a number of organizations and grants. The Arts and Humanities Research Council provided the fees for my course; various grants from the School of World Art Studies helped me to stay in England. Minor grants came from the Hungarian State (Eötvös Scholarship, Ern ı Kállai scholarship) and from the Open Society Institute. Finally, I must give special thanks to my mother and to numerous friends and colleagues who have been wonderfully supportive over these years. 2 Contents Abstract 1 Acknowledgments 2 Table of contents 3 Introduction 6 Introduction 6 Why historiography? 6 Why theory? 8 Themes, modifications, tellability 9 Pictorial narration versus visual narration 11 Context of study 12 General overview of the chapters 13 Part One: Historiography 13 Part Two: Theory 16 Part Three: Practice 17 Part One Historiography 19 Chapter 1 Premodern Theories of Visual Narration 20 Alberti and the concept of istoria 20 Alberti’s sources 21 Istoria and the scenario-type narration 22 Alberti’s significance 25 Theories on moment and narration in the seventeenth century 26 Paradoxes in limitations in Lessing’s Laocoön 29 Lessing’s position 31 The method of argumentation and the question of strong differentiation 33 The place of narratives in the Laocoön 36 Chapter 2 Modern Theories of Visual Narration I 38 Introduction 38 The origins and early developments of ideas on pictorial narration 38 Franz Wickhoff and the beginning of modern research 41 Wickhoff’s terminology and argumentation 41 The role of process in the method of narration 44 The reception of Wickhoff’s theory 45 Typology-making practices 47 Kurt Weitzmann: narratives in book illustration 51 Chapter 3 Modern Theories of Visual Narration II 54 Introduction 54 The aesthetization of basic movements: Paul Souriau 55 When contemplation expands the instant: Etienne Souriau 57 Directed tension and abstract narratives: Rudolf Arnheim 60 The true nature of the depicted moment: Ernst H. Gombrich 63 3 Chapter 4 Postmodern Theories of Visual Narration 66 Introduction 66 Art History 66 Narratology 70 Semiotics 75 Summary 78 Part Two Theory 79 Chapter 5 Abstract Narratives 80 Introduction 80 Formal and perceptual narratives 80 Abstract narratives 81 Perception as narrative 81 Formal narratives 84 Narrativization 87 Perception as action 88 The narrative construction of reality 89 Chapter 6 Anachronism and Narrative Ramification 92 Introduction 92 The Ascoli Annunciation : its history and function 93 Episodes and pictorial signs of presentness 96 Anachronism as a visual phenomenon 99 Anachronistic settings in Italian painting 102 Time experienced in the Renaissance 104 Past seen as past, present seen as present 105 Former theories explaining painterly anachronisms 107 The principle of ‘presentia’ and the living faith 110 Augustine 110 Aelred of Rievaulx 111 Meditationes Vitae Christi 112 Zardino de Oration 114 Loreto, the cult of the Casa Sacra 115 Alberti’s window-metaphor 117 The story of Crivelli’s Annunciation 118 Narrative ramifications 123 Part Three Practice 127 Chapter 7 The Relative Frequency and Distribution of Different Narrative Models 128 Introduction 128 Preparations 129 Sources 130 The database 133 The content of the database 133 Narrative indicators and the process of the mapping 134 Context 135 The story and its structure in the Ovid’s Metamorphoses 135 Episodes and references in images 137 The process of coding 138 4 Results 140 The direction of the narrative 140 The distribution of the episodes 142 The distribution of the references 148 Episodes and references – the distribution of the NCN 155 The NCN by date categories 156 Distribution by place, technique and size 159 Conclusion 163 Conclusion 165 Appendices 170 Illustrations 171 Database 189 Appendix 195 Bibliography 225 CD attached with images in the Database 5 Introduction The dissertation deals with visual narratives. It has a double aim: to look back and to look forward. As its title suggest, by looking back the thesis outlines the major trends in research into visual narratives and reviews both past and present approaches and ideas. Yet, by looking forward, the aim is to advance our understanding of visual narrativity on a theoretical level: to reflect on some well known and lesser known theoretical issues, to make suggestions about how they can be better handled and to give examples of how narrative images can be treated in art history. WHY HISTORIOGRAPHY ? Currently, three main disciplines are involved in shaping our conception of visual narratives. They are the interrelated and sometimes overlapping fields of art history, literary criticism, or rather the sub-field of narratology, and semiotics. The history of art has a long, but little studied tradition of engaging with visual narratives. It is the field that still produces the largest quantity of work on this topic but it does not seem strong enough to have a significant impact on, or to generate much response in the other cognate disciplines. The currently dominant field is the huge and constantly growing domain of narratology – many of whose practitioners on the basis of a supposed primacy and of the more elaborate theoretical framework developed for literature and film – feel authorized to make general claims about the visual arts. The third discipline is the relatively new one of semiotics, where visual narratives are studied as part of the broader area of visual modes of communication. Semiotics offers a more purely theoretical approach with a balanced view of the visual and verbal, although it favours the latter, but operates often without a historical perspective. Given this state of affairs, one would expect there to be lively theoretical debates and dynamic co-operation, resulting in interdisciplinary studies.