Visuals used in a talk presented in NYC in 2006 about language, art, and comics.

1. Visual Mental Images, Content,
and Narrative Schemata
Do visual artists transfer private mental
images to the public space?
Foundations of an alternative view based on
philosophy of language and mind.

2. Visual Mental Images, Content,
and Narrative Schemata
P Philosophical Overview: Problems for mental
images
P Observations on aesthetic perception and
mental images
P The Imagosphere
P Examples from comics

3. I. Problems for mental images
P Private Language Argument
P The Pure Presentation problem
P Higher-order Thought problem

4. Private Language Argument
P Could a “Robinson Crusoe” develop a
language?
P Answer: No. Doubts about:
< The possibility of self-defined concepts
< Understanding nature of interior perceptions
< Reliability of memory/uniformity of association

5. Private Language Argument
“I am going to the bank by the river.”

6. Pure Presentation Problem

7. Higher-order Thought Problem
P No images for logical concepts
P No images tied to abstactions
P No images present in complex thoughts

8. Problems for mental images
P Private Language Argument: an invented,
private personal language is impossible
P The pure presentation problem: not even
God could tell the meaning of an image
P Higher thought (meaning) requires logical
and linguistic coding – or narrative social
context

9. Problems for mental images
A solution by analogy to language
P Problem: A private language is impossible
< Solution: Language meaning generation is a
social phenomenon
P Problem: A private imagery symbology is
impossible - images have no inherent
meaning
< Solution: Imagery meaning generation is a social
phenomenon

10. II. Observations on aesthetic
perception and mental images
P Look at how images are used in context
P Pursue analogy to social construction of
language
P Map natural imagery types to artistic activity

17. Public Aesthetic Principles
Balance
Proximity & Unity
Repetition

18. Public Aesthetic Principles
Alignment - Contrast - Golden Mean - Symmetry
Viewer Perspective - Light/Dark - Perspective
Symbols - Sharp/Blurred - Color Association
Gesture - Optical Illusion - Depth Perception

19. Types of Mental Images
After-images
Memory
Imagination
Thought
Physical, hardwired responses and mechanisms -----> “Free” mechanisms

20. Automatic Mechanisms - Poons
Memory - Seurat
Imagination - Chagall
Thought - Michelangelo

21. III. The Imagosphere
A model of the public space of imagery creation,
interpretaion, and exchange
P Artist conceives “private meaning” – an
image/narration complex rooted in the
imagosphere
P Complex is produced, enters imagosphere
P Art Appreciator supplies narrative context to
constructively create meanings
P New memes released into imagosphere

22. Public Imagosphere mimics structure of mind
Raw Stimulus ----------> Memory -------------> Imagination --------------> Thought ---------->
Minimal narrative
content: Image Image comes “preloaded”
allows appreciator to with public narrative
create many content: Appreciator’s
meanings that do not meaning more closely
coincide with artist’s approximates artist’s
“private” meaning
New elements in the
New interpretations,
imagosphere
new meanings
Physical images can be mixed with narrative content in multitude of ways
Imagosphere simultaneously feeds on and builds itself

23. IV. Examples from Comics
P Use of automatic psychological response
mechanisms - good/bad characters
P Use of lack of detail - subjective identificaton
P Use of visual language “rules”
P Use of political/metaphysical interpretive
narratives

33. Shared cognitive and narrative structures
Meaning
Artist in Thought Art Appreciator