Reading the image

1. English 41

2.  Title of theWork
– may be significant or insignificant
 Artist’s Name
– biographical data
 Medium andTechnique
– documentation, material and technique
 Dimension or measurement
– format of work (rectangular, etc)
 Date of work
– date, year, period
 Provenance
– present owner, collector of work

4.  Basic Semiotic Plane
– study of signs, elements, technical
and physical aspects of work.
 Visual Elements
 Choice of medium and technique
– material and style
 Format of work
– symbolic elements, figurative representations
- shape of work
 Physical Properties and marks of the work
– significations of the work (importance/relevance)

5.  When:TheThird of May 1808
 What time: Early hours of the morning
 What: uprising.
 Description: two masses of men: (1) one a rigidly poised
firing squad, (2) disorganized group of captives held at gun
point.
 How: Executioners and victims face each other across a
narrow space
 Analysis: Contrast of the soldiers' attitudes and the steely
line of their rifles, with the crumbling irregularity of their
target.

6.  Symbol: A square lantern situated on the
ground between the two groups
 Meaning: dramatic
The brightest illumination falls on the huddled victims to the
left, whose numbers include a monk or friar in prayer.

7.  Position: right and center
 condemned figures stand next in line to be
shot.
 central figure is the brilliantly lit man kneeling
▪ his arms flung wide in either appeal or defiance.
(surrender)
▪ yellow and white clothing repeats the colors of the
lantern.
▪ plain white shirt and sun-burnt face show he is a
simple laborer.

8.  Background:
 between the hillside and the shakos
▪ crowd with torches
▪ Onlookers
▪ more soldiers
▪ Or victims.

9.  Signifier-signified relationship
 Particular features, aspects, and qualities of the
image
 Includes the choice of subject
▪ (socio-political implications)
 Position of figures
 Presentation of the image
▪ (frontal, three-fourths, etc.)
 Style of figuration
 Proportion of the body
 deals with the image itself

10.  the man with raised arms
 compared to a crucified Christ.
 similar pose in Juan Luna’s Spoliarium, and
Picasso’s Guernica.
 figure displays stigmata-like marks on his right
hand
 center of the canvas
 traditional attribute of the Roman soldiers who
arrested Christ in the garden.

11.  Full meaning of the work (human and social
implications)
 Relationship of art and society
 Complex such as – concepts, values, emotions,
attitude, atmosphere, sensory experience
 Personal and social circumstance of its
production.
 It contains allusions to personal or public
events, conditions, stages, as well as influences

12.  it shows the progress of time
 death presents a conclusive episode,
imbued with the virtue of heroism.
 It presents a mechanical formalization of
murder.
 the corpse of a man, splayed on the ground in
the lower left portion of the work.

13.  disfigured head and body render resurrection
impossible.
 The painting can not be described as pleasing
 colors are restricted to earth tones and black,
punctuated by bright flashes of white and the red
blood of the victims.
 quality of the pigment foreshadows Goya's later
works: a rough solution producing a matte, sandy
finish
 Finally, there is no attempt by the artist to soften
the subject's brutality through technical skill.

14.  Form and content
 Evaluation of the material
 Full meaning of the work
 Real life and the real world
 Analysis and examination

15.  It depicts an execution, an early event in
the so-called Peninsular War between
France and Spain.
 no attempt to find transcendence, and
 no sense that the sacrifice of life will lead to
salvation.
 he wears yellow and white: the heraldic colors
of the papacy.

16.  The victim
 is as anonymous as his killers
 (beneath) a bloody and disfigured corpse
 (behind and around) others share the fate
 nobility is replaced by futility and irrelevance,
the victimization of mass murder, and
anonymity as a hallmark of the modern
condition.

17.  is an indiscriminate killing of civilians by
French soldiers
 is a painting of the massacre,
 shows terrified civilians facing a firing squad
 Intends to arouse anger and hatred
 is a highly romantic picture of a deeply
emotional episode.
 is cited as an influence on Pablo Picasso's 1937
Guernica, which shows the aftermath of the
Nazi German bombing of Guernica during the
Spanish Civil War.

18. By pair,
Analyze the painting
THE PARISIAN LIFE by Juan Luna
using the planes by Alice Guillermo
½ crosswise