Artist's Dilemma

There are a number of ways we can communicate our ideas with others. One is sound languages, which includes spoken languages and music. The second is writing. The third is through pictures or paintings, or visual languages.

Writing and spoken languages have rules that limit them. Visual languages, though, are less bound by such rules. There are styles, yes. However there are no restrictions or rules. Let compare modern art and a Victorian painting. While one can be a blue field with a red dot in the middle (modern), the other can be a painting of hell, with people suffering, and yet both could be intended to mean the same thing. The interpretation is different for every viewer.

This presents another problem, though. For example, if a girl was drawn naked, people’s mind would immediately assume that the intention of the artist is sexual in nature, while the artist drew the figure there to represent a pure body that is untouched by anything. I call this the Artist’s Dilemma.

So what is to be done? Well… the artist would not be able to do anything, so it is the viewers’ job to dive through the shallow interpretation of an art piece and into the deeper meaning that the artist intended. Don’t just look and go ‘it’s a naked anime girl with chains = anime bondage fetish’ but notice the way that the chains are connected to a heart, a scale, and a book, and make sense from that. Find all the dots and connect them. You might be surprised what you can find.

For the artist that has been ridiculed by people for their drawings, just remember this. Be proud of who you are. You know what you intended to be there. It does not matter what the other thinks. You drew what you drew, and be proud of it, and the meaning behind it.

Jinx