Week 9: Phenomenology

 

Still Life - Vase of Fifteen Sunflowers by Vincent Van Gogh (1888)

    Amelia Jones, author of "Meaning, Identity, Embodiment: The Uses of Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology in Art History", touched on the relationship between the mind, body, and how they are connected. Phenomenology concentrates on the study of consciousness and the objects of direct experience. When it comes to interpreting art, we are all going to look at art slightly differently depending on personal experiences and beliefs. As an art student, I learned this fairly quickly. The way that I interpret art does not always align with the way my classmates interpret art. For example, when we examined a work of art by a Native American artist in which the state lines on the map were dripping nearly making the borders impossible to see, knowing a bit of history about serious injustices done towards Native Americans, I saw this as washing away their culture. Others in the class interpreted in a more lighthearted way. Personally, I am usually not so optimistic, so my mind automatically goes to a more sinister place when interpreting art sometimes. 

    Sometimes knowing and artists biography and intentions with a work of art can change a person's initial interpretation about the piece. When I see a work of art for the first time, I love to examine it and come up with my own interpretation before I learn anything about the artists personal life. I have mentioned this example before, but if you were to initially view Vincent Van Gogh's artwork for the first time, you would probably be delighted to see such happy paintings of sunflowers, irises, almond blossoms, landscapes and many cypress trees. However, we all know of the tragic story of Vincent Van Gogh, so some of us feel empathetic towards him and can't help but feel sorrow upon examining his paintings. When you view his work in museums, it seems like people only want to come up to you to remind you how he truly was a tortured artist. The truth is his paintings only seem sad because we knew what was to come of him later on in life. Not because sunflowers are sad, but because the artist was. 

    I believe that the mind and body cannot be separated. They are connected in everything we do. My mind is the way it is because of things that my body has experienced and vice versa. I suppose the same can be said for our personal biases. We cannot turn off our biases because whether or not we want to have them, they will dictate everything we do. Jones mentions Nochlin and Fried in her paper many times and also acknowledged that although Nochlin is biased, she is aware of her biases unlike Fried, who claims he is not being biased in his writings.

Works Cited

Jones, A. (2003). Meaning, Identity, Embodiment: The Uses of Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology in Art History. In Art and Thought (eds D. Arnold and M. Iversen).

Still Life - Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers, 1888 - Vincent van Gogh - WikiArt.org (Image Source)