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mimesis
©
SB
reconsideration of an
apparently obsolete concept
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see also: mimesis and art
coming soon: mimesis and music
No concept so misunderstood as 'mimesis'. Formerly
simply a synonym of art, it
now seems to be a sufficient condition to refuse a creation the status
of an art work.
Reasons enough to reformulate what it implies.
THE MIRROR
Let us begin with a general circumscription of the concept of imitation.
We call something an imitation - mimesis - where we seem to perceive
something where - in fact, on closer view - there is either nothing (representations,
memories, hallucinations, dreams) or something else (a mirror, marble,
painted canvas, printed paper). As long as you do not have a closer
look, you take the imitation - the virtual image - for the original -
the real perception. Thus, a mental representation seems to be the
original, as long as you do not look, listen or touch, for
then it appears that
you find yourself in the real world:
'It was only a dream'. Thus, an aural
imitation - the recording of someone's voice or of tropical birds - seem
to be the original, as long as you do not look, for then it appears that
the sound is produced by a loudspeaker: 'It is only a recording'.
Particularly apparent is the case of visual imitation. The painter needs
only to provide the visual appearance, as long as you do not want to
hear or to touch, you think you are dealing with the original: 'It is
only a canvas with paint'.
Many an imitation can be found just like that in nature, as when we
descry all kinds of figures in clouds, shadows, roots and branches, mossy
walls (da Vinci) and what have you:
We talk of 'mimésis trouvé' or 'spontaneous mimesis'.
An even more apt example of spontaneous mimesis is the surface of the
water in which Narcissus is mirroring himself. Because there is no edge
on the surface of the water like there is a frame on a mirror, it is
impossible to tell the mirror image from reality. But if you want to
touch it with your hand, it disappears. In that respect, it resembles
the risen Christ admonishing us: 'Noli me tangere!':
There is also spontaneous aural mimesis: when you take the sound of the
cracking of wood for the knocking of a ghost, or the roaring of thunder
for the fulminating of an angry god. In matters of aural
imitation, the 'noli me tangere' has to be completed with ''noli me videre'.
There is, finally, also spontaneous mimesis in the mind: memories,
representations, dreams, delusions. In matters of representations, the 'noli me tangere'
and the 'noli me videre' extend to a 'noli me sentire' altogether.
Next to all these cases of spontaneous mimesis (or 'mimésis trouvé'),
there is also imitation in the true sense of the word: imitation as the
result of an intentional activity ('mimésis créé'): when men succeeds in
conjuring up an imaginary world where there is in fact only a real one.
The paradigm of mimesis is and remains the mirror - although you should
rather think of a mirror wherein you obliquely look to a world, as of
the mirror wherein you admire yourself like Narcissus. To begin with it
reminds us of the fact that we are dealing with an instrument made by
man for conjuring up images. It further clearly establishes the relation
between original and imitation: mimesis works only when the imitation is
'true to nature''. And, finally, it shows how convincing a
virtual image can be, while at the same time the reaching out of
a hand suffices to unmask the unreality of it.
UNCOMPLETED AND COMPLETED MIMESIS
The original that is imitated can exist in the real world. That is the
case with a painted portrait or the photo of a landscape. On first sight,
it seems superfluous to duplicate the existing world in a mirror image.
But there are valid and compelling motives to do so. From a temporal
point of view, the real world - especially the beautiful body - is
transient, and therefore begs to be fixed forever. From a spatial
point of view, every perception is bound to a certain time and place:
wherefore it is a pleasure to have a photo of your beloved when you are
travelling, or to discover exotic places while sitting in your lazy
chair at home.
Stronger even is the desire to remould the real world according to our
image and likeness:
we fancy it more beautiful or more ugly, more transparent or more opaque,
more rosy or more gloomy,
more funny or more tragic, more cosy or more abhorrent. That is why
mimesis is so fond of imitating originals that owe their existence
solely to their imitation: it suffices to provide a mirror image to make
the onlooker believe that it is in fact the mirror image of an existing
original. Whereas in the original state of affairs the mirror image is
the reflection of an original, in the more complex - fully mimetic -
state of affairs, the mirror image rather radiates its original. No
longer a given reality is redoubled: an infinite series of imaginary
worlds is disclosed.
The reversal, through which uncompleted mimesis is turned into completed
mimesis, can be rendered in the following scheme, in which →
means
'produced':
| original
→ imitation |
becomes: |
imitation →
original |
Only with completed mimesis is the mirror image
released from every
referential function. With uncompleted mimesis, you cannot refrain from
replacing the perception of the mirror image with that of the
reality to which it refers. That is why, in Plato's cavern,
the heads have to be immobilised.
With completed mimesis, you continue to look
into the mirror. The virtual image no longer functions as a sign for the
real world, and is thereby turned into a real imitation - into an image
or world - in the full sense of the word. That is poignantly contained
in the story of Narcissus: he has not his arm guided by the mirror
image to find and touch himself, he wants to touch the beautiful boy in
the water.
:
Wherewith, as I hope, the all too cherished idea is swept away that
mimesis would equal faithful (so called 'photographical')
rendering of reality. Obviously, mimesis has to be true to nature: it
stays or falls with the conviction that the original is there
before us, in flesh and blood. But that does not mean that an imitation
has to duplicate the existing world. Mimesis rather come to full
bloom only when it is the reflection of a non-existent, self-created
world. Justifiably, Paul Klee put it that art*
does not render the
visible but makes visible. But that is only a meaningful assertion when
we realise that 'making visible' consists in producing a mirror image of
a world that did not exist previously. And then we are no longer dealing with
an apparent contradiction: art renders the visible as well as the
invisible.
Art* as already always a mirror, hence: but a mirror wherein something
is to be seen that obviously cannot exist.
ORIGINAL AND MODEL
During the construction of imaginary worlds, fragments of the real world
are used as a model; paradigmatically in the old story of the ideal nude
build up with the most beautiful parts of diverse concrete nudes. Also
the example of the centaur may be clarifying: man and horse exist in the
real world, but the centaur that has been constructed through
combination of parts of both, owes its existence solely to the images
that has been made of it:
Here is not the place to unfold a more refined view on the many possible
relations between the real and the imaginary world. But it will be
useful to adapt our concepts to such division between real and
imaginary world. It matters to discern model and original.
The many real nudes are the models of the artist, and the ideal
nude thus constructed up is the original. Horse and man are the
models, the centaur is the original.
Let us place these concepts into what we will call the scheme of
completed mimesis:
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The confusion of model with original is facilitated through the fact
that painters (but also writers and composers) use to take the real
world as a model when constructing an original - paradigmatically in the
theme of 'the artist and his model'. That gives the impression that they
are 'copying' a model - all the more so since da Vinci, in his treatise
on painting, proposes to hold a mirror beside the painting to see
whether it is faithful. To measure the
difference between model and original, it pays to compare the photo a
piano - that already differs a lot from the real piano - with a drawing
of it:
Nobody will object to call the photo of the Steinway a 'mirror image'
of it
It seems obvious, then, to assert that the piano on the drawing is not a
mirror image of reality. That comes down to overlook that the piano on
the drawing is no less a faithful mirror image, albeit not of the real
piano, but of the piano that has been embodied in a virtual image on
paper during the process of drawing.
Also in completed mimesis, the imitation is a mirror image, but from an
original that obviously cannot exist, and that can only be mirrored
faithfully through no longer being faithful to the models out of which
it is built up....
IMITATION AND ORIGINAL
After having clarified the relation between model and original on the
vertical side of the triangle, we are well armed to properly tackle the
relation between imitation and original on the lower side of the
triangle. For, our definition of mimesis clearly stipulates that mimesis
as such - uncompleted no less than completed - is determined no less
through similarity then through difference. Complete identity - as with
mass products or twins - is not regarded as imitation. To be an
imitation, there must be a clearly perceptible difference. It is apparent that we
are not dealing here with the kind of difference that tells two brothers
from each other: for, how great the likeness between the two, we do not
experience the one as an imitation of the other. The difference that
makes an imitation an imitation is that the imitation is faithful to
the original only for one or more senses, but not for all (or, as far as
representations are concerned: that the original is only faithful in the
mind, while it does not exist for the senses). However perfect
the likeness of the image in the mirror, it differs from the real
thing in that it is only light. Even though it seems
to have a body, that body is not tangible. The imitation in the mirror
only resembles the optical appearance of the original, but not the
original as such. We can give account of this constitutive difference
between imitation and original by adding the mention
'appearance of' in the scheme of the mimetic triangle:
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To fully understand why we nevertheless have the certain impression that
the original is there in flesh and blood, we have do dwell somewhat on
the way in which the world is given to us.
THE STRUCTURE OF THE ORIGINAL
In matters of mimesis, it is an ineradicable illusion that we can grasp
reality in one single glimpse. In fact, we are only dealing with a
mentally given that is built up from countless perceptions through all
the senses and from countless verbal communications. Such mental image
is far more comprehensive that the concrete visual, aural, olfactive and
tactile perception that we have of something on a given moment. Every
concrete perception, however transient, activates the whole mental
image. That is why you read into the mirror image the tangible body that
you would feel when you would touch the visual appearance. And what is
more: that is why you read in the outer appearance above all the inner
state of mind and intentions. A perception for one sense serves as sign that refers to perceptions of many other senses: that is why we see
the hardness of stone, the sweetness of the fruit and, above all, the presence of soul:
Also what we perceive as an appearance for a separate sense is built up
from countless visual perceptions that are structured and completed by
our mind. And because many relations turn out to be standard, the brains
have learned to conclude to the presence of concomitant
perceptions: think of the spatial situation of a figure against a
background, the completion of a partially hidden figure, the reading of
all kinds of gradients as roundness and perspective - to mention only
some obvious examples.
Thus it comes that an extremely fragmentary perception nevertheless
suffices to tell us that there is something to be perceived, and what it
is. The more you want to know about that something, the more you have to
listen, see, smell, feel, taste and ask. But long before to such further
exploration, the mind has already produced an encompassing image by way
of 'hypothesis'.
MIMESIS AND SUGGESTION (1): INTERSENSORY
REDUCTION
It is precisely owing to such structure of the original that something
like mimesis is possible altogether: it suffices to provide the
appearance for one sense to produce the illusion that the whole thing is
there is flesh and blood. In the mirror, you get only to see a purely
visual appearance, and you nevertheless have the impression that the
whole person is there, not only as a corporeal, but in the first place as
an animated being. The same goes when you are blindfolded and get to
hear the voice of a person: you have the certain impression that he is
corporeally present there in de room. In literature, even a mere sign
for such visual appearance suffices: the words 'and he fell in love with
his mirror image in the water' suffice to evoke the corollary
representation.
In so far, an imitation resembles a single, isolated perception.
The difference between both is that, in the real world, additional
perceptions can be made, while in the imitation, the perceptions are
finite. That goes also for literature: the writer cannot give us an
extensive description and restricts himself therefore equally to
providing impressions for separate senses.
And it is precisely because additional perception is impossible, that we
experience an imitation as an imitation, and not as reality. However
faithful the visual appearance in the mirror may be: 'on closer look'
there is nothing to be heard or felt, and there is altogether no talk of
an inner world. And that holds all the more true for representations: 'on
closer look' there is nothing to be perceived at all.
MIMESIS AND SUGGESTION (2)
INTRASENORY
PERCEPTION
The above holds not only of the addition of perceptions from the many
different senses, but also of the addition of perceptions within one and
the same single sense. A single glimpse suffices to identify a visual
impression as 'tree', but it is only when you have examined the tree
from all sides, that you get a complete image of what there is really to
be seen. In expectance, your brains have even completed the slightest
hint to a hypothetical image of the whole.
Herein lies another opportunity for the artist.* A limited number of
carefully chosen hints suffices to evoke the illusion that something is
present there in its full sensory glory. To depict something round, it
is not necessary to render the minutest gradations of light and dark. It
suffices to provide the minimal information necessary to evoke the
desired impression: some strokes at one side of a circle suffice to
evoke the impression of a globe. This principle can be
applied to more intricate three-dimensional formations like bodies or
draperies.
Even more spectacular is the effect when a few elementary cues suffice
to evoke complex spatial formations. Thus, a circle with a cross and two
points suffices to give the impression
that there is a complex spatial formation
like a face, ànd that your read that face as the outer appearance of
some inner soul. The effect is all the more strong when we get more
clues, although the effect is stronger when no longer a line, but an
entire surface is delineated against a background. Not only the shape of a circumference can work such wonder. Also the
depiction of certain characteristic features of a face suffice to
evoke the presence of the person ànd the appearance of Hitler.
That goes not only for
schematic suggestion, but also for a sensorily fully saturated image:
Thus it comes that the rendering of a part does not fail to suggest the presence
of the whole: you do not read the heads of Brancusi as a head that comes
to roll
from the guillotine, and a torso as a
body with the head and the limbs cut off. For the same reason,
colour can be omitted in visual representations (marble sculptures,
prints, photos) without inducing the idea that we are dealing with
bodies painted white.And,
of old, visual artists have understood that some suggestive strokes
suffice to produce an often more convincing effect that minute rendering
of details.
The intrasensory reduction can proceed even more drastically.
With a torso, the absence of the parts omitted does not catch the eye,
because what remains visible is a coherent and recognisable whole, and
because what is omitted is as it were framed out. The case is totally
different when the parts withheld in the image are no longer a coherent whole. What has been left out leaves a blank in the image. In the
Klee below you get to see two arms, the fore-arms of which are condensed
with drum sticks. Of both eyes of the drummer, you get to see only that
one that gazes straight in your eyes. What is
perceived as the right arm, hangs totally isolated in a vacuum. There is
no trace whatsoever of a trunk, and even less of a drum:
klee
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Although there is only something to see and nothing to be heard, you
feel the threat of the beat. And what is more: even though only loose
parts of the body can be discerned, they are clearly part of one and the
same encompassing whole - although it is no longer sustained by the
coherent visual appearance of the body, but by the unity of the will that
animates gesture and glance alike. We can compare that
image with Schlemmer's figure from the 'Triadic ballet', the body of
which has been made invisible, so that only the face, the hands and the
lower legs are visible. Also here, the movements of those membra
disiecta are ascribed to an underlying unity:
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schlemmer
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If you would try to film these images, you would have to make the
intrasensory reduction undone, and so replace the newly constructed
original with the model. Therein, visual art comes to resemble
literature, that contents itself with even more scarce
information. To the same effect: when the vague, reduced image, that we
have constructed via the text is translated into a fully saturated
filmic image, that cannot fail to disappoint us.
To be a faithful rendering - a mirror image - an imitation need not
provide the appearance for all the senses, nor the saturated appearance
for a single sense. Quite the contrary: an imitation is the more
artistic, the more it knows to suggest a full sensory appearance with
less, or even with apparently meaningless information. And what is more:
often a more convincing faithfulness is produced through suggestion than
through so called 'photographic' rendering, which is often experienced
as 'surrealistic' if not 'hallucinatory'.
THE CONFLICT BETWEEN INFORMATION PROVIDED AND WITHHOLD
Also in real life, the share of suggestion in perception is often
considerable. Only when we are interested in what we only noticed in a
glimpse do we proceed to exhaustive perception. Suggestion is thereby
replaced with concrete perception. But, as a rule, we are not at all
interested in full perception, on the contrary. To begin with, we are
not always living in the perceptible world: the whole night through, but
also during the day, we yield to dreaming and daydreaming. If
submerging in the real world, we do so principally in our mind: we are only thinking about things in the past, in the future and on other places. If
we leave our thoughts for what they are and proceed to perceiving, we
filter the majority of our perceptions. And we use the remaining
perceptions mostly as mere signs for further furtive perceptions or for
mere
thoughts. Only exceptionally do we allow an appearance to fully enter
our mind, and that mostly entails activating other senses: what we heard,
we want to see and to touch, to finally consume it gastronomically or
erotically.
The survey above may suffice to remind us of the fact how, in daily life,
we rather ward off perception than yield to it. When yielding to fantasising, it is not at all difficult to
suspend sensory perception:
that is what we do every night when going to sleep. If we proceed to
perception, we generally content ourselves with looking and resign from resorting tothe other senses. If a sound imposes itself, we immediately turn
our eyes towards the source of sound to see what it is. Only when we
have to work with our hands, or proceed to eating or lovemaking, the
diverse tactile senses are activated.
That explains altogether the ease with which we take something like an
imitation for the real thing. In dreams as easily as in a novel, we take
representations for real. With the same ease we accept the intrasensory
reduction of purely visual imitations. Only with moving visual
images is it not so obvious to switch off the other senses, because
movement often makes noise. With auditory imitations, on the other hand,
it is practically impossible to suspend the desire to also see what
we hear: when listening to the news, we prefer to see the face of the
speaker, although that does not provide us more information. Even when
listening to music do many listeners want to see the interpreters,
although the world that is conjured up in music is invisible.
That does not prevent that a conflict can arise between our propensity
to suspend the activity of the other senses, or of the senses altogether,
and the propensity to proceed to more complete sensory activity or
sensory activity altogether. When the shift turns out to be impossible,
it appears that we find ourselves in the imaginary world of imitation. A
first, already described effect of the conflict between suggestion of
full reality through reduced commerce with reality is that we experience
imitation as imitation: what is suggested turns out to be absent and its
suggestion merely an illusion.
But there is more. The difference between endorsed and illusionary
suggestion has also an effect on the way in which we understand the
original. In literature, we experience the world that is conjured up
always a little bit as a ghost world, a 'dream world' - however
much it may be experienced as tangible reality when we are submerged in
it. And that goes also for aural imitations, especially for music.
Visual imitations, on the other hand, are experienced as more worldly
and material,
because it is with our eyes that we are orienting ourselves in the world,
although the still image always has something of the frozen. Only moving
images with a sound track have a degree of reality that nearly differs
from reality itself. That there is still a difference becomes apparent
only when the subject matter asks for tangible commerce: the train that
moves towards us or the nude that we would like to touch.
The conflict between suggestion and perception is heightened when the
intrasensory information is reduced. Even though we need only summary
information to suggest rounding, the less information we get, the more
ghostlike the world appears to be. As we get more information, the world
becomes more worldly and material:
From here derives a conflict between the propensity to saturate the
intrasensory information and the desire to produce a maximum effect
with minimal means.
Also resigning from colour has an effect on the original that should not
be underestimated. That is most apparent in the difference between a
version in black and white and one in colour of one and the same
picture, especially when we are dealing with subject matter where
colour plays a crucial role, as with a nude. Whereas in the colour version of the Venus of Urbino we easily read
impressions of volume and space, the softness and warmth of the skin -
and with this nude exceptionally also a dedicated soul - the black and white version utterly fails to convey the effects
produced by colour.
The conflict only comes to its apogee when there is a drastic
intrasensory reduction. For there is a fundamental difference between
the world of painting - the world of visual perception - and the world
of literature - the world of imagination. In the imagination, there is
no problem in making fragmentary and reduced representations: imagined
objects tend to resemble the figure from Schlemmer's 'Triadic Ballet'.
But on the two-dimensional plane, the omitted cannot just be left blank:
the eye runs up against a gap when it wants to find information that
is merely suggested. The painter can either minimally indicate what has
been omitted - and than you get beings which in our world would be
experienced as deformed, or he can just omit the missing - and than you
get to see some one-eyed head with legs that telekinetically commands a
free-floating arm. For the same reason, the eye often feels tempted to
read a torso as a mutilated body. In Rodin's 'Iris messagère' the
temptation is only heightened in that only one arm has been omitted and
in that there is already a cut between the legs:
NEW ORIGINALS (1): IDEALISATION AND
ESSENTIALISATION
Although the reduction of the original does not corrode the
suggestion of reality, it has an effect on the way in which the original
is experienced: the stronger the reduction, the more ghostlike the
original. Taking this into account, it still holds true that the
imitation is a faithful rendering of the original: the original of which
the coloured version of the Venus of Urbino is a faithful rendering, is
another one than the original of which the version in black and white is
an imitation. On the axis original → imitation, there
still is talk of identity, even when there is no longer a saturated
rendering of the original.
And that reminds us of the fact that, next to the relation between
original and imitation, there is also the relation between model and
original. Only with completed mimesis is this relation determined by
identity. But, as mimesis unfolds into completed mimesis, the difference
between model and original only increases.
To begin with, there are the new originals that are created through
idealisation and essentialisation.
From a given reality, not every aspect is equally important. When the
artist wants to show that someone is anxious, he only has to provide the
cues that express anxiety. All the other cues may me omitted. Thus,
Munch's 'The scream' 'does not provide ample information about the
individuality, the sex, the age of the person who cries out. But there
is no doubt whatsoever that we are dealing with someone who is
terrorised and cries out.
Next to such
essentialisation, there is also idealisation: a given is thus
transformed as to produce a stronger effect. Think of the removal of
stains from the skin, the reddening of the lips, the elongating of the
legs, and what have you.
A well know example is the caricature that exaggerates the characteristic
traits of a face
Essentialisation and idealisation often go hand in hand, to the extent
that the borders of the recognisable are crossed, as in Brancusi's
'Torse de jeune homme'.
But, that the original is idealised and essentialised, does not mean
that its imitation would no longer be faithful. It only is no longer
faithful to the familiar image of a young man or a young woman. With a pinch of salt - and
paraphrasing Plato or Schopenhauer - we could say that Brancusi
faithfully imitates the 'idea' of a young man and a young women 'an sich'.
NEW ORIGINALS (2):
FANTASTIC BEINGS
Artists do not restrict themselves to essentialisation and idealisation
of the model. Of old, they relish in creating originals that are not to
be found in the real world altogether: mythical beings, (centaurs and
mermaids, dragons and monster), religious beings (all kinds of gods,
angels and demons) and fantastical beings as such (Brueghel, Bosch):
Especially from the
invention of photography onwards, painters
begin to excel in the production of non-existing originals, that for a
long time have been out of reach for photographers - think
of Odilon Redon or Salvador Dali.
But, next to these traditional composite originals, there increasingly
appear beings that hitherto had been absent. To begin with, there are
the expressionistically deformed beings, like those of Otto Dix.
From Cubism onwards, there appear figures that inhabit no longer organic,
but rather geometrical bodies. In Schlemmer's 'Triadic Ballet' they are
three-dimensional, but with Klee, they are imitated on the flat plane. Picasso even creates people that are no longer three-dimensional, but
two-dimensional, as in his 'Three musicians':
In his 'Fighting Forms' Franz Marc, on the other
hand, stages figures that do no longer resemble men or animals, and with
Malevitch, they are still further reduced to two-dimensional geometrical
beings that float weightless in a space with parallel layers.
It cannot be emphasised
enough that all these new originals, not only those of Redon and Dali,
but also those of Schlemmer, Klee and Picasso, and particularly those of
Marc and Malevitch are rendered faithfully.
What is more: especially such
fantastic originals ask for a saturated,
non-reduced rendering: precisely because we are not familiar with them,
there are no pre-established mental schemes on which to rely. Whereas a
few hints suffice to conjure up a figure like Hitler, with a triangle
you cannot but provide the required information to prevent that, say
three loose corners are read as simply three loose corners, and not as a
triangle.
COMBINATION OF DIFFERENCES ON BOTH AXES
That does not imply that there is not also a more suggestive rendering
of the new originals. On the Klee below the circles are read as eyes,
and, by extension, also the circle on the hand. The black line around
the eyes and over the mouth is a faithful rendering of similar
configurations in the original. But the line that circumscribes the face
is not read as the rendering of something in the original. And the face
itself, finally, is not read as a deformed cue hinting at a normal face,
but as the faithful rendering of face with the same form:
paul klee
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MIMESIS AND MEDIUM **
In matters of mimesis, the medium is that part of reality that has been
transformed to give the impression of being (the appearance of)
something else.
Examples of media for visual mimesis are the silver surface of the
mirror which produces a virtual image; the piece of wood that gives the
impression of being a monster; the marble, bronze or wood that gives the
impression of being a body; the painted surface of the canvas, the
printed sheet of paper or the developed photo paper on which a world
appears. Examples of media for aural mimesis are the sounds produced by metal plates with
which the thunder is imitated in the theatre or by the loudspeakers with
which recordings are rendered, and also the tones of instruments on which
music is played. Literature has no medium at all: to produce mental
images in the mind, no matter has to be transformed. Literature has only
an mediated medium: language (see below).
Some media can be so transformed as to seamlessly match the original. As
long as we have no 'closer look', such media are nearly discernible from
the original: think of the mirror, colour photos and tape recordings. In
that respect they come close to the mediumless representations of
literature, which coincide fully with the (mostly reduced) original. But,
as a rule, the medium has characteristics
which prevent it from
seamlessly matching the original: think of the strokes on the painting,
the lines on the drawing, the stones of the mosaic; and what have you.
In all these cases, we are dealing with an autonomous medium.
When, on the other hand, the medium seamlessly matches the original, than we can call it a heteronomous medium*.
In a first series of cases, the difference between the medium and (the
appearance of) the original disappears, because our brains interpret
them away. When a horse is standing behind a tree, we do not read the
two fragments of the horse as two pieces of
a horse. We fill in the hidden part. For the same reason do we not read
hatchings as stripes of shadow, but as a continuous shadow on a curved
surface. When a scene is to be seen behind a lattice, we do not read is
as a heap of loose fragments, but as a whole that continues behind the
lattice. For the same reason do we not read the skin and the aureole on
the mosaic below as a series of loos fragments, but as a continuous
whole.
In all these cases, the eye
overlooks the autonomous traces of the medium. But also here can the
hypothetical construction of the mind not be completed through
additional perceptions. Thus, an autonomous medium becomes a second
factor that changes the nature of the original. Artists can make a
virtue of need and choose their medium so as to have it reveal more than
the original appearance in the real world: just like the intrasensory
reduction makes the original more ghostly, so does white marble make the
nude more serene, and so does gold or transparent glass lend some divine
flavour to the figure.**
In the same vein, the writer
or poet can use the sonorous body or the visual appearance of words as
an additional mimetic or semiotic medium.**
And artists can, finally, eliminate the problem altogether by choosing
originals that match the medium. On the mosaic above you can see how the
artist uses round pieces of stone to render pearls. What is in essence
an autonomous medium, thus is turned into a heteronomous medium. (See:
'The mimetic domain', soon on this site).
UNMEDIATED AND MEDIATED MIMESIS
There are imitations that can be perceived directly: a painting or a
sculpture, music, theatre, ballet. Other imitations cannot be perceived
at all: from a novel or a poem, you can only see or hear the words with
which representations are conjured up. But the real work of art - the
imitation of a world - exists only in the mind of the listener or
reader who constructs this world according to the instructions provided
by the words. In that respect, a book can be compared with a score that
dictates the course of events that are evoked through words. When the
imitation is perceptible, we are dealing with immediated
mimesis, and when they are not perceptible, we are dealing with mediated mimesis.
Let us remark that mediated mimesis comprises more then literature
alone. The signs that conjure up representations can also be non-verbal.
Already in the real world can objects conjure up representations in the
mind: think of the graveyard where ghost tend to roam around. Relics,
ruins and historical places have the same effect. In that respect, these
objects have something in common with the words in literature: they
conjure up representations in the mind.
That is precisely wherefore they often are exhibited: think of Beuys' ‘Wirtshaftswerte':
Not only real objects, but also imitations can conjure up
representations. Thus, Ilya Kabakov constructed a faithful imitation of
a toilet in the former Sovjet Union that had been used as a house. And
that cannot fail to make the ghosts of its inhabitants revive...Artists can even take a further stride and use real objects to conjure
up imaginary events. Thus a murder can be evoked by merely providing the
real traces: a dagger and some blood suffice.
KINDS OF MIMETIC TECHNIQUES ACCORDING TO SENSES
ADDRESSED
We can classify the imitation according to the senses addressed.
Film, theatre, opera and ballet address the ear and the eye. Sculpture,
painting, prints and photography address only the eye.
Aural imitations - ordinary and musical - address only the ear.
There are also imitations for the nose and the skin (stuffed animals, dummy
teats), the tongue (all kinds of ersatz if they are 'true to nature')
and the genitals. Diverse combinations are possible: a stuffed animal
addresses both eye and hand. But in many respects, these kinds of
imitations are inferior to imitations for the
distance senses (eye and ear). To begin with, they are situated towards
the end of the chain of senses which runs from ear, over eye, nose, skin
to tongue and/or genitals. As the chain approaches its end, its ability
to conjure up a world decreases. For the same reason is it increasingly
difficult to tell imitation from original: to tell imitated coffee from
real coffee, you have to run through the chain in reverse direction and
look from what it is made. Touch is situated in the middle: the lips and
the tongue of the baby take the dummy teats for real nipples, but its
hands feel that there is no breast. And, finally, they are extremely
difficult to manipulate: smells cannot be produced and removed in
space at will and that makes them extremely inappropriate not only for
staging processes, but foremost for enabling simultaneous perception by
a larger 'audience'.
The mediated arts, on the other hand, address no senses at all: they are
perceived in the mind. In principle, it would be possible to discern
representations according to their mental sensory qualities. It immediately
appears that these comprise, next to visual and aural, also olfactive and
all kinds of tactile representations, but foremost countless inner
perceptions, not mediated by outer appearances (feelings, intentions,...).
But such a classification is only interesting to discern between diverse
kinds of mediated mimesis, not for a classification of imitations as
such.
It would be equally misleading to include in such a classification the
words (or objects) by which representations are conjured up in the mind
The words by which the author conjures up representations in the mind
are audible or visible. But that does not make them to visual or aural
imitations: mental representations are not perceived by the senses.
Let us, finally, remark that such classification is only about the
senses addressed and has nothing whatsoever to do with the sensory
nature of the world conjured up. Visual and aural impressions can also
conjure up tactile qualities, and many a visual or aural appearance is a
sign for inner states. As we have analysed above, there is a difference
between the original and its countless appearances. The
strength of a good - interesting - imitation lies precisely in its
ability to conjure up a most complex world through providing one single
sensuous appearance.
INSTRUMENTAL MIMESIS (1): DOCUMENT, ILLUSTRATION, MODEL
Many an imitation is made for its own sake and for the sake of what it
imitates. But other imitations serve another purpose. We can make
imitations in order to identify somebody or to fix the traces of an
accident,
to promote some product (meals in a restaurant, clothes or cars in
catalogues and magazines),
or to show what havoc has been wreaked by war or a tornado,or to show how something looks like (illustration).
Also three-dimensional imitations can refer to real objects:
models of atoms, molecules, DNA, cells, organs, dinosaurs, primeval man
and what have you.
And there are, finally, also scale
models for buildings, cars,
airplanes and the like.
In all these cases it is as if you look through the imitation to the
reality it depicts: the model of the opera of Paris is an imitation, but
in your mind you replace the medium and the size of the model with the
real materials and the real scale.
The imitation - the image - is only a means for a goal that lies outside
it. We can call this instrumental mimesis.
This kind of imitation my be compared with words: the image is only a
sign that refers to (the representation of) the real thing.
That does not prevent that, in all these cases, we can make abstraction
from the referential function and enjoy the imitation as something in
its own right, and then judge its qualities as an image. That is what
pupils do when the set up the skeleton in the class room to frighten
somebody. That is what Damien Hirst
does when he enlarges a model and exhibits it in a museum.
That the imitations are enlarged and exhibited, facilitates the
unlinking from its referential function. And that there are always
made
some changes
(a piece of cloth on the skeleton, a change in size of
the model) only betrays how much such instrumental mimesis is not
conceived as an imitation sui generis.
INSTRUMENTAL MIMESIS (2):
Nearly related is the case where images serve as signs as such. Already
real objects can be used as non-verbal signs, as when someone lifts his
glass to show that he wants another drink. More handy are imitations:
paradigmatically in the icon of a man or a woman that indicates where to
enter the toilet.
There are also more sophisticated complexes of signs
that convey more
complex meanings: think of the often very complicated iconographic
programs in the cathedrals or on the many ancient
and modern allegories, like those of Bosch and Breughel and
Marcel Duchamp's 'La Mariée mise à nu par ses célibataires, même'.
Also in these cases we can judge the images in their own right.
They then stop being signs, and what they are referring to does - in as
far as we are concerned with art - no longer matter. That goes
especially for allegories, like the Primavera of Botticelli,
Brueghel, Bosch, but also for allegoric still-lives. Also the reverse is
true: the quality of the image is of no concern for its referential
function: a bad
image of a man or a woman suffices
to discern the right door - as long as the opposition between male and
female is clear. There is a mimetic logic as there is a semiotic logic,
and both should not be confused. That goes not only for icons on
toilets, but above all for intricate allegories.
MIMESIS AND DECEPTION
That mimesis is 'true to nature', does not
mean that mimesis is a kind of deception. Quite the contrary. As is
already obvious from our definition, 'on a closer look' it should always
be evident that we are dealing with an imitation, and not with the
original itself.
That is why mimesis has to be discerned from illusionism or trompe-l'oeil,
and above all from deception as such (forgery).
In all these cases, it is so difficult to establish the difference, that
we take the imitation for the real thing - and that implies that it is no
longer an imitation, but false reality. That makes the whole
difference between a false dollar bill and Jasper Johns' flag: the
latter immediately betrays that it is an imitation, because it obviously
is not made of cloth, but of paint on canvas.
For the same reason, the
painting of which there is talk in the stories of Zeuxis and Apollodoros - or
in those of da Vinci - have rather to do with the art of deception than
with the art of imitation - even when the required abilities are
roughly the same.
An imitation willingly betrays that it is only an imitation.
That is why artists never forget to reveal the strings of the puppet. Already
the mirror is cast in a frame, and that goes also for the painting. A
sculpture is placed on a pedestal and theatre is performed on a scene.
While listening to music, the sight of the instruments never fails to
remind of the fact that we are merely listing to a performance.
For the same reason are imitations all the more artistic as the intrasensory of intersensory reduction increases and do artist have a
predilection for autonomous media. For the same reason does sculpture,
that has already the third dimension in common with the real world,
willingly resign from rendering colour (Madame Tussaud of Carl de Andrea),
let alone tactile qualities (like the stuffed animal, that, by the way is
idealised in that it has no bones).
For the same reason do
artists
preferably conjure up worlds that are evidently not real. For the
same reason do artists show a predilection for imitations for the
distance senses. And for the same reason do artists
more then often
reduce the continuum of their medium to a limited number of steps:
MIMESIS AND MIMESIS
In every day language, there is also talk of imitation when someone
imitates
the
behaviour or the skill of another person. But even when the words are
the same, the phenomenon is completely different. That becomes
immediately apparent when the verb is replaced by the noun: although it
makes sense to say that someone imitates someone's behaviour, that does
not imply that the one becomes an imitation of the other. And it is not
difficult to see why. In mimesis, the actor imitates special kinds of
behaviour in view of impersonating a figure. That is worlds apart from
imitating a behaviour to conform oneself - think of soldiers or dancers
- or to acquire an ability. Nor the dancers, nor the soldiers are out at
making believe that they are someone else and
also
the onlooker does not take the one for the other. And that is, to begin
with, because the behaviour as such is practically the same, as in the
case of the twins or the mass products above. But that is above all
because they only imitate some particular behaviour, whereas the rest of
their appearance remains the same: their own. For the same reason do we
not have the impression that all the policemen are imitations of each
other because they all wear the same uniform. Even less is there mimesis
when the pupil imitates the example of a teacher. And the same goes for
all those who share a common passion or obsession. That is why it is
only to regret that figures like René Girard have extended the technical
term 'mimesis' to a domain that is fundamentally
alien tothe domain of art, all the more so, since
there are good terms available in that other domain. In any case,
mimesis in the sense used above is not René Girard's mimesis.
©
Stefan
Beyst, November 2005
* In this text it is assumed that art and mimesis are synonyms. See our
text: 'Mimesis and art'
** For a more detailed analysis of the medium of mimesis, see:
'Mimesis and medium' (soon on this website).
Your reaction
(English, German, French or Spanish):
beyst.stefan@gmail.com
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See also
stefan beyst on contemporary artists
Referrers:
matthew dallman
goncourt's bog
teleomimesis
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