Evoking Myth:The role of title in the works of Anselm Kiefer and Doris Salcedo

Artworks can communicate to viewers in quite straightforward ways, but increasingly more often they use complicated language, which require complex interpretation. Artists often title their work as an additional means of communication; these can be arbitrary, such as “untitled” and those that are sequential. Regardless the use of title will create a dialogue between the work it’s attributed to and wider culture. In some cases titles can offer the best access to interpretation of artworks, particularly when audiences have no previous knowledge of the artist. This text will illustrate this by applying semiotic analysis to the works of Doris Salcedo and Anselm Kiefer. These readings shall at first be confined to what can be conferred from the artwork and then repeated with access to the title of the work.

Semiotics offers a model for deconstructing language (Cobley 1999: 46-9). It is able to do this as a result of trying to explain how language works as a system of signs and relationships (Cobley). It is particularly useful here for several reasons. It is equally applicable to a piece of artwork as it is to a piece of written text, or even film and music (Cobley: 27,151). All of which it considers to be composed of signs. Furthermore it considers culture and language to be closely tied, if not synonymous (Cobley: 136-7). Moreover it can account for the complex references and relationships an artist will often imbue a piece with, as it considers his artwork to be a mode of speech on the artists behalf (Barthes 1957: 110). Finally, although the way semiotics explains language as a whole can be complex, incomplete and difficult to understand. It’s application for analysis of specific pieces of language is relatively straightforward to produce and easy to understand by those reading such an analysis.

Semiotics was started independently as two similar schools of thought. One in France by Ferdinand de Saussure, which he coined “Semiology” and the other in America by Charles Peirce; under the name we now use for both (Cobley: 46-9). Peirce probably gives us a more accurate description of the way language works, however in comparison Saussure is simpler and not contradictory to Pierce, both schools now having merged. As such Semiology is adequate for a Semiotic analysis.

Roland Barthes a member of the Semiology school of thought, offers a good example of Semiotic Analysis. Barthes was well known for his fluid analysis of signs in popular culture, which revealed the complexities that maintained these constructions (Cobley: 43-6). The most well known of these appeared in his book “Mythologies” (1957). The book also contains the chapter “Myth Today” (109-58) where he sets out a modern account of Myth as a semiological phenomenon. Barthes explains myth as a commonly evoked set of associations implied by an idea or image. Another advantage of basing a semiotic analysis on the work of Barthes, is that he has had much to say on the visual arts; having written about photography in “Camera Lucida” (1980) and fashion in “The Language of Fashion” (2004). These do not explicitly talk about fine art, however the disciplines involved communicate in vastly similar ways.

So what exactly is Myth? Myth is a form of speech, it communicates a message. Myth is not defined by what it communicates, but rather the way it communicates. As such anything can be myth given the right circumstances. In Barthes words; “Every object in the world can pass from a closed, silent existence to an oral state, open to appropriation by society, for there is no law, whether natural or not, which forbids talking about things.” (Barthes 1957: 109) For example a pine tree is a pine tree, but as a Christmas tree, a pine tree comes with all sorts of additional baggage, derived from its cultural context. Myth can be conveyed by any form of language, it can include any mode of writing and representation (Barthes 1957: 110). So art can serve to support mythological speech. As Barthes puts it; “Mythical speech is made of material that has already been worked on, so as to make it suitable for communication.” (Barthes 1957: 110)

How does this work in semiotics? To explain this Barthes first tells us how a Sign system is constructed and then how a Myth system as constructed, as the latter is contingent on the first. Semiotics proposes that meaning is conveyed through the relationship of two objects, one of which belongs to the category signifier, the other to the category signified. As these objects belong to different categories, the relationship between them is of equivalence not equality (Barthes 1957: 112). Although it is commonly said that the signifier express the signified, semilogical systems are tri-dimensional. The third object we are dealing with in this system is the sign. The sign is the associative total of signifier and signified. To illustrate this Barthes uses the example of roses being used to signify passion. The sign in this situation is “‘passionified’ roses.” The sign can be perfectly and correctly split into the signifier ‘roses’ and signified ‘passion’, which both existed before

uniting to form a sign (Barthes 1957: 113). A sign is a language object, as it is composed using a system of language (Barthes 1957: 115).

Like signs, myth being a semilogical system is also tri-dimensional. In fact myth is composed of the same elements as a sign. However what differentiates myth from a sign is that it is a second order semilogical system. What this means is that it is composed of a sign that has another sign as it’s signifier (Barthes 1957: 114). Like a sign being composed of language, myth is a meta-language, as it is a second language which only be used with inference from language objects (Barthes 1957: 115). When interpreting meaning from a signifier, denotation is used to refer to the meaning deduced from within a sign system. Connotation on the other hand is the meaning deduced when the resultant sign is understood as part of a myth system (Barthes 1977, 116). Barthes used a diagram (Fig1) to help illustrate these relationships.

Fig1. Barthes, R. (1957) Mythologies: 115

We can further illustrate this by returning to and expanding upon Barthes’ example of the rose. The rose as a symbol of passion is part of a long tradition of romance. Examples can be found in the works of Shakespeare, such as in the 1st and 54th sonnet (Shakespeare 1609: 14, 42) and in the often quoted phrase from Romeo and Juliette; “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet” (Shakespeare 1597: 51). This can be further supported by the common act of giving roses as a symbol of passion on valentines day. In this situation the sign ‘passionified’ rose becomes a signifier for the myth of romantic love, evoking in the recipient all sorts of ideas such as Shakespeare's poetry, kissing, candle lit dinners, and love songs.

Fig2. Duchamp, M. (1917) Fountain

Ducamp’s ‘Fountain’ (Fig1) is a great example to start with when showing how a title can have an impact on the interpretation of an art work. This is because the title in this case is an integral piece of the artwork. When we look at the ‘Fountain’ we can see an ordinary urinal placed on its side upon a pedestal with the signature “R.Mutt 1917”. The signature and the pedestal are common features of an exhibited artwork, this means the pedestal has been imbued with the connotations of an artwork. This in itself is an interesting result of signs being able to change the context of an artwork. However with the addition of the title ‘Fountain’, we can see a play on words with many connotations being drawn. Both fountains and urinals are hardware for the management of water, contrasting with one another; one a receptacle the other unleashing fluids. Although we can see how the urinal might act to be a fountain. Also connotations of the act of urinating are drawn as a fountain unleashes a stream similar to the act. The introduction of title here completely changes the energy of the work, and is essential to the meaning of the work, as it intends for all these associations to be made in the viewers head.

Fig3. Salcedo, D. (2007) Shibboleth

Doris Salcedo carefully considers the titles of her sculptural installations, adding an important layer of meaning (Borchardt-Hume 2007: 15). Salcedo’s ‘Shibboleth’ (Fig3) is no exception; we might be able to extract more meaning without access to title, than we did with Duchamp’s ‘Fountain’, however with it we can extract far more. ‘Shibboleth’ is a vast crack recessed into the floor of the Tate Modern’s ‘Turbine Hall’. At first look this crack conveys feelings of monolithic weight, imposing itself with it’s sheer scale. It suggests that the floor you are standing on is unsafe or untrustworthy and could collapse into an abyss bellow. These feelings are obviously intended by the artist but they are a means of giving the work impact, not the overall intention of the work. A viewer looking at the way the crack split’s the room might deduce that the work is about divisions in society. This would certainly be a step in the right direction. However without prior knowledge of Salcedo’s work, it would be a difficult leap to make with any certainty, and only begins to unpick the artists intention.

Most viewers would probably not know the meaning of the word ‘Shibboleth’, so could extract meaning from the form of the word on it’s own. It’s sounds grand and strange, putting across feelings that compliment the image of the piece. However if they did have knowledge of the meaning of ‘Shibboleth’ or were to look it up, the work suddenly invokes the myth’s of unnecessary slaughter, and the old testament. In the aftermath of a battle recounted in the bible. The Ephramites having been defeated by the Gileadites tried to flee across the Jordan River. Anyone caught crossing by the Gileadites were asked to say

‘shibboleth’. The Ephramites unable to pronounce ‘sh’ sounds, would say ‘sibboleth’, identifying themselves to the Gileadites, who would execute them. This resulted in 42,000 deaths, the largest massacre in the bible. Illuminating those that have suffered is the driving force of Salcedo’s work (Borchardt-Hume: 15-7). Her work has no concrete meanings which is a necessity of a work that calls upon myth, as different people will infer different meanings from these relationships. However her use of title is enlightening as it guides us to a fairly close understanding of her intention.

Fig4. Kiefer, A. (2006) Palmsonntag

Anselm Kiefer’s work is particularly relevant to this idea of myth. Kiefer is particularly concerned with German history, his earlier work trying to deal with the holocaust and his later work trying to establish a form of German identity. ‘Palmsonntag’ or Palm Sunday (Fig4) is a body of work composed of 39 mixed media paintings and a dead palm tree lying on it’s side. The paintings are composed of backgrounds stained with mud and black and white mediums in spectacular fashions, with plants in various degrees of living and lifelessness placed in the foreground. The background brings to mind some kind of force of

nature, possibly the seasons. The series could be read as a comment on the decline of the natural world. With knowledge of Palm Sunday however we can begin to get more from these. Palm Sunday marks Jesus death, but brings with it the idea of his resurrection a week later. It is no coincidence that this happens in spring it is analogous to the seasons spiring begins with dead plant life before the annual renewal and growth. The picture not only connotes ideas of Jesus but of seasons and cycles (Bond 2007). Kiefer often puts text into his paintings serving a similar purpose and making similar connections to his use of title. Palm Sunday is no exception to this, one of the paintings quoting ‘Aperiatur Terra’ from Isaiah 45:8, “Let the Earth be opened and bud forth a saviour and let justice spring up at the same time.” This clearly has many similar connotations to the rest of the work and broadens our understanding of the work to include holy justice. This also served as the title to an exhibition which included ‘Palmsonntag’ (Howes 2007). Here we have no clear idea of the message that Kiefer is trying to give us, but title does serve to instil in us ideas of the Christ Myth.

Fig5. Kiefer, A. (1984-86) Glaube Hoffnung Liebe

Analysing ‘Glaube Hoffnung Liebe’ (Fig5), further illustrates the difficulty of relying on title to inform the interpretation of Kiefer’s work. The piece contains a three bladed propeller on top of murky looking paint, which could well be a landscape or even seascape, although this is vague and could not be said with any certainty. We might consider the propeller to denote flight, but it is not clear how this conveys anything about the piece. The title which is transcribed on the propellor translates as ‘Faith Hope Love’, which are the three cardinal virtues. This associates the work with Christian myth, but again it is no clear what is trying to be conveyed. If we were to research the piece we would discover that three lead rocks were later added to the painting. Kiefer’s intention was for these rocks to multiply the three propellors or virtues by three, to make nine the number of angels in the Seraphim. Indeed the title was originally going to be ‘Ordnung der Engels’ or ‘The Order of the Angels’. With this knowledge we can see that the work is trying to talk about transcendence, passing from the material to the immaterial world. The propellor a sign for flight straddles the horizon line, separating heaven from earth, is intend to bring forth the myth of transcendence (Bond 2007).

To conclude by accessing myth, title’s cannot lock-down or offer definitive access to the meaning of an artwork. Although they can offer additional and sometimes clearer access to myth, at times giving a work focus. It also can be seen that sometimes this can be the best way for an audience to access the artists intention. On occasion the title may even be the predominant way an artists decides to permeate an artwork with meaning. In the works of Salcedo and indeed Duchamp’s ‘Fountain’ this is certainly the case. However in Kiefer's work we can see that although it can help inform the reading of his work, it doesn’t give the work focus, as Kiefer tries to evoke a broad range of myth’s with no clear intention. Here prior knowledge of the artist might be more informative than title, this is not to say a viewer could not make use of both. In addition not only can it clearly be seen that Barthes account of semiotics can explain how artists communicate through their artwork, but also how utilising myth they can evoke preexisting associations. In addition to all this, the work of Kiefer and Salcedo both shows that religious mythology, particularly Christian can be a powerful tool for communication in an artists hand; as it is deeply embedded in the public consciousness, even those who are atheist can have powerful feelings in response to such symbolism.

Bibliography

Books:Cobley, P. (1999) Introducing Semiotics. Royston: Icon Books Ltd.Barthes, R. (1957) Mythologies. London: Vintage.Barthes, R. (1980) Camera Lucida. London: Vintage.Barthes, R. (2004) The Language of Fashion. Oxford: Berg.Barthes, R (1977) Image-Music-Text. London: FontanaShakespeare, W. (1609) Shakespeare’s Sonnets. Project Gutenberg.Shakespeare, W (1597) Romeo and Juliet. Bookbyte Digital Edition.Borchardt-Hume, A Sculpting Critical Space In: ! Salcedo, D. Et Al. (2007) Shibboleth London: Tate Publishing.Howes, G. Palm Sunday: Myth, meaning and representation In:! Kiefer, A. Et Al. (2007) Aperiatur Terra London: Jay Jopling/White CubeBond, A. Fields of reference In:! Kiefer, A. Et Al. (2007) Aperiatur Terra London: Jay Jopling/White Cube

Images:Duchamp, M. (1917) Fountain Web: Viewed 15 Jan 2011,<http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f6/Duchamp_Fountaine.jpg>Salcedo, D. (2007) Shibboleth Web: Viewed 15 Jan 2011,<http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/dorissalcedo/images/salcedo_shibboleth.gif>Kiefer, A. (2006) Palmsonntag Web: Viewed 15 Jan 2011,<http://www.tate.org.uk/collection/AR/AR00038_9.jpg>Kiefer, A. (1984-86) Glaube Hoffnung Liebe Web: Viewed 15 Jan 2011,<http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/media/collection_images/3/358.1987.a-b%23%23S.jpg>