SAMENVATTING VISUAL CULTURE – 2025-2026
LECTURE 1: INTRODUCING VISUAL CULTURE
READING VISUAL CULTURE
This image is a good example of visual culture (zie slide 6)
Playboy isn’t bought to read the articles, especially watch the pictures → BUT the woman are not the
main audience of Playboy, they are looking what the hype is about
VISUAL TEXTS
We are surrounded by images:
➔ News, Politics, Entertainment, Education, …
➔ Vb.: Lecture recordings are an example of how visual culture plays a big role in our lives, it’s very
visual
But we have been trained to interpret and analyse written texts
➔ And the ‘muchness’ of the visual often leads us to ‘view’ rather than ‘read’
This course is about how we can conceive of and approach images as ‘visual texts’
- Classic theories of visual analysis to understand different approaches
- Back-and-forth between theory and method
Reading visual texts requires ‘visual literacy’
- Visual literacy is more than the ability to read alone
- Visual literacy presumes insight in ‘styles of reading’ too
Evaluative approach to theory
- We look at the dis/advantages of approaching visual culture from specific perspectives
- Combining the theory of method with the practice of looking
Visual literacy’s ‘double use’
- Crucial social scientific competence
- Crucial civil competence
1
,AFTER VISUAL CULTURE
From ‘viewers’ to ‘analysts’
- Refining and applying visual literacy
- Challenging our ‘way of seeing’
Being critical individuals in a world increasingly dominated by images means being mindful of
- The power of visual representation
- Our socio-cultural reliance on the visual
2
,LECTURE 2: ICONOLOGY: WHAT IS IN AN IMAGE?
what do we see in the image here:
- Illuminatie
- Eye of providence → linked to illuminatie → government of
USA are pulled by dark forces
- 1 dollar bill of USA
IMAGES & SUBJECT MATTER
What do we see: landscape (could be in Belgium), house, farmer,
haywain (car to move hay), dog, two horses, cloudy ducks, boat
- The Haywain – John Constable
No art historical knowledge needed!
Evidence presented by the text itself → natural cues (weather,
nature,….) /factual cues (characters, time,….)
➔ Can give us good indication when painting was painted
CUES INSIDE VISUAL TEXTS
Primitive but useful method
➢ Giving structure to primary interpretation of images
➢ Disciplined ‘dissection’ of unfamiliar images: Important with visual images that are
unknown to us Vb.: old newspapers, museum in South-Asia
➔ 7 ‘stops’ to make an informed conclusion (=WYSIWYG)
= 7 stops to address the most important elements of an image
‘what you see is what you get’ method → factual overview of what’s in images
1. Genre (// ‘type’ & ‘kind’)
Genre = kind of image (easy with paintings that’s why we do it
with paintings instead of pictures)
- Portrait
- Still life
- Genre piece
- Nude
- landscape
3
, 2. Subject matter (// ‘content’ & ‘theme’)
- Merkel (Politics, Angela Merkel)
- Skull, cup, stationary
- Woman, umbrella, seaside
- Nude, woman, sea
- ?
3. Setting (// ‘location’ & ‘environment’)
- Not much of setting in portrait, wherever?
- Writing table?
- Belgian coast
- Beach, seaside?
- Mediterranean?
Often not a lot of specificity
4. Era (// ‘timeframe’ & ‘period’)
- Today?
- 16/17th century ?
- End of 19th century, belle epoque?
- Early 20th century?
- Late medieval?
5. Season (// ‘time of year’; ‘occasion’)
- Whenever?
- Winter?
- Fall?
- Summer?
- spring?
6. Time (// ‘moment in the day’ & ‘hour’)
- Whenever?
- Evening, night?
- Noon?
- Afternoon?
- Morning?
Sometimes you can guess the time by shadows (sun moves through the day)
4
, 7. Moment (// ‘instance’ & ‘event’)
- Reflection?
- Fallen asleep?
- Boredom?
- Sunbathing?
- Sowing?
‘7 STOPS’
Easy to apply, but many problems arise
➢ Common sense (e.g. agricultural; religious)
➢ Codes, conventions & canon
➔ ‘Meaning’ of image conjures something external to it
- No way for images to speak for themselves, meaning takes place outside of image → never trust
images to do their own telling
Vb.: interpretation Haywain → we think it’s summer because of the harvest of hay etc.
- We can never reduce images to their content
ERWIN PANOSFKY & ICONOLOGY
- Panofsky = godfather of iconology → systhematic approach (lot of oil paintings) → 3 levels of
meaning
- Analyzing visual culture → come to sensible analysis
- His work points to what the point of images is and an analysis of the context of where the painting
was made (?)
- Using painting to say something about broader context
Relationship engagement, Van Ijk in the
back,
7 stops: it’s during daylight (why is there
1 candle burning?), hats show era (late
middle ages in Netherlands, late 15th
century), family portrait, wealthy people
5
,Very interesting details in painting
- Single lit candle during daylight: very little function, but stands for visual cue that wants to show
us that we are only on earth for a short period of time like a candle burning bright and after
burning out
- Crystal beads and mirror: upstanding nature of woman in picture
- Not wearing shoes but still painted in painting → suggest that they stand on holy ground,
removed shoes because of this and represents that they take their marriage very seriously
- Dog included: strength of bond between man and woman
- Apple on a windowsill and fruit in cupboard: Fruits symbolizes comfort of Adam and Eve → Eve
ate apple (apple on windshield) → constant temptations/dangers of marriage
- Curtains are drawn back & wood carving of St. Margaret
➔ St. Margaret → illusions to whole baby making process → demonstrates that they could directly
make children
- Well-rounded stomach & deliberate gesture: Debate if she’s pregnant or not or if it was a fashion
style
➔ Irrelevant if she’s pregnant or not
DISGUISED SYMBOLISM
Arnolfini Wedding Portrait (Van Eyck, 1434) (zie hierboven)
Depicted objects have deeper meaning:
- ‘Realistic existence’
- ‘Symbolic existence’
‘Full’ meaning of an image transcends the factuality of the ‘7 stops’:
- Conventional meaning of signs (e.g. dogs & loyalty)
- Cultural significance of objects (e.g. colors & status)
Every single element has a kind of deeper meaning
Symbolic meaning: every object presented says something beyond their physical projection
With the 7 stops we lose interpretative level:
- Conventional meanings → we still link dogs with loyalty
- Cultural significance → vb green dress: purity before marriage
➔ These symbolisms might be lost in 7 stops method
6
,ICONOLOGY
Fully understanding Van Eyck’s Arnolfini Wedding Portrait requires
- Basic knowledge of Medieval painting
- Basic knowledge of Christian theology
- Basic knowlegde of Medieval social conventions
➔ Extraordinary painting but we need background info to know why this is extraordinary
‘7 stops’ (WYSIWYG) fails to fully account for the meaning of images because
- They are produced with a (knowledgeable) audience in mind
- They un/consciously reflect social and cultural logics of the context they emerge from
ERWIN PANOFSKY
- Hamburg & Princeton University
- Specialist in late-Medieval & Renaissance painting
- Seminal work: Studies in Iconology: Humanistic Themes in the Art of the Renaissance (1939)
- Key arguments:
- Renaissance art is marked by a belief in human potential and dignity
- Naturalism & perspective emulate individuality
- Hybridization between Christian and mythological themes to reconcile classical wisdom
and Catholicism
We suddenly see paintings that are not flat anymore → shift in paradigm
From flat perspective to high human perspective
➔ Renaissance art
Three-tiered method to examine meaning in images → We are mostly interested in framework
- Primary level: factual, expressional…
- Secondary level: conventional, social…
- Tertiary level: cultural, historical…
7
, St. Peter Healing a Cripple and the Raising of Tabitha
(Masolino da Panicale, ca 1423)
Primary level: factual, expressional…
- e.g. use of graphical perspective in painting
Key element: optical/graphical perspective → simulation of optical perspective
Secondary level: conventional, social…
- e.g. visual art perceived as a domain of scientific experiment
Tertiary level: cultural, historical…
- e.g. art as expressing a broad shift towards premodern notions of society
St. Jerome and the Lion (Van der Weyden, ca. 1450-
1465)
Primary level: factual, expressional…
- Use of practical experience of daily life
- What is shown? (//factual level) – man, hat, cave, lion
- What does this communicate? (//expressional level) – man helping a lion with a thorn in
its paw
➔ He is pulling a thorn out of his paw = Uncommon situation
8
LECTURE 1: INTRODUCING VISUAL CULTURE
READING VISUAL CULTURE
This image is a good example of visual culture (zie slide 6)
Playboy isn’t bought to read the articles, especially watch the pictures → BUT the woman are not the
main audience of Playboy, they are looking what the hype is about
VISUAL TEXTS
We are surrounded by images:
➔ News, Politics, Entertainment, Education, …
➔ Vb.: Lecture recordings are an example of how visual culture plays a big role in our lives, it’s very
visual
But we have been trained to interpret and analyse written texts
➔ And the ‘muchness’ of the visual often leads us to ‘view’ rather than ‘read’
This course is about how we can conceive of and approach images as ‘visual texts’
- Classic theories of visual analysis to understand different approaches
- Back-and-forth between theory and method
Reading visual texts requires ‘visual literacy’
- Visual literacy is more than the ability to read alone
- Visual literacy presumes insight in ‘styles of reading’ too
Evaluative approach to theory
- We look at the dis/advantages of approaching visual culture from specific perspectives
- Combining the theory of method with the practice of looking
Visual literacy’s ‘double use’
- Crucial social scientific competence
- Crucial civil competence
1
,AFTER VISUAL CULTURE
From ‘viewers’ to ‘analysts’
- Refining and applying visual literacy
- Challenging our ‘way of seeing’
Being critical individuals in a world increasingly dominated by images means being mindful of
- The power of visual representation
- Our socio-cultural reliance on the visual
2
,LECTURE 2: ICONOLOGY: WHAT IS IN AN IMAGE?
what do we see in the image here:
- Illuminatie
- Eye of providence → linked to illuminatie → government of
USA are pulled by dark forces
- 1 dollar bill of USA
IMAGES & SUBJECT MATTER
What do we see: landscape (could be in Belgium), house, farmer,
haywain (car to move hay), dog, two horses, cloudy ducks, boat
- The Haywain – John Constable
No art historical knowledge needed!
Evidence presented by the text itself → natural cues (weather,
nature,….) /factual cues (characters, time,….)
➔ Can give us good indication when painting was painted
CUES INSIDE VISUAL TEXTS
Primitive but useful method
➢ Giving structure to primary interpretation of images
➢ Disciplined ‘dissection’ of unfamiliar images: Important with visual images that are
unknown to us Vb.: old newspapers, museum in South-Asia
➔ 7 ‘stops’ to make an informed conclusion (=WYSIWYG)
= 7 stops to address the most important elements of an image
‘what you see is what you get’ method → factual overview of what’s in images
1. Genre (// ‘type’ & ‘kind’)
Genre = kind of image (easy with paintings that’s why we do it
with paintings instead of pictures)
- Portrait
- Still life
- Genre piece
- Nude
- landscape
3
, 2. Subject matter (// ‘content’ & ‘theme’)
- Merkel (Politics, Angela Merkel)
- Skull, cup, stationary
- Woman, umbrella, seaside
- Nude, woman, sea
- ?
3. Setting (// ‘location’ & ‘environment’)
- Not much of setting in portrait, wherever?
- Writing table?
- Belgian coast
- Beach, seaside?
- Mediterranean?
Often not a lot of specificity
4. Era (// ‘timeframe’ & ‘period’)
- Today?
- 16/17th century ?
- End of 19th century, belle epoque?
- Early 20th century?
- Late medieval?
5. Season (// ‘time of year’; ‘occasion’)
- Whenever?
- Winter?
- Fall?
- Summer?
- spring?
6. Time (// ‘moment in the day’ & ‘hour’)
- Whenever?
- Evening, night?
- Noon?
- Afternoon?
- Morning?
Sometimes you can guess the time by shadows (sun moves through the day)
4
, 7. Moment (// ‘instance’ & ‘event’)
- Reflection?
- Fallen asleep?
- Boredom?
- Sunbathing?
- Sowing?
‘7 STOPS’
Easy to apply, but many problems arise
➢ Common sense (e.g. agricultural; religious)
➢ Codes, conventions & canon
➔ ‘Meaning’ of image conjures something external to it
- No way for images to speak for themselves, meaning takes place outside of image → never trust
images to do their own telling
Vb.: interpretation Haywain → we think it’s summer because of the harvest of hay etc.
- We can never reduce images to their content
ERWIN PANOSFKY & ICONOLOGY
- Panofsky = godfather of iconology → systhematic approach (lot of oil paintings) → 3 levels of
meaning
- Analyzing visual culture → come to sensible analysis
- His work points to what the point of images is and an analysis of the context of where the painting
was made (?)
- Using painting to say something about broader context
Relationship engagement, Van Ijk in the
back,
7 stops: it’s during daylight (why is there
1 candle burning?), hats show era (late
middle ages in Netherlands, late 15th
century), family portrait, wealthy people
5
,Very interesting details in painting
- Single lit candle during daylight: very little function, but stands for visual cue that wants to show
us that we are only on earth for a short period of time like a candle burning bright and after
burning out
- Crystal beads and mirror: upstanding nature of woman in picture
- Not wearing shoes but still painted in painting → suggest that they stand on holy ground,
removed shoes because of this and represents that they take their marriage very seriously
- Dog included: strength of bond between man and woman
- Apple on a windowsill and fruit in cupboard: Fruits symbolizes comfort of Adam and Eve → Eve
ate apple (apple on windshield) → constant temptations/dangers of marriage
- Curtains are drawn back & wood carving of St. Margaret
➔ St. Margaret → illusions to whole baby making process → demonstrates that they could directly
make children
- Well-rounded stomach & deliberate gesture: Debate if she’s pregnant or not or if it was a fashion
style
➔ Irrelevant if she’s pregnant or not
DISGUISED SYMBOLISM
Arnolfini Wedding Portrait (Van Eyck, 1434) (zie hierboven)
Depicted objects have deeper meaning:
- ‘Realistic existence’
- ‘Symbolic existence’
‘Full’ meaning of an image transcends the factuality of the ‘7 stops’:
- Conventional meaning of signs (e.g. dogs & loyalty)
- Cultural significance of objects (e.g. colors & status)
Every single element has a kind of deeper meaning
Symbolic meaning: every object presented says something beyond their physical projection
With the 7 stops we lose interpretative level:
- Conventional meanings → we still link dogs with loyalty
- Cultural significance → vb green dress: purity before marriage
➔ These symbolisms might be lost in 7 stops method
6
,ICONOLOGY
Fully understanding Van Eyck’s Arnolfini Wedding Portrait requires
- Basic knowledge of Medieval painting
- Basic knowledge of Christian theology
- Basic knowlegde of Medieval social conventions
➔ Extraordinary painting but we need background info to know why this is extraordinary
‘7 stops’ (WYSIWYG) fails to fully account for the meaning of images because
- They are produced with a (knowledgeable) audience in mind
- They un/consciously reflect social and cultural logics of the context they emerge from
ERWIN PANOFSKY
- Hamburg & Princeton University
- Specialist in late-Medieval & Renaissance painting
- Seminal work: Studies in Iconology: Humanistic Themes in the Art of the Renaissance (1939)
- Key arguments:
- Renaissance art is marked by a belief in human potential and dignity
- Naturalism & perspective emulate individuality
- Hybridization between Christian and mythological themes to reconcile classical wisdom
and Catholicism
We suddenly see paintings that are not flat anymore → shift in paradigm
From flat perspective to high human perspective
➔ Renaissance art
Three-tiered method to examine meaning in images → We are mostly interested in framework
- Primary level: factual, expressional…
- Secondary level: conventional, social…
- Tertiary level: cultural, historical…
7
, St. Peter Healing a Cripple and the Raising of Tabitha
(Masolino da Panicale, ca 1423)
Primary level: factual, expressional…
- e.g. use of graphical perspective in painting
Key element: optical/graphical perspective → simulation of optical perspective
Secondary level: conventional, social…
- e.g. visual art perceived as a domain of scientific experiment
Tertiary level: cultural, historical…
- e.g. art as expressing a broad shift towards premodern notions of society
St. Jerome and the Lion (Van der Weyden, ca. 1450-
1465)
Primary level: factual, expressional…
- Use of practical experience of daily life
- What is shown? (//factual level) – man, hat, cave, lion
- What does this communicate? (//expressional level) – man helping a lion with a thorn in
its paw
➔ He is pulling a thorn out of his paw = Uncommon situation
8
