Inpretating this visual artform personally, I see this as a dry landscape portraying surrealistic art.
This painting is part of a storyboard for a project for an animated film to be made together with Walt Disney called Destino. The use of color makes the painting seem arid, dry and scorched. He elaborates on juxtaposition by putting the “pyramid” and the two people looking up to it near each other also adding the use of disposition by changing the shape of the ball (interpreted as Earth) and the humans surrounding the pyramid. As seen below, a strangely muscular formed human seems like he is pushing down the clock with his hands. The way I interpret is that he’s pushing down time or trying to make it stop with his muscular form.
The distinction between the humans behind the pyramid and the mountains seem unproportional but far away from each other at the same time. Adding to this, the shadow of the pyramid doesn’t follow as an usual shadow but it effortlessly falls in an abstract way behind the pyramid. Altogether, the artwork doesn’t imply or express unity because of the way the people are spread out amongst the landscape, the way the Earth is left lonely on the left side. Most importantly, the pyramid and the human both have intense cracks showing a breakout or some kind of distress. When I look deeper into this painting, it makes me feel like everyone is running away from a specific time zone. If you look closely into the pyramid, you can see that there is a human whose hands are shaped in a way that acts like its’ running away. Comparing this to other humans in the landscape, it depicts the action of running away from time, which is shown by the human pressing down on the clock.
As mentioned previously, the visual development by Salvador Dali portrayed surrealism. Here, I will be showing how surrealism related to the global context; orientation in space and time. It’s best known for its’ art works and writings making it a cultural movement which began in the 1920s. Dali’s use of juxtaposition during that time really helped to change the way people began to see things. Today, we still have his influences of surrealism in all kind of art forms since he was the pioneer of the movement.
This artwork of Dali’s portrays orientation in space and time really well because of its’ proportions, use of colour and the clock. When relating it to the global context, time is clearly shown in the painting, the action of running away from it, and it’s being pushed down by the human. The landscape depicts one of Salvador Dali’s dreams which is imaginary, unrealistic and far away from the real world; maybe somewhere and sometime in space he has this landscape in mind. In conclusion, the use of surrealism and juxtaposition is very well put together in this painting. In other words, Dali’s approach to surrealist painting, including the distortion of space and time, remains influential in contemporary culture. The use of colour, proportions and clocks depict time zones as well as this arid landscape representing one of Dali’s dreams.
The first time I looked at this artwork, it took me several hours to understand Bosch’s artwork because I knew it conveyed something extraordinary. In “The Garden of Earthly Delights” by Hieronymus Bosch, three panels have various different significant roles making it a triptych. The triptych scene on the left shows God introducing Adam and Eve into the garden of Eden. In the central scene, it seems as if it’s a very chaotic world as in one of his dreams and many objects here act like metaphors, will be explored further on. The scene on the right, Bosch imagines the disasters of hell also including many devices in this panel.To begin with, according to me, the first panel consists of a lot of blue and pink. The blue represents oceans and earth substances whereas pink represents heaven.
The two colours contrast with each other since pink is more of a warm colour and blue is a cold colour. In the upper part of the panel, birds seem like they are hovering around the mountains trying to reach the influence of heaven. Coming from an Indian background, I see the pink central fountain represents a chakra outlining the flow of influences of heaven into reality. It’s also placed down on blue substances, gemstones, implying beauty and elegance. In the lowermost part, the central three figures really put the panel altogether. Since the setting is in the Garden Of Eden, I interpret the figures as God introducing Adam and Even into his world and imagination. According to me, the central panel is the most interesting and controversial one out of the three panels.
The lower you go on the panel, the less holy the place is. For example, the uppermost part of the central panel shows heaven whereas the central part focuses on animals and the lowermost part shows Earth (animals and humans). The pink objects are used again in the uppermost part representing heaven and warmth and the flying objects surrounding it make feel that this is what heaven is. I connote the central part to correspond with the left panel as well, the scene where God introduced Adam and Eve into the garden, both of them depict the scene of gods. There’s also a circle in the centre where animals seem like they are surrounding it; I think this representation acts like a metaphor. A metaphor that uses the inner circle and the animals around it and compares it to the inner life of a human.
Altogether, I think this central panel acts like an allegory because if you look at this panel in small bits and pieces, they come together to reveal a hidden meaning. This panel really connects with the title of “The Garden of Earthly Delights” On the contrary, the right panel does not match with the title, “The Garden Of Earthly Delights.” Instead, I think it represents hell because of the dark backgrounds, strangely looking objects and the humans in pain. Many objects act like metaphors here, like the musical instruments really show evilness. Humans are also huddled in groups like the one in the bottom left of the panel; looking like they are frightened of something.
In the top right of the panel, the eagle is lasering the mountain and it looks like it’s going to explode, I think this represents the consequences of a “dark eye” in hell. The background of blackness really adds effect to the whole panel, by making it a scary and daunting atmosphere. This triptych, the Garden of Earthly Delights, was Bosch’s most ambitious paintings ever using imagery for hidden meanings. The colours used in this artwork are very varied, he used blue, black, pink, green, white, beige, red, yellow and a lot more. According to Christians, the sun and moon were responsible for light so it could possibly be that Bosch created this artwork to show times before and after the sun and moon.
He painted each panel by himself, using the technique of the Dutch. He glazed every panel, resulting in a smooth surface which could cover the paintwork of Bosch’s. He used oil paint on an oak panel to give it a specific feature making it not very well preserved. In the triptych, some say that he paints his dreams but I think this is a mix of crowded scenes, dark images and fantasies depicting a hidden meaning about mankind. The artwork, The Garden Of Earthly Delights, by Hieronymus Bosch works really well with the global context, orientation in time and space. This artwork is based on both Bosch’s dreams and the three panels representing different regions of time occurring simultaneously distorting space and time.
In the left and central panel, heaven is shown through the uppermost parts through a representation of an unworldly space. The strangely looking objects in the right panel are connoted as something that would not be present on Earth, and only in such a space. In addition, there is also a sense of space that is not on Earth instead objects that are present somewhere far beyond our planet.
For example, the flying objects and the mixture of animals and humans would not be something on Earth, instead they are far beyond a place on our planet. The three panels also follow a chronological order with the first panel describing the introduction of Adam and Eve. Then, the second panel showing the Garden Of Earthly Delights and the third one vividly showing hell. This order shows three different regions of time, relating it back to orientation in space and time.
In the third panel, the relation between the backdrop and the objects have a very a unclear space between them and the space seems undefined.