Defining emerging TERMINOLOGY; visual literacy, visual narratives, visual story telling,visual rhetoric and visual allegory

 While I construct and then deconstruct my case studies my focus is on the question; How are the indigenous social-cultural influences reflected through design? I feel that in exploring this question I shall be unearthing answer to other questions that I outlined in the ‘mapping post’.

As I review visual communication literature and practices, the terms that I come across continually are visual literacy, visual narratives, visual story telling, visual rhetoric and visual allegory.

 

Articulating my case studies, I find myself depending more and more on these terms to define the phenomenon I discover, and to further investigate my claim i.e. identification of a context specific a visual grammar (that the audience associates with and understands) based on the context the visual appears in.

For example in my case studies, the point of focus in Pakistani truck art is its iconographic rhetoric; The visual icons illustrating the historical as well  as contemporary influences in Pakistani socio-cultural context through strong iconography. Icons based on indigenous subjectivity reflecting indigenous worldviews. To contend Pakistani truck-art as a popular art form, we can deconstruct it as a comprehensive knowledge archive about the prevailing local beliefs and attitudes. For example, the strong spiritual influence in truck art reflects the role spirituality plays in the common man’s life in Pakistan, at the same time influential political figures denote the power structures in this context. Favorite actors and actresses painted on the back of the trucks reflect the colorful nature and choices in the Pakistani visual context. Similarly the visual treatment of Lollywood cinema billboards as well as political advertising billboards reveal a strong message about beliefs and attitudes in Pakistani social and political context. These are a blend of exaggerated visual depiction of fantasy and local mindsets. Their purpose may be publicity design but when visually deconstructed the elements revealed are self-explanatory of the political structures, power structures and socio- cultural structures in the context they are created and viewed in.


Here the question that surfaces is; what are the terms I rely on to explain, explore and deconstruct the communication implication of these popular mass cultural productions; visual literacy, visual narrative, visual story telling, visual rhetoric or visual allegory? Looking at these terms and wanting to employ them within the context of this research I realize a strong need to define them generally and specifically as I refer to them in my  graphic communication design research.

Mass cultural productions as Vernacular Visuals ; A contextual knowledge base tool

Traditional arts and Mass cultural productions as vernacular productions can be a direct tool for an indigenous knowledge base. The vernacular is ascendant in how and what we see today. This discussion is a move away from what we know as  classical art, towards exploring the communicative ability of the artistry of the everyday. Helmer [1] observes that 'in many ways, the place to begin when discussing the work of art may not even be within the exhibition space itself, but in the mall bookstore, the campus poster shop, or the parking lot of the museum, places where the meaning of art is negotiated and where art is transmitted as a commodity such as a calendar, poster, or billboard and where the initial idea of an object as ‘fine art’ is apprehended'(Pg.77)

Ads are what some critics call ‘specific representational practices’ and produce meanings which cannot be found in reality. To understand the role  that advertising plays in our society, there is a need to understand how advertising organizes and constructs reality, how ideology and meanings are produced within the advertising discourse and why sonic images are the way they are, how they are been constructed[2].The billboards that I am analyzing in my research (Lollywood billboards) concur with this statement. These billboards reveal an explicit communication influence that can be proven be ideological in essence. Exploration of technique involved in their design and production can provide insights towards developing context specific graphic communication design principles.

My focus therefore is not on so-called classical art productions but mass cultural productions that we are exposed to everyday. Lollywood cinema billboards, Pakistani political posters and Pakistani truck art is identified as as mass cultural productions in Pakistan that represent the allegorical plurality of popular arts as vernacular visuals and cultural productions.


Discussing the visual allegory of Lollywood art, we are looking at how vernacular  establishes a visual content/context and  how allegory is establishing a visual rhetoric.

---

[1] C.H. Helmer. Defining visual rhetoric.

[2] George D. Chryssides, John H. Kaler.1993 An introduction to business ethics. Pladstow,Cornwall. TJ International.

Mapping the inquiry

To map out the areas to be looked and define the allegorical construction,I come back to the questions I asked in my earlier post regarding the visual media I am investigating.( as communication)

• The purpose of the artifacts under-discussion?  
• Geographical location?
• The dimensions;size and materiality; Is it 2D or 3D?  
• Static or in motion?  
• What media are involved?  
• What colours and forms are involved?  
• Construction; How is it made and by whom?  
• What images are used, and where are they sourced?  
• How are the images treated, e.g. heroically and larger than life and why?  
• What patterns or other enrichment is used, and where are they sourced?  
• Who makes them, where and how?  
• What qualities are seen in the images and other enrichment?  
• Who is it designed for and is visible to, and in which circumstances? 
• How these media relate to the Pakistani audience? 
• How the knowledge about the target audience impacts the designs created? 
• What are the factors that influence the visuality, popularity and influence of these visual media? 
• How are the  indigenous socio-cultural influences reflected through the designs?

So basically what I am  looking at is;

1. The composition and construction
2. The location ; The level of context involved
   
3. The type of audience invoked
4. The cultural cache it carries
5. And its relationship to commercialism within the communication context hinting at the process of production and reception.

Lack of visual culture discourse in Pakistan; a barrier in communication

A most surprising realization is that in a culture that is extremely visual there appears to be a lack of visual culture discourse.Pakistan’s 63-year-old visual history has lacked tools that can help explore/interpret its vibrant visual artifacts as representative of an autonomous visual ideology … a visual identity.  The visual material world in the broad sense (production, reception and practices) also remains ambiguous when defining or appreciating their rhetorical role in the Pakistani visual culture. 

Therefore it is not surprising that the image-saturated Pakistani culture is lacking  a visual culture discourse. Exploring the allegorical nature of Pakistani visual media intends to change this state of ambiguity. According to Foucault [1] “discourses are ways of referring to or role of discourse in a culture: it can be a cluster of image ideas, images and practices which provide ways of talking about forms of knowledge and conduct associated with a particular topic, social activity or institutional site in society”.

The visual media selected to be explored as case studies are looked at as Pakistan’s authentic vernacular expression. The illustrations are claimed to allegorize an indigenous Pakistani visual identity and ideology, and is rhetorical in composition and construction. The production, distribution, and consumption of these visual artifacts (as media texts) can be positioned as an allegorical literacy practice  -  one that can lead towards understanding reading and writing, albeit with a visual medium other than traditional print.This will help understand the idea of literacy in relation to the larger social and cultural context rather than the traditional understanding of literacy as the ability to read and write (as being formally educated in schools)

This brings us back to the question:Can visual be so powerful as to convey meaning without depending on the verbal?

Searching for answer to this question there is a need to explore the existing visual media in Pakistan. In case of this research, the identified cases of Lollywood Billboards, Political posters and Pakistani truck art with the frame of production and consumption as media texts.

How they are positioned in the Pakistani visual culture within the frame of production and reception,  and why should they be specifically chosen to be explored and not any other genre' ?