Metalanguage of painting: Semiotics and geometry as lingua franca of interpreting painting works

Abstract

The author of this paper considers the question whether semiotics can be used as a potential metalanguage that enables reasonable discussion on painting, or that provides a linguistic substitute for visual artworks. In contrast to iconography and iconology which are primarily diachronic disciplines directed to historical aspect of works of art, the semiotics of painting is based on synchronism; it deals with articulation and transformation of visual codes from the point of view of the 'textuality' of the painting. The aim of the text is to sum up the basic problems of the discipline, representing them through the viewpoints of acknowledged authors. Its aim is also to point to the limitations of semiotics of painting, and to its ideological aspects. Finally, the author offers a possible alternative to the semiotics as a metalanguage of painting in the form of geometry (i.e. geometrical analysis), which he compares with Chomsky's model of generative grammar.