Visual Objects: Types, Forms and Status

(This paper has been published in the journal New Horizons: A Multidisciplinary Research Journal, Vol. XV (August 2018).

 
Visual Objects: Types, Forms and Status

Rustam Singh

One should begin, perhaps, by saying that most visual objects are not just visual objects. Many of them can also be touched, heard, even smelled or tasted. We can touch a tree or an animal or, if we are allowed to do so, even a sculpture or an ordinary object. We hear the people speak in a film or a TV serial or even in a news presentation or discussion. We can smell both living and nonliving visual objects, such as a person or a freshly printed or old, rusty book. And we can taste fruit or bread, etc. Apart from all this, many visual objects—a painting, a photo, a cartoon—are normally accompanied by some text, such as a commentary, a title or a caption.

This doesn’t mean, however, that there are no purely visual objects. I will mention only one example here, that of a photo in a newspaper that doesn’t need a caption and speaks for itself, such as the photo of a parched field in drought, or the photo of a crow drinking water from an open tap.[1] In the rest of this essay I will focus on the visual aspects of those objects that can also have one or more non-visual aspects.

There are man-made visual objects, but there are also forms of the visual in nature. Man-made visual objects can initially be divided into two kinds of forms: (1) art forms, and (2) non-art forms. Non-art forms of the visual objects can again be divided into two types: (1) forms that carry an intellectual and emotional content, and (2) forms that do not carry such content. For example, forms such as a cartoon, etc., do carry intellectual and emotional content. But forms such as a bulb, a table, a toilet seat, a bottle or a cap, etc., do not normally carry such content. It is only in exceptional circumstances that they do so. For example, when I feel possessive about a chair and believe that it is my chair, that chair, for me, carries an emotional content. Similarly, when a cap, for example the Che Guevara-style of cap, becomes a symbol of an ideology and a political movement, it does carry intellectual and emotional content.

Art forms of the visual objects, such as a painting, a sculpture, a photo, a film, etc., carry intellectual, emotional as also aesthetic content. But one can also make another kind of division in the visual objects: (1) pictorial forms, and (2) non-pictorial forms. Here, a photo, a film, a TV serial and a video, etc., are examples of the pictorial forms; and a sculpture, a building, theatre, a dance performance and mime, etc., are examples of the non-pictorial forms. However, there can also be a third type of forms in this division, ones that combine the pictorial and the non-pictorial elements. The example one can give here is that of an installation in which the central object is accompanied or surrounded by TV or computer screens showing moving images.

Now, visual means that which can be seen, which is seeable. So that when we say that a thing is visual, what we mean is that if we wish we can see it. But what do we mean when we say that we can see an object? Or what does seeing involve?

At first look, seeing involves three things: an object that is seen (and what I’m calling the ‘object’ here may also be a living being, human or nonhuman), a subject who sees, and seeing itself. But what is seeing? What happens when I say that I am seeing?

When I see an object my visual perception encounters the object, takes notice of it and tells me that there is an object there. But this is not all that happens. When I see, I do not just take notice of the object; I also figure out what object it is or what kind of object it is, what its shape and size are, how far or near it is, whether it is static or moving, whether it is dangerous or friendly, harmful or none of these things. If it is an object which is pleasurable to see, I immediately notice it. If it is an object which makes me sad or arouses fear in me, that too I take note of. I also figure out whether after noticing the object I should stay where I am, go close to the object or go away from it or even run away. In other words, I am even able to figure out, at least to some extent, what action in the immediate future I should take.

The implication here is that seeing involves not just taking notice of an object but also understanding it or at least the attempt to understand it, and it is not just our eyes that are active in this process but also our mind. (I should mention here that if we simply notice an object but do not or cannot understand it due to some reason, it would mean that ‘seeing’ has been obstructed or the process of seeing has not been completed and therefore seeing has not been fully accomplished.)

(What I have said above reminds me of the Hindi and Sanskrit word ‘darshana’. ‘Darshana’ means seeing but it is a kind of seeing that includes understanding, having an insight into things, the phenomena. ‘Darshana’ means not just looking but also unveiling, that is, exposing and then understanding that which is not apparently visible. That is why this word is also used for a philosophical system or a philosophical vision, where the system or the vision is the result of seeing. And a philosopher is called a ‘daarshnika’, that is, the one who sees, what in English is called a seer.[2])

This brings us to the second implication, which is that when we are seeing we are actively and fully involved in the process, with our entire being. This further means that there is no such thing as bare visuality where we only notice or passively look at an object.

Now, we have been talking so far of objects as if they were sovereign and independent and, as such, the source of all the information that we gather about them. But not all visual objects are sovereign and independent in this manner. Here, I’ll talk about four types of objects which don’t seem to be sovereign and independent.

The first are what I’ll call violated visual objects. These are those nonhuman visual objects that have been impinged upon or encroached or invaded by humans. The visual that most readily comes to mind here is that of the trees which are decorated with electric lights or paper flags on various occasions and for various purposes. The second are what I’ll call appropriated visual objects. These are those nonhuman visual objects which have been appropriated by humans. The examples are nonhuman animals which have been enslaved (such as buffaloes, cows, goats and sheep) or are being raised for slaughter (such as cows, goats and sheep again, or pigs and poultry). (Needless to say, I’m also including here those visual objects which are raised in factory farms for the meat industry.) Nonhuman animals and insects which have been captured and are kept alive for experimental purposes fall in the same category. Other examples are animals in zoos and birds in cages.[3]

The third and the fourth categories of the visual objects which are not sovereign and independent include those objects which are created and used as a medium. And I’m talking here of visual objects that are man-made, that are produced by humans. As such, they are not to be found in nature, but only in settings which are created by humans and can be called human-dominated settings. To make things more clear, I should say that these objects include all those art and non-art forms of the visual objects which are made by humans.

But there are some differences between the objects included in these two latter categories. In the third category, what I will call mediated visual objects, I will place those visual objects whose purpose is not mere entertainment. The examples here are art objects, such as a photo, a painting, a sculpture, certain kinds of films—what are called art or documentary films—and a theatre or dance performance. We can also include here cave paintings and objects known as craft such as items made from clay, wood and metals, etc. Cartoons making socio-political commentary, too, can be included here as examples. Finally, in the fourth category, what I will call mediatized visual objects, I will place those visual objects which are meant to provide pure entertainment. The examples here are popular kind of films, soap TV serials, reality TV and even delivery and analysis of news on TV channels when these are turned into a performance.

In the case of the visual objects in all these four categories there is not just a viewer and a visual object; rather, there is another entity residing somewhere behind the object but at the same time present within it, and when we see the object, this entity is not always explicitly visible: it is like a presence that we cannot see but is always there. In the case of the objects in the first two categories, namely the violated and the appropriated visual objects, the identity of this presence is quite clear: it consists of those humans who impinge upon or enslave the objects. In the case of the third and the fourth categories, namely the mediated and the mediatized visual objects, this presence is the person or the people who create a visual object or phenomenon and use it as a medium. And I need to add here that this person or these people need not necessarily be alive; it is possible that they created this object and are now long dead. Further, normally makers of these objects can be named; but I’m including here also the objects whose makers are unknown and hence cannot be named, they are anonymous.

However, in all such cases, the presence that we are talking about, that is, the entity behind the object and also within it, becomes the dominant source from where the information flows and reaches the viewer through the visual object.

Therefore, it seems to me that visual objects that belong to these four categories, mentioned above, are not complete visual objects but are rather incomplete in the sense that in order to see them in their totality we need to be aware of this third entity which is behind them and also within them like a presence but is not explicitly visible.

And in the case of the visual objects in the first two categories—the violated and the appropriated visual objects—we need to add that, in addition to being incomplete, they are also damaged visual objects. They are impinged upon or invaded or enslaved and are not fully in possession of their being. Part of their being, and as such their destiny, is in the possession of someone else.

Here, I would like to introduce another element in this discussion: when we see an object in the manner in which seeing has been described above, it is as if the object begins to speak to us, and what it tells us and what we hear is a part of seeing, or, we can even say that it is part of its visuality. The object begins to tell us about itself, about what it is, and about its destiny or situation. For example, when we see a pig in a factory farm, in the small space where it is confined (and the same is true of all the other animals in the factory farms), it is as if without speaking in the human voice it tells us about the painful life it is forced live and that it will be sent to the slaughterhouse when it is fat enough and therefore doesn’t have long to live. Animals which are targets of experiments in laboratories tell us that their life is perhaps even more painful than animals in the factory farms. A parrot in a cage, too, tells us a story, the essence of which is that it is exists for the entertainment or the emotional or rather sentimental tickling of the people who have enslaved it. An elephant on a crowded and noisy city road being made to participate in a religious festival tells us that it has been uprooted from its habitat and is being forced to live a life which is alien to it. A tree decorated with lights and other sundry stuff tells us that it is being forced to serve a purpose for which it was not made.

Mediated and mediatized forms of the visual objects, too, speak to us but in a somewhat different fashion. The voice of the mediated objects, when they speak to us, is quieter than the voice of the violated and appropriated visual objects. There is less tremor in it, if at all, and there is less pathos. However, the voice of the mediatized objects is the loudest, even when it sounds quiet, even when it sounds like a whisper. This is so because their aim is not really to talk to us but rather to shout us down or to shut us up. That is why the being of the mediatized visual objects is much coarser or cruder as compared to the being of almost all the other objects mentioned above.

Towards the end, I would like to come back to what I have called the violated and appropriated visual objects. The examples I gave of such objects earlier were all of them of living objects. This gives the impression that the violated forms of the visual objects, as also those of the appropriated objects, can only be the living objects. But this need not necessarily be the case. Even the nonliving visual objects can be violated and appropriated. For example, a painting can be violated, a sculpture or a statue can be violated, and may stay in that condition at least for some time. However, in such cases we call it a violation because of the value we, the humans, place on them. But a graver violation is that in which the object is not a product of the humans and thus has a sovereign being, independent of the humans.

Among the living visual objects the examples of a sovereign being are a tree, a bird, an animal or an insect in its natural habitat. Among the nonliving visual objects the examples of a sovereign being are, let us say, a river, a mountain, a rock or a stone, before they have been violated or appropriated.

In other words, when dams are built on a river, when it is forced to change its course or when it is heavily polluted by man-made objects and chemicals, it is no longer sovereign. When trees and shrubs on a mountain are cleared away and it is loaded with man-made ugly objects, such as modern buildings, or when chunks of its body are blasted off to make holes through it or for mining purposes, it is no longer sovereign. When we sit on a rock and stare down into a valley, its sovereignty is not violated. When we use stones to build a small hut in their natural habitat, I don’t think their sovereignty is violated. But when rocks and stones are cut into pieces and are taken hundreds or thousands of miles away to become part of a structure in an alien environment, they are no longer sovereign and have been violated and appropriated.

Finally, it is necessary to say that when we no longer see things or objects in their sovereign state and become used to seeing them only in their violated, appropriated or damaged form, it means that our visual perception, our own ability to see, too, has been damaged, if not violated. This damage to or violation of our visual perception in turn means that our being itself has been damaged or violated. And henceforth we move around carrying a damaged or violated being, even if we may not be aware of this.

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Notes

[1] We are saying this despite what W. J. T. Mitchell, in his paper “There Are No Visual Media”, had argued. According to him, there are only mixed media, therefore no purely visual media. Clearly, we don’t agree with Mitchell. See, Journal of Visual Culture, August 2005, Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 257-66. Veu.sagepub.com/content/4/2/257.full.pdf+html  Accessed on 16 March 2016.

[2] Monier Monier-Williams, in his A Sanskrit-English Dictionary, mentions, among others, the following meanings of the word ‘darshana’: seeing, observing, inspection, examination, experiencing, contemplating, apprehension, understanding, foreseeing, philosophical system, a vision, etc. See, A Sanskrit-English Dictionary, Motilal Banarsidass Publishers Private Limited, Delhi, 2002.

[3] Properly speaking, this kind of visual objects are not just objects; they are also, at least partly, subjects. However, in this paper we will continue to call them objects.

Works Cited

Mitchell, W.J.T. (2005) ‘There Are No Visual Media,’ Journal of Visual Culture, 4(2). Available at: Veu.sagepub.com/content/4/2/257.full.pdf+html [16 March 2016], 257-66.

Monier-Williams, M. (2002) A Sanskrit-English Dictionary. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers Private Limited.