Photo, paint & poem
Feline Streekstra
10001416 / 6281982
MA Thesis
Literary studies: Comparative Literature
Supervisor: dr. Boris Noordenbos
Table of contents
1.
Introduction
5
Paint on photographs
6
Writing about art: ekphrasis
8
2.
Family focus
11
Family snapshot
12
Liberating paint
15
Representing a picture in words
16
Impersonal liberation
20
3.
In the absence of people
24
Sight and cite
24
Suggesting human presence
28
From individual to collective memory
31
Poet’s selfishness
34
4.
To return and reinvent
37
‘Reality’ of paint and photography
37
Return, reinvent
38
To conclude
40
Bibliography
41
Appendix:
‘If you could say it in words, there would be no reason to paint.’ - Edward Hopper
‘The dark is not evil for it has indigo and cobalt inside and let us never forget indigo and the warmth of that the warmth of the mind reflected in a dark time in the time of pictures and refracted light.’
1. Introduction
‘Put a flag in the room and watch it weep’, poet James Byrne writes (60). It is a line that instantly makes you picture the weeping flag. But the flag Byrne speaks of here is not what you would initially think, because in fact it is not an actual flag. It is a painted flag. Byrne’s poem – for which this line forms the closing one – is an interpretation of an artwork by Gerhard Richter. Hereby the poem belongs to a specific type of poetry called ‘ekphrastic’, in which words do not directly represent a story or an object. Instead they speak of a representation of that specific story or object: a visual work of art. Ekphrastic texts are literary texts that speak of, refer to or describe visual artworks, like sculptures, paintings or photographs. English poet Byrne has written a sequence of five ekphrastic poems that interpret five artworks by Richter. All of these artworks are so called overpainted photographs: photos that are painted over by the artist. By analysing the five ekphrastic poems in relation to their corresponding overpainted photographs I will discuss how a scene captured on camera is being represented from one representation to the other. This discussion brings to light that this case of ekphrasis is not just a ‘verbal representation of a visual representation’ (Heffernan 299), but it is more so a result of poetic imagination based on a visual representation.
Because an ekphrastic text should represent a visual representation of something else, it often seems to reflect on or even critique representation in general. James Heffernan argues that ekphrasis questions and challenges the visual representation it relates to (309). Representing in words something that has first been visually represented emphasizes the fact that no representation and no form of representation can ever become (like) the actual thing. This thesis forms a contribution to this discussion, because the question of representation is taken even a step further in the case of the ekphrastic poems about the overpainted photographs. Byrne’s poems do not just speak of a visual work of art; they relate to artworks that themselves already are complex forms of representation. The paint and the photograph beneath the paint both represent the world in very different ways. When, for example, a photograph shows people it shows how these people were once. As I will discuss in more detail in the following chapter, this way of representing the world and people results into the photograph forever being bound to a specific moment in time. The way painting represents the world, and people specifically, is different. Because a painting does not have such an indexical nature and the way a person looks in a painting is not the way they looked exactly in real life – if the person represented even exists in real life – a painting is not stuck in time, the way a photograph is. The temporality that for Barthes characterizes photography does not concern painting. Interestingly enough the overpainted photographs combine these two types of visual representation, which releases the artwork from the indexical nature of the photograph, even though the photograph is still (largely) visible. The artworks themselves are intermedial (Rajewsky 51), in which the two forms of
representation are combined in one work of art. When Byrne writes his poems about these artworks the intermediality is taken a step further, as ekphrasis is a form of intermedial referencing as well. The poem not only refers to an artwork produced in another medium, the meaning and interpretation of the poem is influenced by the other work of art. By discussing the five ekphrastic poems by Byrne in relation to their overpainted photographs I will question and show the way in which these different forms of representation relate to each other.
Paint on photographs
The overpainted photographs that Byrne writes about in his poems are actually only a small part of the hundreds of overpainted photographs made by Richter. Gerhard Richter (Dresden - Germany, 1932) is often referred to as one of the most important and influential artist in contemporary art (Godfrey et al. 10). He migrated to West Germany in 1961 and started his study at the Art Academy in Düsseldorf, where he met and collaborated with friends, like Sigmar Polke. In his early years as a painter, Richter was mostly known for his paintings that were based on photographs that came out of magazines or out of his own family albums. From the late 1980s Richter started mostly producing abstract paintings, made with the use of scrapers (Godfrey et al. 11). It was however around this time (1989) when he also started the overpainting of photographs, which now has resulted in hundreds of overpainted photographs. It is no coincidence that the overpainting of photographs began when Richter also started working on the large abstracts. The change of material (from brushes to “squeegees”, plastic scrapers) actually started the process of overpainting the photographs. After adding layer onto layer of paint on the canvas using the squeegee, a lot of paint is left over on the plastic tool. And it is actually this ‘left-over’ paint that Richter then uses to paint over photos (Heinzelmann 84). He takes his ‘art’s waste’ (Schneede 193), the paint that was not fit to be part of the first artwork and uses this for a different creative process. For this process Richter starts with a photograph he has once taken himself. They are photographs out of his own (personal or family) archive. By taking such a photograph and pushing it into the largely still wet paint, a layer of thick paint sticks to the photograph and a pattern of different coloured paint becomes visible on the picture. So the overpainting is not at all done in a controlled manner, as the word might suggest (Heinzelmann 84). The way the wet paint leaves a pattern on the photograph is not completely in the artist’s hands and thereby the end result partly depends on chance. Because of this, many of the overpainted photographs turn out in a way that does not satisfy the artist and these ones are thrown away.1 When the overpainting of a photograph does turn out well enough for Richter, he titles the overpainted photograph with the date.
1 Although not all works turn out to be good enough, it is exactly this aspect of chance that for Richter is central to
his work as an artist. In an interview with Nicholas Serota, Richter says: ‘[…] that’s our job. Chance is given, unpredictable, chaotic, the basis. And we try to control that by intervening, giving form to chance, putting it to use’ (Serota 15).
However the large amounts of ‘left over’ paint on the scraper do not dry out for about three days and one of these scrapers could be used for sixteen to twenty different photographs (Schneede 193). So Richter produces quite a lot of overpainted photographs at the same time. To cover up this ‘mass-production’, Richter often titles the works with different dates than the date on which they were actually produced (he only changes the day, not the month or year). Because of this, only a few overpainted photographs have been given the same date, although many have actually been made on the same day. (Butin et al. 114). However, the idea of the artwork being made on one particular date is more complex in the case of these pictures anyway. The overpainted photographs actually have two moments of creation. The first one is the moment on which Richter took the photograph. And second when Richter paints over this photograph, turning it into an artwork and adding it to his collection of overpainted photographs. Although the moment, year or date on which the photographs are taken cannot be determined in every case, some of them are quite clear, for example (as I will discuss in the next chapter) when his children are depicted. One thing that is for certain is the fact that all the photographs are taken from Richter’s own archive, and most of them are taken years before they are painted on. Because Richter has taken these photographs himself and revisits the photos a period of time later, the photographs represent a memory; something that happened earlier, but was captured on camera and thereby saved. Not only does Richter return to these old photos, he also repeats the image from the past, by reusing it for an artwork. The image once captured on camera is now represented again in an artwork.
The overpainted photographs are all very modest artworks, measuring approximately 10 centimetres by 15 centimetres. In spite of this the artworks raise many questions, regarding for example the combination of painting and photography, the tension between abstract and realism and the transformation from a personal picture to a work of art. And these questions both inspired an overview exhibition in 2008 in Museum Morsbroich in Leverkusen and apparently poets such as Byrne as well. The act of overpainting a picture is transformative and intriguing. The paint that has been added to the photographs does not only cover a part of the picture it also adds different colours and textures to the image. The paint is applied in such a way that it leaves thick layers of paint, breaking the once so smooth surface of the photograph2.
The five overpainted photographs that Byrne interpreted in his poems are made between 1989 and 1998, and are all quite different in terms of colours and photographed objects. The link between these artworks is the poet, who decided to interpret these five poems in his series of ekphrastic poems. James Byrne (Buckinghamshire - England, 1977) is a poet, and co-founder
2 In November 2014 I went to see an exhibition of Richter’s work in Marian Goodman Gallery in London. Although
the particular overpainted photographs that Byrne speaks of were not on display in this show, the gallery did show a more recent sequence of overpainted photographs from 2009. Seeing these artworks gave me a good idea of what the overpainted photographs look like in real life. I noticed for example how the paint and the photographs differ in terms of materiality and outlook, how they work together to form a new image, and what the effects of the small size of the artworks are on the viewer. These are all observations that will be considered in the next chapters and that helped me to analyse the overpainted photographs.
and editor of the international poetry magazine The Wolf. He also works as a translator of contemporary Burmese poetry (Byrne 109). His debut collection Passages of time was published in 2003. The sequence on Richter’s artworks is part of Byrne’s second poetry collection Blood / Sugar, published in 20093. Interestingly enough the ekphrastic series ended up in this poetry collection on Richter’s request. When he had finished Blood / Sugar and Byrne started thinking about what he wanted the cover of the book to look like, he decided he wanted one of Richter’s overpainted photographs (Untitled (18.1.89)) on the cover page (appendix 42). Richter’s management replied to Byrne’s request to use the artwork in quite a remarkable way: Richter gave permission to reprint the image, if Byrne would write about his overpainted photographs. Byrne accepted and he added the series of poems on five of Richter’s artworks, including the one that is now printed on the book cover, to the collection of poems. He explained this process of writing the poems in my interview with him. I had the opportunity to write Byrne and ask him some questions about the series of poems and the writing process. As he himself has an interest in ekphrasis as well and he was triggered by my questions, he gave me some very elaborate answers. That correspondence resulted in the interview added to my thesis as appendix (43-46). The interview will be referenced to a few times throughout this thesis, at times when Byrne’s input is of relevance.
The ekphrastic poems that are the results of Richter’s condition for using his image are remarkably compact and non-elaborative. At first sight this might seem contradictive with the general idea of ekphrasis, meaning ‘description’ in ancient Greek. The literature on ekphrasis however is large and quite diverse and I will give a short introduction below to determine the position of Byrne’s poems in the existing discussion on ekphrasis.
Writing about art: ekphrasis
Ekphrasis is generally defined as literary texts that ‘involve descriptions or other sorts of verbal representation of [visual] works of art’ (Hollander 4) or as James Heffernan phrases it: a verbal representation of a visual representation (299). Ekphrasis as a literary tool is by no means a modern phenomenon. The classic and much discussed example of ekphrasis is a passage in Homer’s Iliad in which the shield that Achilles carries – on which among other things the sun, the moon, a field being ploughed and a sheep farm are depicted – is described in much detail (Hollander 4). Because the shield is decorated with all these different scenes and pictures, it does not just function as a shield used by Achilles in his fight against Hector, it is also a work of art.
The shield of Achilles is purely fictional; it only exists in Homer’s writing. Poets can however also react to actual existing works of art. American literary critic and professor John
3 In 2013 Byrne was invited to the Poetry International Festival in Rotterdam, which was where I was introduced
to his poetry for the first time. Already being interested in various aspects of ekphrasis, the series of poems on Richter’s overpainted photographs intrigued me straight away. Although he did not read the poems during the festival, after reading them myself in his poetry collection Blood / Sugar they have always stayed in the back of my mind.
Hollander therefore introduced the distinction between ‘notional’ and ‘actual’ ekphrasis. He uses the term notional ekphrasis when a literary text speaks of a purely fictional work of art (4). The work of art that is represented in words does not exist. It is a verbal representation of a visual representation that is made up by the writer. The shield of Achilles represented by Homer is a clear example of this type of ekphrasis. Actual ekphrasis however engages with identifiable works of art (Hollander 4), works of art that exist and that can be seen in real life. Peter Barry elaborates on this distinction between notional and actual ekphrasis. He proposes a subdivision in both types of ekphrasis (156). Firstly, notional ekphrasis is divided into ‘fictional’ and ‘conceptional’ variants (156). A fictional version of notional ekphrasis represents a purely fictional, imaginary, work of art, but the artwork is presented in entirely realist terms. A fictional artist who created the artwork can be pointed out and the artwork does not do anything out of the ordinary; ‘it doesn’t do anything which paintings don’t usually do’ (Barry 156). In case of the conceptional version of notional ekphrasis again a fictional artwork is central to a literary text, but the artwork also has certain characteristic that a real work of art could never have (Barry 156). Examples of this type of ekphrasis are the paintings described in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter. The fictional paintings hang on the wall, like normal artworks. But the people who are represented in the images can talk to their viewers and to each other. They can also leave their own painting. These are characteristics that paintings in the real world, as we know it, could never have.
Secondly Barry subdivides Hollander’s notion of actual ekphrasis, which is more relevant in relation to Byrne’s ekphrastic poems. The first term Barry introduces is ‘closed’ actual ekphrasis. In this type of ekphrasis it is clear that the literary text is speaking of a representation (a work of art) of a specific event and not of the event itself (156). It does so by explicitly mentioning the work of art or the materiality of the artwork. ‘Open’ actual ekphrasis however does not explicitly state that it is referring to an artwork. The ekphrasis could be understood as a description of the event instead of a description of the visual representation of that event (Barry 156). This relates to an argument by W.J.T. Mitchell that says that ekphrastic texts, from a semiotic standpoint, cannot be distinguished from any other texts (159). The description of an artwork is, grammatically, not different from a description of anything else that is not a representation. And although there seems to be a clear distinction between closed and open actual ekphrasis, Barry argues that in most cases the ekphrasis is not completely closed, nor is it completely opened. Here he adds another term to the discussion: ‘ajar’ (156). Most ekphrastic poems do not explicitly state that they are speaking of a work of art from the beginning. The first stanzas or lines of a literary text may be an example of open ekphrasis, while in the rest of the text it becomes apparent that the text is representing a visual artwork, which makes this part of the ekphrastic text closed.
James Byrne, however, leaves no room for doubt in his ekphrastic poems. The series of poems that refer to Richter’s artworks is called ‘Five Interpretations of Overpainted Photographs by Gerhard Richter’. Right from the beginning it is made explicit that the poems are speaking of visual works of art, which makes them clear examples of closed actual ekphrasis. In addition, the
title of each poem names the exact overpainted photograph that the particular poem refers to, by copying the title given to the artwork (which is always a date).
This brief introduction on ekphrasis above does not do justice to the research that has been done on the subject. And as I will discuss in the following chapters, by analysing the works of Byrne and Richter, there are different ways to think and speak of ekphrasis. What all these views have in common is the idea that ekphrasis deals with representation in a unique way. The example of ekphrasis central to this thesis differs from other examples by the complex form of representation of the artworks, consisting of both photographs and of paint. Researching how the ekphrastic poems refer to the two forms of representation within one visual artwork sheds new light on how ekphrasis can reflect on and even critique representation, as Heffernan argues. By this, this research on ekphrastic poetry in relation to overpainted photographs forms a relevant contribution to the existing literature on ekphrasis and on intermediality. Because there can be made a clear distinction within the selection of five overpainted photographs between the two works that depict people and the remaining three that do not (a difference that is reflected clearly in the poems), I will discuss the first ‘type’ of overpainted photographs and their corresponding poems in the first chapter. Chapter two is dedicated to the second type of artworks on which people are absent. In the final chapter I will bring together all the questions raised and answers given in the previous two chapters and return to the issue of ekphrasis’ reflection on representation.
In an interview with Jonas Storsve in 1991 – when Richter had just started his series of overpainted photographs – Richter says: ‘Photography has almost no reality; it is almost a hundred per cent picture. And painting always has reality: you can touch the paint; it has presence; but it always yields a picture – no matter whether good or bad. That's all the theory. It's no good. I once took some small photographs and then smeared them with paint. That partly resolved the problem, and it's really good – better than anything I could ever say on the subject.’ (273). Richter here recognizes a problem with and difference between photography and painting and how they represent something. His solution is merging the two by painting over a photograph. And although he does not think he himself has anything good to say on the subject, Byrne might.
2. Family focus
How do you remember the people you love? You probably have memories locked in your mind about the time you have spent together and moments you have shared. But you also remember them by taking photographs, capturing their image on film and revisiting these images. And what happens then if that intimate family document is used for something else, turned into something different? If, as is the case in the overpainted photographs, the personal photographs are turned into an artwork, for the world to see? In this first chapter I will analyse the two overpainted photographs and their corresponding poems that depict people. One of the artworks clearly uses a family photo, from Richter himself. The other artwork does show people, but the idea of a family or any intimate connection to the photographer is less apparent. What is the consequence of this difference for the overpainted photograph and the ekphrastic poem?
Byrne selected five overpainted photographs and interpreted these in poems. The five artworks however all come from different categories of overpainted photographs. On Richter’s website, all his overpainted photographs are published and they are posted within a certain category: ‘Family’, ‘Rural Landscapes’, ‘Water scenes’, ‘People’, Interiors’. Two of the overpainted photographs that Byrne interpreted in a poem represent people. Both of them however fall into different categories and the natures of these two works are completely different from one and other. I am starting with the overpainted photograph that falls in the category of ‘Family’. A family photograph does not just show people; it shows people that have a connection to each other and to the photographer. Central to the photo is the family bond and the capturing of a shared moment. Because of this intimacy, the family photo differs from pictures that show random people, who do not have an intimate relationship with the photographer. Because this intimate family relationship is only central to one of the overpainted photographs, I will start with analysing this particular artwork and Byrne’s corresponding ekphrastic poem. Focusing on this specific aspect of the artwork clearly brings to light how the mixed media artwork – both a photograph and a painting – and the poem represent these types of personal narratives in different ways. Moreover this specific focus allows me to point out the transformations that the intermediality constitutes. Richter’s artwork Untitled (18.1.89) also shows people, but in contrast to the people on Untitled (16.2.98) the intimate family relationship seems to be absent. What is the result of the lack of this intimacy for the poem? By analysing the artwork based on a family photo (and the ekphrastic poem concerning this work of art) first and comparing this to the artwork and poem that lacks this family connection I can emphasize an important difference between the ways in which both images are represented and interpreted in the poems.
Family snapshot
The artwork selected by Byrne, that depicts a family photo is Untitled 16.2.98 (Richter 1998). The photograph shows a woman, holding a child – a baby still. The woman’s lips are pressed against the baby’s forehead, while the baby has its small hand on the woman’s shoulder. It is an intimate scene of a woman, probably the mother, and her child. The room they are in is not shown in its entirety. Behind the two there is a large dark surface against the grey-toned green wall, but what this dark square is exactly remains unclear.
Richter, Untitled (16.2.98)
It is the type of photo that all parents take of their newly born child. Central to this type of family photography is not just the personal connection between the subjects on the photograph, but also the relation between the people on the picture and the photographer. In Untitled 16.2.98 the photographer had to stand close to the mother and child in order to take this picture. The woman and child however do not seem to mind the photographer’s presence. They are used to him or her being there. The photographer, although behind the camera, seems to belong to the people captured by the camera. This makes this kind of photo personal. There is an intimacy, not only between the people on the photograph, but also between them and the one behind the camera. It is different than portrait photography in which a subject poses for the camera and the photographer. Curator of the overview exhibition of Richter’s overpainted photographs in Museum Morsbroich in Leverkusen (2008), Markus Heinzelmann notes that these pictures seem to be taken out of a family album (81). The pictures do not give the impression of being shot by a professional or an artist, but by an amateur. The size of Richter’s artwork emphasizes this idea of
it being an ordinary, amateur’s family photo. It is rather small, measuring only 10 centimetres by 14.8 centimetres. As Uwe Schneede notes, these photographs ‘make absolutely no claim to an artistic view or to capturing something spectacular’ (195). These types of photographs are usually taken not to become art, but to document a specific personal moment. And we all document our own private lives to one degree or another. Everyone takes these types of photographs of personal moments during a family trip, holidays. As a consequence, these photographs do not only refer to the people who are seen on the photo, but possibly even to a larger extent to the photographer, although not captured in the photo. As these photos are taken to document a personal moment – so it will not be forgotten – taking these types of photos creates an external, physical memory. The photograph shows what family life looked like in the past. ‘The family photo is a document that stands in the place of memory, the mechanical alternative to the faces, views, and events that shift and blur in the mind that strains to recall them’, Hustvedt says (281-282). Human’s memory is never completely clear. Certain details, about the way someone looked, about the type of weather or about who did what, will always be forgotten or remembered wrongly. A photograph however captures a scene precisely how it is. Ten years later a woman’s hair will still look the same in the photograph as it did in reality. Without the photograph, there is a good chance that the one who took the photo would not remember the woman’s hairstyle of that time. As the photograph represents the memory of the one who took the photograph, the photographer is made into a central element of the photo. In the case of Untitled (16.2.98) the photograph used by Richter is already one from the past itself. The artwork is made in 1998 (on February 16th, the title suggests), but the photograph must be taken years before. The child on the photograph is only a few weeks old. Richter’s own children were born in 1967, 1995 and 1996. Knowing that Gerhard Richter uses his own personal photos, this particular one had to be at least two years old when he painted over it. The intimate scene that Richter once captured with his camera was already in the past when Richter used the photo for his art. The scene was already a memory.
Although the family photo depicts a moment from the past and it thereby ensures that this moment and the people concerned will be remembered lively, there is also a certain ‘stillness’ in such a photograph. The moment in the photograph will never happen again. The people in the picture will never look the exact same way ever again. Botho Strauß therefore states that ‘every photograph is a dead moment’ (203). Because the people on a photograph will never be the same as they were at the time, the photo is proof of the inevitable absence of these people (Heinzelmann 83). This notion of a photograph showing the inevitable end of someone’s life by capturing him or her on camera derives from Roland Barthes’ book on photography called Camera Lucida, in which Barthes discusses the impact of photographs on the spectator. Barthes writes that when he looks at himself in a photograph, he sees that he has become ‘Total-Image, which is to say, Death in person’ (14). Although the person on a picture can still be alive, he will never be exactly the way he was when the photograph was taken. That person is gone, because a photograph repeats something that has been, something that has occurred only once. This
relates to the idea that contrary to for example painting, poetry or sculpture, photography has an ‘indexical status’ (Carabell 176). There is a physical relationship between the photograph and the object that has been photographed. The object was present when the photograph was taken. The object of a painting however did not have to be present, at least not the whole time. As Barthes puts it: ‘A specific photograph, in effect, is never distinguished from its referent (from what it represents) […]’ (5). A photograph can only represent a particular object if that object was present when the picture was taken; ‘the photograph is technically brought about by the presence of its referent’ (Carabell 177). This makes the referent of a photograph different than referents of other forms of representation. Because the photograph could never be made without the referent being present, you could never deny the ‘having been there’ of the specific object (Barthes 76). Barthes states that there is ‘a superimposition here of reality and the past’ (76). We have to acknowledge that the referent is real, as it has existed. But simultaneously, the situation caught on camera is already in the past. This unique relationship that photography has to its referent and to reality means for Barthes that the photograph exists ‘outside’ of meaning (34). Every photograph is contingent. It depends on the reality it represents as it is not made or constructed as a painting or sculpture is. The photograph can only represent something and cannot reflect on anything or generalize as a text can do (Price 120). One could say that because of this contingency a photograph is forever stuck in time. It is forever linked to the moment it was taken and to what the object looked like at that particular moment in time.
The image of this particular moment then can be reproduced mechanically (reprinted, copied) which then can be repeated this way infinitely. It could however ‘never be repeated existentially’ (Barthes 4). The image can be reproduced, but the moment it has captured can never. For Barthes, what brings the liveliness into images from the past is what he calls the punctum. Barthes states that thinking back on a photograph seen before, the point of the photograph is revealed (53), this is the punctum. The punctum differs from what he named the studium of a photograph (26). The studium is the cultural connotation of a photograph, which is perceived consciously and rationally (26). The term punctum refers to the notion of punctuating. That is what the punctum of a photograph does; it ‘rises from the scene’ (Barthes 26) and pricks the viewer. It catches his eye and it is the ‘random quality’ (27) about the photo that is captivating. This punctum however does not come to the viewer immediately, Barthes states: ‘sometimes […] the punctum should be revealed only after the fact, when the photograph is no longer in front of me and I think back on it. I may know better a photograph I remember than a photograph I am looking at’ (53). The discovering of the punctum rests mainly on chance and also on everyone’s individual memories and experiences and can thereby not be repeated.
The idea that it is this punctum that brings liveliness and emotion to a photograph depends heavily on the individual situation of the person looking at the photograph. But in the case of Richter’s overpainted photograph, the artist himself has come between the photograph and the viewer to manipulate the photograph. Up till now I have only focused on one element of the overpainted photograph, being the photograph. And although the overpainted photographs
are photographs, that is not all they are. They are paintings too. So what is then the role of the paint in this discussion on the temporality of the photograph?
Liberating paint
It seems like these artworks have found a way out of the captivity of the photograph and it is the added paint that provides this way out. Because the moment the paint is added to the photograph the personal, family snapshot transforms. When Strauß states that a photograph shows a killed moment, he says that painting over them brings them back to life: ‘The photograph steals the soul. Overpainting rescinds that’ (204). Both Strauß and Hustvedt consider the act of painting over the snapshots a way of bringing the photograph back to life (Strauß) and of preventing the photograph to ‘die’ (Hustvedt). But how can the overpainting of pictures establish this? The answer to this lies in what is called ‘intermediality’ and the process of transformation from one medium (photography) to the intermedium (Rajewsky 51) of the overpainted photograph. By combining the two media (photograph and paint) the overpainted photograph becomes an example of intermediality. The two forms of representation are both present at the same time and both contribute to the end product and what this represents. As the viewer can see the photograph and the paint at the same time, they construct meaning together. So although it is still the same photograph underneath, the ‘simple’ act of adding paint results in a transformation of the artwork. It is no longer a photograph; it is now a painting, too. The photograph is still one that everyone can relate to – an intimate family picture – but the added paint moves the artwork away from the familiar. The carrier of the artwork is still the same, but the memory that has been captured in the picture is not represented the same way as it was before. This mixing of media – the artwork has not left its old medium (the photograph) behind completely – sheds a new light on the difference between the ways that photography and painting represent a narrative, an image or ‘reality’.
First, the indexicality of the image is jeopardized in the overpainted photograph. As discussed earlier, the photograph has a unique way of referring to reality, which has led to the idea that a photograph is forever stuck in time. But a painting is not bound to a specific moment in time, the way a photograph is. So painting over a photograph as Richter does, can liberate the photograph from its captivity in time. Strauß states in regard to this that Richter’s act of overpainting ‘is breaking the spell of all our yesterdays that had been woven round it and shifting it into the time-free presence of the artwork’ (207). Second, the overpainting of the photograph causes not just a shift in genre (from photograph to painting, or rather to the intermedial genre of the ‘overpainted photograph’); it also seems to elevate the picture from just an ordinary family snapshot to a work of art. As Barthes argues, a photograph can be reproduced, but the moment captured could never be repeated that exact same way. Adding paint to the photograph however makes it impossible to reproduce the artwork exactly. A mechanical reproduction, as is very well possible with photography, is not possible in the case of a painting. The paint does not only add colour in a certain pattern to the picture. It also changes the flat surface of the photograph. The
surface is made uneven. Now the work cannot be mechanically reproduced anymore. ‘The act of painting put an end to duplication’ (207), as Strauß puts it. And the two people in the picture are now represented in a way that is similar to their situation: both the event captured and the way in which it now is represented can never be repeated or reproduced.
Representing a picture in words
So we have seen that the overpainting of the photograph has ‘liberated’ the photo. It has taken the picture out of the familiar and elevated the representation of a family memory to a work of art. The poet Byrne then represented, or rather interpreted, that same scene in a poem, in words. Byrne himself recognizes the transformative act of painting over a photograph as well. It was exactly this transformation that supported Byrne in writing about the artwork: ‘By applying paint, Richter has already disrupted the conventional language of each photograph and this served as an invitation or a gap in which I could evoke language’ (appendix, 44). But as we are moving further away from the initial picture, how does Byrne’s ‘language’ now relate to the image provided by the overpainted photograph? If the picture is already liberated, what can a poem then contribute?
Where the overpainted photograph on its own can be considered ‘intermedial’ – because it combines two media in one artwork, which results into the mixed media artwork of the overpainted photograph – the ekphrastic poem that refers to this artwork is an example of intermediality as well. Irina Rajewsky, in her article on intermediality, states that the ekphrastic poem is an intermedial reference, because the poem uses its own medium to refer to an individual work in another medium (52). Because of this intermedial referencing the poem ‘constitutes itself partly or wholly in relation to the work it refers to’ (Rajewsky 53). So in other words, Rajewsky states that the meaning of the ekphrastic poem should rely (on the meaning of) the artwork it refers to. As the analysis of Byrne’s different ekphrastic poems will show this statement can be questioned and should be put in perspective. Does the meaning of ekphrastic poems actually always rely on the artwork they refer to? The analysis of Byrne’s ekphrastic sequence will demonstrate that this relation between the artwork and the poem actually differs from one poem to the other. What sets the ekphrastic relationship between these poems and artworks apart from other examples of ekphrasis is the intermediality within the visual artwork itself. And taking a close look at the relationship between each of the five poems and its corresponding artwork will show that intermediality in the case of ekphrasis (these ekphrastic poems and the complex artworks they relate to specifically) cannot be seen in such a straightforward way in which the poem depends on the meaning of the artwork.
Returning now to Richter’s artwork of the woman and child, Byrne interprets this artwork in his poem ‘’16.2.98’ Mother and Child, Sundown’ (57). Byrne copies the date in Richter’s title to his own title, which is the first and most important and clear indication that Byrne is referring to this particular artwork. Before I discuss the ekphrastic relationship between the poem and the artwork I will first analyse the poem on its own. This might be an unexpected approach, given the
fact that the poem relies on the artwork, through its intermedial reference. But although the poem is inextricably linked to Richter’s work of art, discussing the poem first without the visual artwork in mind brings up interesting questions that are essential to my analysis of the ekphrastic poem and the different forms of representation between the poem and the overpainted photograph. The questions that are raised when reading the poem without the artwork, and the subsequent gaps in the interpretation of the poem that can later be filled by also taking in account the artwork, point exactly to how the artworks relate to each other.
’16.2.98’ (Mother and Child, Sundown) Carapace drapes the footer
A mother’s voice – natal oak – slides over her wet-headed child *
Marmoreal through an open room
Poised – yet freeze-framed – for the branch to temper the leaf
The title of the poem makes clear that the text speaks of a mother and (her) child. The addition of the word ‘sundown’ complicates the interpretation of the title. Does this refer to the time of day at which the scene of the mother and child takes place or does it have a somewhat metaphorical meaning and does it refer to the approaching dark, to misfortune in the near future? As I will show by analysing the poem in its entirety, this text is characterized by these kinds of ambiguities and contradictions, which complicates interpretation. We encounter this ‘problem’ again straight away, in the first line of the poem: ‘Carapace drapes the footer’. The image of a carapace that drapes something seems conflicting. A carapace is the upper part of the shell or shield that covers certain animals, like tortoises. It is hard and made to protect the rest of the animal’s body. Draping however mostly refers to covering something up with clothing or other types of fabric or garment, like curtains. Although both a carapace and the act of draping relate to covering something, a carapace is hard and stiff while draping is done loosely. Can a carapace drape anything? This is however not the only part of this line that raises questions. The footer is draped by the carapace, the poem says. Usually ‘footer’ is used for a line or a few words printed at the bottom of a page. Is the poem referring to a book or page that is partly covered or is the ‘footer’ again meant metaphorically, by which it could mean the bottom part of any object?
After the blank line the actual mother and child are mentioned. The poem however does not seem to refer to a mother and child that are close or familiar to the subject of the poem. It speaks of ‘a mother’ (instead of ‘the mother’ for example), which could mean that the poem is making a general statement about every mother and child. It could also give away that the poet is
speaking of a particular mother and child, but that they are strangers to him. Not only mother and child are introduced in this stanza, a metaphor of the ‘natal oak’ is too. The mother’s voice is compared to a natal oak and the metaphor of the tree in regard to the mother-child relationship returns later on in the poem. The voice of the mother is said to slide over the wet-headed child. Why is the child called ‘wet-headed’? In regard to the fact that the mother’s voice is ‘sliding over’ the child, the ‘wet-head’ could mean just that: the child’s head is wet. In popular language however a ‘wethead’ is often used to call out someone who ‘acts like a baby’ or ‘cries a lot’ (Urban Dictionary) and the phrase ‘to wet the baby’s head’ means to celebrate the birth of a baby by having (alcoholic) drinks (Urban Dictionary). Moreover, ‘wet-headed’ could refer to the baby’s head being wet from just being born. So calling the child ‘wet-headed’ makes clear that the poem is not speaking of a toddler or a teenage child, but of a baby, a new-born. This constructs the image of a woman holding a baby. The baby must be close to her in order for her voice to slide over the baby’s head.
The third stanza has the same position on the page as the first line. Here the relation between movement and stiff material like the draping of carapace mentioned earlier becomes a recurrent theme. The phrase ‘through an open room’ indicates movement, while marmoreal, meaning ‘made of marble’ refers to something static, hard and heavy. In the next line the mentioned contradiction between movement and static material is made explicit: ‘Poised – yet freeze-framed – ‘. The word ‘yet’ indicates that there is a contradiction in this statement. ‘Freeze-framed’ quite literally resembles the theme of stiffness, of non-movement. And although ‘poised’ does not imply movement specifically, it does indicate a human subject who acts ‘poised’. When a scene is ‘freeze-framed’, in a film for example, the people in the shot do not only not move, the whole scene is set still. It is clear now that the poem describes one moment in time. The time is set still as it were; the people are not moving, the clock is not ticking. In the next and final line the poem returns to the metaphor of the oak: ‘for the branch to temper the leaf’. What do the branch and leaf represent here? Do they symbolise the mother and the child? The use of the word ‘temper’ in this line is worth noticing. ‘Tempering’ is used to describe the process of ‘improving the hardness’ of a metal, like steel (Oxford Dictionaries). So once again the relation between hard and soft, in this case the process of making something harder, is of importance. If the branch represents the mother and the leaf the child, this poem as a whole could be interpreted as a representation of the child eventually growing up and becoming tougher, as it is ‘tempered’.
Now that I have analysed the poem on its own, it is time to look at both the poem and Richter’s overpainted photograph. What can the artwork add to the interpretation? The first thing that becomes apparent is that when the poem is read with the overpainted photograph it refers to in mind, some words and phrases that seemed ambiguous or almost impossible to interpret, become clearer. ‘Sundown’ in the title could still refer to an ominous future, but it certainly also fits the colour scheme of the painting. The yellow, red and orange paint that cover large parts of the photograph give the impression of a sunset. The pattern in the paint on the photograph looks like the pattern of a shield, which relates to the carapace mentioned in the poem. The red paint
covers the bottom half of the photograph completely, so the footer of the photograph is covered. The noted tension in the poem between stiffness and movement, hard and soft, could relate to the hardness and softness of drying paint. Although the paint on the photograph is fixed and not changing anymore, when it was applied it was still soft and could be applied in all sorts of ways. So the tension or contradiction in a sentence like ‘Carapace drapes the footer’ might very well reflect on the difference between the two states of paint: when it is wet and when it has dried. Moreover, the difference between movement (liveliness) and static material (death) also regards to the act of painting that brings the (dead, still) photograph back to life. Hereby the poem responds to the special relation between stillness, the photograph as a moment killed, and the liveliness of painting that characterizes the overpainted photograph. This can be recognized best in the sentence: ‘poised – yet freeze-framed –‘. The poem here refers directly to the materiality of the overpainted photograph. The photograph is a freeze-frame, in which time is set still. The friction then in this poem between this stillness and movement relates to the act of painting that takes the photograph out of this state, elevates it to a work of art and thereby ‘brings it back to life’.
Through the transformation from photograph to painting (or overpainted photograph), from painting to poem a question worth discussing is if the personal memory, the essence of the family snapshot, is still present. Knowing that Richter uses his own personal photograph, photos he took on holidays or on special and intimate family moments, we can always discover one way or another who it is on the photograph beneath the paint. We know that Untitled (16.2.98) represents his own wife and own child. The intimate bond between the photographer and the people on the photo is a central part of this photograph. They are his loved ones. He is the one capturing this moment, capturing this memory. It is clear that in the poem the relationship between the mother, child and the narrator is not as intimate. The poem speaks of ‘a mother’ and as mentioned before this could mean either that it concerns mother and child in general or that it concerns a mother and child unknown to the narrator. The importance of the close connection between photographer and subjects, the capturing of a personal memory is now gone. In this sense this ekphrastic poem serves as a counterexample to Hollander’s idea on ekphrastic poems that relate to photographs. Hollander notes that ‘most poems on photographs are still directed to portraits’ (67) and that in these photographic portraits the camera, contrary to a painter of portraits, is impersonal (67). The camera has no memory, no imagination and can only capture what is in front of it. Ekphrastic poems on photographs, Hollander says, reflect on the ‘unknowing’ and the limits of the photograph (67-68). The personal in these cases can be found in the poem, not in the photograph. With this poem by Byrne it seems to be the other way around. The big difference however between Byrne’s ekphrastic poem and the type of poems that Hollander touches upon, is that actually Byrne does not speak of a photograph. The personal is not lost when Byrne started writing his poem, but when the photograph was turned into another work of art; when the paint was added. I identified painting over the photograph as an act of liberation; the photograph is transformed into a painting – an artwork – and thereby the depicted scene is
released from its specific time and space. This however also liberates the photograph that still exists beneath the paint from the photographer. The personal connection between the photographer and the mother and child in the photo – the essence of a family photo – is lost now that the picture is released from that specific moment in time in which the photographer photographed his loved ones. Not only is the paint liberating, it is also impersonalising.
Impersonal liberation
This idea of the paint being liberating and (or consequently) impersonalising is very well demonstrated by the overpainted photograph and the corresponding poem of the mother and child, because of the intimate character of the artwork. But how can this transformation be viewed when the personal character of the photograph is less important or not as obvious? And what then is the consequence for the ekphrastic poem, how does that then relate to the artwork (differently)?
With these questions in mind, let’s look at the other overpainted photographs from Byrne’s selection that also shows people. This work of art is involved in this discussion on the personal and impersonal in a different way than the family snapshot of mother and child. As mentioned earlier, all overpainted photographs are categorized on the artist’s website. The artwork discussed earlier has been put in the category of ‘Family’. The overpainted photograph Untitled (18.1.98) fits in a different category: ‘People’. Even this categorisation suggests a difference between the two artworks. The personal connection central to the first one seems to be absent in the second, judging from this categorisation.
Untitled (18.1.89) shows two people, a man and a woman. They are seen from a distance, while they are standing in a large, grey-coloured space. The background is hardly specified, which makes it unclear where they could be exactly. The man and woman seem to be of middle age. They are both dressed properly; the man is wearing a black suit-jacket and black pants. The woman wears a knee-length skirt, short-heeled pumps and carries a purse. What complicates the characterization of these two people in more detail is the fact that in this case, the paint added to the photograph covers their faces completely. Because of this coverage the people are made difficult to recognize and we cannot see the expression on their faces. This makes them rather anonymous and does not signal a connection between them and the photographer. The literal distance between the photographer and the two people already suggests a detachment between them, which is completely different from the intimacy caught in the scene of mother and child. The space man and woman are standing in is large and unspecified, which also contributes to the rather distanced and ‘cold’ vibe of the artwork. Moreover, the two people are standing straight and looking towards the camera. It seems that they are aware that they are being photographed, which makes them aware of themselves and how they look and stand. This makes this photograph a bit more posed and not as natural as many characteristic family photos are.
I argued that the personal aspect of Untitled (16.2.98) was lost during the act of painting over it. The paint liberated the photograph that before was stuck in time, and that liberation also detached the artwork from the personal story between the photographer and the people depicted. This photograph however is already much more impersonal. We do not experience such a strong connection between photographer and subjects. The personal memory is not central to this photograph. How can we then characterise the act of overpainting? The overpainting of the photograph in this case increased the impersonal element. The faces that are now hidden, making these people completely anonymous and unrecognisable, is the best example of this. Although we cannot see it anymore, the camera did once capture the faces of this man and woman. Since the paint has been added the artwork is now completely detached from the two people and from the context of the photograph. Just like the people, the background and surrounding are not to be recognised. So the overpainting still liberated the photograph from its specific context and time, while increasing the impersonal element. The act of overpainting however is not as transformative as seen in the first case. In the ekphrastic poem discussed earlier Byrne chose the transformation caused by the added paint as a central theme by reflecting on the materiality of drying paint and the process of bringing the ‘freeze-frame’ back to life. But as this process was not as transformative in the case of Untitled (18.1.89), the nature of Byrne’s poem on this overpainted photograph is completely different.
’18.1.89’ (Biogenesis) Flesh over flesh
fated iron -
From the hanging distance of a whittled house
white rain on chalklight two honeymooners
touched
by the wing-spray of seraphs *
Brooded over for thirty years the almanac sings
You in your ivory wedding coat And I a ghoul in a funeral suit
To a much larger extent than the poem about mother and child, this second poem provides us with a narrative. This poem does not reflect as much on the materiality of the artwork as the first poem does. Instead, it offers a story not provided by the overpainted photograph and it seems to fill in the blanks left by the artwork. First, the narrative is constructed by Byrne’s characterization of the two practically anonymous people in the artwork – unrecognisable because of the paint covering their faces – as ‘honeymooners’. The man and woman are not just ‘people’ anymore. They are husband and wife, so there is a loving connection between the two people. I argued that in the first poem the narrator does not seem to know who the mother and child are, while in the photograph the intimacy between the people on the photo and the photographer is a central element. In this second poem this seems to be turned around. The narrator knows the specific relationship between the two people, while the photograph is characterised by detachment. The overpainting of the photograph emphasized the impersonal nature of the photograph by covering the faces. By doing so the question of who these two are, is evoked even more. Byrne answers the question of who the people in the picture are. This function of an ekphrastic poem (reacting to the limits of the visual artwork and filling in blanks left by it) correlates with the function of ekphrastic poems on photography specifically that Hollander mentions (67-68). The poem provides information that is left out by the ‘unknowing’ camera, and in this case is even covered up by the paint. Because this information is added the verbal interpretation of the artwork is more personal and intimate than the impersonal overpainted photograph itself 4. In the artwork the two
4 Byrne took advantage of the anonymity of the couple to narrate ‘behind the scene’ (appendix 43) and interpret
the unclear relationship between the man and the woman. The fact that these two people are unrecognisable, which means that they could be anyone, gave Byrne the chance to even relate them to himself. He imagined the man and woman to be his parents: ‘In considering the overpainted photograph ’18.1.89’, I reimagined the couple—their actual faces obscured by the paint—as my mother and father (they divorced when I was two years old) and so perhaps this was a way, through Richter, that I was able to confess, or give away something from my
people are not recognizable and the connection between them and with the photographer remains unclear. The poem however does characterize the couple. Where the viewer of the artwork cannot know who these people are, the narrator in the poem does.
The second important aspect of this poem that contributes to a narrative, which differs from the first poem, is the fact that this poem covers a period of time. The poem on mother and child was ‘freeze-framed’ and described one particular moment in which time was set still. In this poem the narrator can oversee a period of thirty years. ‘Brooded over for thirty years / the almanac sings’, the poem says. While the picture of the two people shows just one moment, the poem provides us with at least two moments in time: the moment in which the two people are just married (honeymooners) and thirty years later.
The idea that the verbal representation can add a narrative that the image lacks is a traditional one in relation to ekphrastic literature. Visual representations in this traditional view are inherently spatial, static and shapely, while verbal communication can represent arguments, narratives and abstract ideas (Mitchell 160). Because the poem on the mother and child talks about a specific moment in time, the difference between verbal and visual representation mentioned above does not surface as it does in this second poem. The first poem focuses mainly on the materiality of the artwork and is thereby freeze-framed itself – time does not pass by, but is set still to reflect on the work of art and the scene that is represented. The second poem adds information that does not refer to the spatial, static and shapely character of the visual artwork. What then instigates the different natures of the poems? This seems to be the result of the main distinction between the two photographs, which is the intimate element that is much stronger in the first one than in the second. Because of this, the overpainting of the photograph leads to a larger transformation in the case of the picture of the mother and child. This transformation then is what the poem reacts to. For the second artwork the transformation and liberation is smaller, which gives the poem more space to go beyond the materiality of the artwork and to provide a different narrative.
own history, to the poem’ (appendix 43). Not only did Byrne define the relationship between the man and woman, for himself they are even connected to him similarly to the intimate relation between the mother, child and artist in the previous poem.
3. In the absence of people
Photographing people, family members, a loved one, a child is to remember them the way they were on that particular moment. To capture on camera a situation in which they are together with you. But what does it mean when photographs do not show people? And what if overpainted photographs do not show people? How to react, as a poet, to such a picture? The poems discussed in the previous chapter focus on the people in the overpainted photograph and the intimacy displayed has an influence on the way in which the poem reacts to the artwork. But what do Byrne’s poem react to in regard to an overpainted photograph when people are absent in the picture?
This absence of people is central to the remaining three overpainted photographs that Byrne as interpreted. Two of these photographs show landscapes (a wood and a shore) and the other a large, empty room. As the other overpainted photographs, these ones are also taken from the personal archive from Richter, but the absence of people gives these artworks and consequently the ekphrastic poems a different character. Because we cannot see any people on the photograph, the issue of the picture and the people on it being stuck in time is less pressing than in the previous chapter. The pictures show places that the artist has visited and that he has decided to capture on camera. The intimacy of a family snapshot is not at all present. Moreover, with the absence of human objects the suggested narrative by the artwork seems to be minimalized. By asking to what extent Byrne’s ekphrastic poem brings the image of the artwork to mind, I will discuss the connection between the visual work of art and the poem – when there are no people in the picture – and what role the poet plays in this already complex relationship. How does the poet interpret and describe a narrative that does not involve people?
Cite and sight
In order to understand the complex relationship between Byrne’s remaining three ekphrastic poems and Richter’s artworks, and the role of the poet in this ekphrastic process, we should first look at one of the most traditional ideas on ekphrastic poetry. Because ekphrastic poetry has often been given a special and almost impossible task; these types of poems should conjure up the image. As the poem and the visual artwork do not always go side by side, the poem should communicate the image of the artwork. Words should represent the visual in such a way that the readers can picture the artwork that they are actually not seeing. Not only does an ekphrastic poem portray a visual representation, it should also create verbal ‘pictures’ (Krieger xiv). W.J.T. Mitchell calls this expectation the ‘problem of ekphrasis’ (152) and states that it is precisely this problem of a verbal representation of a visual representation that fascinates us about ekphrasis. This fascination, Mitchell argues, comes to us in three different phases, three moments of realization (152). Who this realization comes to precisely, who this ‘us’ is, is not mentioned by
Mitchell. He seems to suggest that everyone with a fascination for ekphrasis goes through these three different phases and encounters the same thoughts and troubles when thinking about ekphrastic texts. Simultaneously the phases could refer to different periods of time in art history and literary criticism, however no specific time periods are mentioned by Mitchell. Despite the fact that these phases are quite general and not clear as to who they refer to, Mitchell’s phases are actually quite useful to demonstrate different ways of thinking about visual and verbal representation. Besides this, they illustrate attitudes towards the question if ekphrasis can actually be successful, which is an interesting point of view in relation to the remaining three poems by Byrne.
The first of Mitchell’s three phases he calls ‘ekphrastic indifference’ (152). Central to this phase is a common-sense perception that ekphrasis is actually impossible. A verbal description can never achieve exactly the same as a visual representation can: ‘no amount of description […] adds up to a depiction’ (Goodman 231). As Mitchell puts it himself: ‘Words can “cite”, but never “sight” their objects’ (152). Because in this phase the ekphrastic goal is considered impossible, ekphrasis as a literary genre seems to be of little importance. But, despite the attitude of indifference towards ekphrasis, Mitchell notes that there has been done quite a lot of research on ekphrastic texts (like the extensive research on ekphrastic fragments in Homer’s Iliad discussed earlier). With this research on the subject of ekphrasis a second phase has started, one that Mitchell calls ‘ekphrastic hope’ (152). In this phase the idea that ekphrasis is impossible is overcome and the belief arises that we can discover a way in which language can ‘make us see’ (Mitchell 152). This phase is characterized by scholar’s hope for and belief in a successful verbal representation of a visual one. However, in Mitchell’s next phase, which is called ‘ekphrastic fear’, this hope is countered by a resistance that occurs when it is realized that successful ekphrasis entails the possible collapse of the difference between verbal and visual representation (154). If ekphrasis is successful and a literary text can represent a visual representation we cannot rely anymore on the natural fact of a distinction between the two forms of representation. This results in a problematic relationship between the visual and the verbal, because if the lines between the two are blurred, how can they now relate to each other?
For literary critic Murray Krieger successful ekphrasis does not necessarily break down the distinction between the two forms of representation. He considers ekphrasis as an artistic genre in which one art (poetry) heavily depends on another art (6). The ambition of ekphrasis then is to make language represent the literally unrepresentable (9). Because of this the study of ekphrasis to Krieger is the most useful way of discussing the pictorial limits of the function of words in poetry (6). But what are these pictorial limits of poetic words? And what is it then that words can represent and how can they be pictorial? To answer, or rather discuss, these question Krieger introduces his ideas on the ‘natural sign’ (2). In ekphrasis words have to do the job of this ‘natural sign’, a sign that is a visual substitute for its referent (Krieger 2). The picture of a tree for example, should be taken as a visual substitute for the real thing the picture refers to: an actual tree. So here the difference between the two forms of representation comes in to play. A visual
