Wild Icons
To begin with, let me say that I love small class sizes.
It’s nice to have a handle on who each of my students is as a person. I like to know your faces, your personalities, and your aspirations. In my opinion, small classes are where the real professionals and thought leaders of a field are born.
And I’m going to see a lot of that now, since I have been relieved from teaching the entry-level iconetics courses. Our government appointed department head has determined that my place is here, and I don’t have the wherewithal to argue.
The other nice thing about this change is that such specialized courses receive less scrutiny from the powers that be. I no longer have a sniper’s laser scope pointed at my head during class. And I’m told that we will not be secretly recorded in this classroom, though I remain skeptical.
We’ve got a whole semester ahead of us, and excellent material to cover. As you have already passed the previous “filter” classes, you’ll find this class to be less competitive in grading. Here, we are pursuing knowledge for its own sake.
This is Iconetics 318R: Special Projects: Wild Icons.
Instead of teaching you the iconetic principles which you already know. Here, we study the construction of existing icons, with the aim of distilling the properties that made them great.
Lesson 1: Guernica
Criteria for determining whether this artwork is an icon:
- Representative of a larger body of work: ✅
- Has become a source of derivative artworks: ✅
- Is timeless: ✅
Iconetic values present:
- Monstrous sense of scale: ✅
- Unnerving Eye contact: ✅
- Protracted pain: ✅
What hasn’t been said about Picasso’s Guernica. It’s his most famous painting—a stand-in for not only his entire career but the entire cubism movement. Timeless? Surely. And it has caught the world’s imagination enough to be referenced in countless other artworks and pop culture.
Let’s examine how it has mastered the three primary iconetic values.
Monstrous sense of scale is the hardest of the three to place here, but an sophisticated examination of the work demonstrates it. It is difficult to tell whether the scene depicted is indoors or outdoors. That lightbulb/sunburst is ambiguous enough to suggest either, considering that electric lights can be used to light a street as easily as a house. And the cubist flattening of the removes all depth from the image. You could use that as an argument against this artwork having a proper sense of scale.
But the loss of depth only exaggerates the length and width of the scene. And an even more important sense of scale comes from the quantity of figures involved in the image. That these figures are all part of the same event lends a sense of scale (or should I say “enormity”) to the horrors depicted here.
Unnerving eye contact is made by at least four of the figures—the decapitated man, the woman with hands thrown up, the bull, and the horse. And the lightbulb itself is reminiscent of a staring eye.
As for protracted sense of pain, there’s hardly a better example in all of art. We have the limp figure of the baby, two women throwing their heads back in agony, animals with their heads twisted around unnaturally. It’s quite abundant.
Frankly, this painting is close to being the perfect introduction to iconetics, and one of the best examples of which qualities make for an iconic artwork.
Lesson 2: Saturn Devouring His Son
Criteria for determining whether this artwork is an icon:
- Representative of a larger body of work: ✅
- Has become a source of derivative artworks: ✅
- Is timeless: ✅
Iconetic values present:
- Monstrous sense of scale: ✅
- Unnerving Eye contact: ✅
- Protracted pain: ✅
The first thing people think of when they hear the name “Goya”.
Or canned peas. Also canned peas.
In any case, Saturn Devouring His Son is a widely regarded, and occasionally parodied, work that encompasses the dark side of Goya’s repertoire. It’s monstrous sense of scale and sympathetic response of protracted pain in the viewer make it memorable in ways that more innocent paintings cannot match.
But the unnerving eye contact of this painting is what elevates it to legendary status. Saturn stares out, horrified, at the viewer, as if the person looking at this painting has discovered Saturn practicing a secret habit he’s ashamed of but cannot stop doing. And now, the viewer has exposed him, and he understands how this will ruin the rest of his life.
Truly an excellent icon.
Lesson 3: Amadeus Poster
Criteria for determining whether this artwork is an icon:
- Representative of a larger body of work: ✅
- Has become a source of derivative artworks: ✅
- Is timeless: ❔
Iconetic values present:
- Monstrous sense of scale: ✅
- Unnerving Eye contact: ✅
- Protracted pain: ❌
An earlier version of this artwork, used on the playbill for the live stage production of Amadeus, was nearly identical to this image, except that the Vienna skyline is absent. That skyline gives this image a monstrous sense of scale it would otherwise be without.
The image always turns heads. Back when video stores were a thing, it would stare out at people browsing the shelves, who would invariable pause to lock eyes with the phantom figure inside. The unnerving eye contact of this piece is that powerful.
It frankly lacks a protracted pain, but manages to to grip the viewer even without it. And while I would argue for its timelessness, I may be in the minority. The movie is nearly forty years old, and is known by a lot of people, yet I worry that it’s iconic poster art is already being forgotten.
Has the absence of protracted pain kept this artwork from being everything it can be? Time will tell.
Lesson 4: In the Well of the Great Wave off Kanagawa
Criteria for determining whether this artwork is an icon:
- Representative of a larger body of work: ✅
- Has become a source of derivative artworks: ✅
- Is timeless: ✅
Iconetic values present:
- Monstrous sense of scale: ✅
- Unnerving Eye contact: ❌
- Protracted pain: ✅
Katsushika Hokusai’s most internationally renowned artwork is firmly in the “icon” camp of the greater art ecosystem. As the image was created with woodblock printing, there are multiple original copies of the artwork, each with subtle differences, yet that has not stopped the image from being copied and reused countlessly in by imitators and homage makers.
Though it lacks any kind of eye contact, the monstrous scale of natural forces, compared to the miniscule figures of the Japanese mariners, cramped together in the eternal moment before the wave hits, provides plenty of iconetic material.
Lesson 5: The Ancient of Days
Criteria for determining whether this artwork is an icon:
- Representative of a larger body of work: ✅
- Has become a source of derivative artworks: ✅
- Is timeless: ✅
Iconetic values present:
- Monstrous sense of scale: ✅
- Unnerving Eye contact: ❌
- Protracted pain: ✅
If Hokusai’s woodcut demonstrated the monstrous sense of scale found in nature, William Blake’s iconic painting The Ancient of Days demonstrates a monstrous sense of scale found in supernature.
Here we have Blake’s interpretation of God, bending down in a sympathetically painful posture to measure out His future creation using a giant compass. It places a human figure in contrast to enormous clouds, a giant star (possibly the sun), and a seemingly endless void below.
I must confess in my treatment of iconetics thus far, I have neglected to include William Blake in our discussions. Which was a mistake. Blake is often remembered as a fanatic, but that fanaticism drove him to create artworks that were truly larger than life, and The Ancient of Days serves as the title page to his vast and peculiar portfolio.
Lesson 6: Las Meninas
Criteria for determining whether this artwork is an icon:
- Representative of a larger body of work: ✅
- Has become a source of derivative artworks: ✅
- Is timeless: ✅
Iconetic values present:
- Monstrous sense of scale: ✅
- Unnerving Eye contact: ✅
- Protracted pain: ❔
Quite a few Spanish works have made their way into this course. And I must admit: there are enough examples to argue that the Spanish had a handle on iconetics even before the Germans did.
And in the case of Las Meninas, these connections are highly visible. I could point out how it has become representative of Diego Velazquez’s entire career, not only as a popular artwork but as a de facto self portrait of the painter. The scene is taken from the painter’s life, as he was painting a couple’s portrait of King Phillip IV of Spain and his wife.
Awkward eye contact is given by several figures to the viewer, and perhaps also by the reflection of the king and queen projected by the mirror in the back of the painting.
A monstrous sense of scale is found in the size of the paintings and the chamber compared to the human figures. The canvas Velazquez stands behind appears twice as high as he does within the scene. And the room has an exaggerated sense of depth from the angles of the ceiling and the human figures that get proportionally smaller in the distance.
There may be no overt sense of protracted pain in this artwork. Granted, I imagine that standing around while someone else’s portrait is painted can’t be easy on the feet. Yet even without a clear source of pain, the painting is an icon.
Lesson 7: The Scream
Criteria for determining whether this artwork is an icon:
- Representative of a larger body of work: ✅
- Has become a source of derivative artworks: ✅
- Is timeless: ✅
Iconetic values present:
- Monstrous sense of scale: ✅
- Unnerving Eye contact: ✅
- Protracted pain: ✅
Naturally, I couldn’t get through an entire semester without delving into German expressionism. And Edvard Munch’s The Scream is the poster boy for that entire artistic movement.
The focus of the work is the specter in the foreground. And it is a specter, not a mortal human, as evidenced by its lack of legs. Instead, it has a shroud that slowly fades to nothing as it approaches the floor of the balcony. That this supernatural figure floats before a landscape of exaggerated proportions scales the painting grossly.
I don’t think I have to demonstrate how this painting uses unnerving eye contact.
As for protracted pain, you can see it in how the specter’s jaw appears unhinged, or in the way it claps its hands over its ears, as if hearing an explosive sound that would otherwise rend its eardrums. Is the figure screaming, or is it merely hearing the scream—a note so shrill that the specter has to block its ears against the painful noise?
Finals Week!
I understand that for some of you this class is your last elective before you graduate from this program and this university. As such, I want to leave you with some words.
You will never understand just how hard it was to bring the current level of recognition to the study of iconetics. There were many fierce debates, dissertations, and even fights about whether this could be a distinct and formalized course of inquiry outside of any existing arts majors. That its value has not only been acknowledged but fully embraced within my lifetime is a miracle—perhaps the only miracle I have ever witnessed in my lifetime.
I know the last thing you want to hear, as you approach the end of your education, is that you should consider getting more schooling, but I want to take this moment to remind you that the graduate program of the iconetics department is welcoming applicants. And, due to our subject’s corporate and government interest, many scholarships are available. Even if you think you don’t qualify, I would advise you to make your proposal. Few are actually turned away these days.
And, truly, there are aspects of iconetics to be shared only with the initiated. I do hope you will consider our graduate classes. You’ll find them to be…revelatory.
Have a nice vacation. Stay safe. And keep your eyes open to the icons all around you.
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