The 'people' would be the author and at least one other. They need to agree, more or less, to reach the same interpretation of a mark. Whatever they decide in that regard has nothing to do, inherent, with the mark. But these two people are just the minimum; they could be millions and tens of millions, or billions.
An example of a mark being interpreted to be about something shared by two people, the minimum, would be, say, If I prearranged with you that I would send you a letter and sign it with a Z. An example of a mark being interpreted in more or less the same way by millions might be the :) or ? or maybe any of the various keys on your computer. However, the other reality of interpretations is that many of them crowd up against any other and there's no assurance that one of them or several, or more, might take precedence over others, or even over the one supposedly already agreed to. That's why I insist that anything always looks like something else and always evokes associative thoughts, images, feelings, which may or may not be shared by others. If they are not shared then no 'communication' takes place even though 'meanings' can be imagined by the person who is imagining them. WC ----- Original Message ---- From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Sun, December 9, 2012 4:52:39 PM Subject: Re: Kate's excellent queries; Barthes; etc It would be even better if I had said he was wrong. And I didn't say the intention was embedded in the mark. "The only reasonable thing to say about the mark that seems to convey its author's intention is that it conforms to other marks that have already been agreed to by at least two people as standing for such and such ." What do you mean by this and who are these people? From: William Conger <[email protected]> To: aesthetics-l <[email protected]> Sent: Sun, Dec 9, 2012 5:46 pm Subject: Re: Kate's excellent queries; Barthes; etc See below and other comments on this thread. I say ridiculous! It's irresponsible to make up a saying or thought and attribute it to Jackson Pollock and then claim that he was wrong. For crying out loud, you can't do that even if you are pretending to make an argument about something irrelevant to Jackson Pollock and his art. Further, I can't determine what difference it makes whether or not an intention produced a given mark. The intention is not embedded in the mark no matter how much someone like to think it is. The only reasonable thing to say about the mark that seems to convey its author's intention is that it conforms to other marks that have already been agreed to by at least two people as standing for such and such . Anything short of an exact duplicate of something is 'missing the mark'. even an exact duplicate would have to replace the original in space and time as well as in all other respects....and we know that's not possible. So there is no such thing as a fully, exact duplicate of anything. when we say something duplicate something else we are already admitting it serves well enough and that's all. Pollock is not here to object to the ridiculous comments being attributed to him or using him as a red herring to propose a faulty argument. But I'm here to object for him. wc ----- Original Message ---- From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Sun, December 9, 2012 2:04:56 PM Subject: Re: Kate's excellent queries; Barthes; etc Shaped, as in something whose shape might match the edge of a line. You could look at a cartoon and separate the lines in the drawings into bits. Since a mark with no conscious meaning was what Pollock was aiming at he would indeed be justified in chiding the viewers on their insistence that he intended a penis. This would be partly because their chatter would probably arouse memories of simple schoolboy humor. -----Original Message----- From: Cheerskep <[email protected]> To: aesthetics-l <[email protected]> Sent: Sun, Dec 9, 2012 2:26 pm Subject: Re: Kate's excellent queries; Barthes; etc In a message dated 12/9/12 12:10:24 PM, [email protected] writes: A mark is not a word. A mark shaped to resemble a small part of something is not intended to carry memories or notions and if the viewer insists that it brings memories and notions he is not looking at the mark itself in a field of other marks . He is you might say missing the mark. Kate Sullivan What Kate seems to be citing here is a mark of a kind I myself cannot imagine. My failing may in part be due to my lack of surety of what Kate has in mind when she says, "A mark shaped to resemble a small part of something". Does she mean it's INTENDED to resemble? My guess is she does not. She means, the shaper creates a mark that DOES resemble something (to some people) but that resemblance is, call it, coincidental - the shaper did not have that resemblance in mind. More strongly: the shaper had no intention that her mark "resemble" anything at all. Picture, say, a Kline or Rothko, or the first paint-fling as Pollack starts a new work. Let's say Pollack's flung paint hits the canvas in such a way that four out of five observers, upon seeing the shape, cannot help being reminded of a penis. Kate seems to be saying that Pollack would be justified in growling that they "miss the mark". But it seems to me arguable that Pollack is the one who's missing something here. What we tend to count on in any "artist" in any genre is her ability to control the response in her audience by selecting what goes into her work. Suppose a novelist names one of her characters Alfred Peter Enis. One reader after another queries that name: A.P. Enis. Is the novelist justified in saying "A.P. Enis is not intended to carry me mories or notions," and criticizing her readers because they "are not looking at A.P. Enis in a field of other marks"?
