Mitchell, McCloud and Some Racist Images

McCloud and Mitchell have similar ideas about how and what a picture can do, and does for a person. Whether that person be looking at a picture in passing, or studying the image, there is a spark of imagination that runs through the viewer. McCloud has an interesting point when he discusses physical appearance and the physical world. This basically says that artists sometime do not need to draw an in-depth drawing in order for the drawing to give a viewer the concept of whats being drawn, but if the artists intention is to show "beauty" and a "complexity of the physical world" the image much have some sort of realism. This is something I believe is related to Burke when he discusses symbols. We as humans can grasp an idea such as, a stick figure means human. However, for deep insight and imagination to unfold, the symbol, or picture, must contain a sense of realness. This is when the viewer can be one of what you call a "curious" eye. I hope to show that Mitchell's idea of a metpicture being possible through all images can't simply be true.

Mitchell, even though I find him relating to McCloud, or vice versa, I think Mitchell has more in-depth theories about what a picture does and means. This may be because he wrote a long essay whereas McCloud's essay was done in a comic. However, that being said, McCloud's comic essay was very insightful and for him to use that type of medium allowed for his text to work on the level of, say an essay like Mitchell's. Either way there's an importance to take away from Mitchell that helps me discuss further the cartoon pictures I have chose. That being his discussion about how any image can be a metapicture if the picture is used to reflect on nature, or the nature of pictures.

http://fsucardarchive.org/files/original/d27b1d36f4fcca84459943c5100b3413.jpg
http://fsucardarchive.org/files/original/9f75240635519ad1292cce24f2c76e9b.jpeg
http://fsucardarchive.org/files/original/65247f5637d31b8db7f8dc840367222f.jpg
http://fsucardarchive.org/files/original/c73c71ac3561598e4468fb28242e0df1.jpg
http://fsucardarchive.org/files/original/2eab03423faf8513e9ca9829334a16ad.jpg

For the pictures I have chosen there is a complexity for each, but there is also some reverence to the real world in the times they were drawn. So, if I posted these images to the wall and asked someone to find the differences it would be quite obvious that race is in effect. The "image" of a black person in these pictures portray un-humanistic features. This idea is to show that at the time period of which they were drawn, these humans were treated as not human. However, we can look at the image of johnny Cash and question why he is drwan the way he is, with detailed human qualities. My point here is to show that Mitchell's idea of the image becoming a metapicture by showing the nature of pictures can falsify views on what "Nature" means to the viewer. If you only knew these pictures, and walked out into our world for the first time you would be shocked to find out that the portrayal in these images are false.

However, as I write this I realize that it does reflect a time period and the way humans saw other humans through that time period...