Metaphors We Draw By: Metaphoric drawing explored as a visual language

Abstract

Having a certain subject in mind, how can it be communicated in drawing in stead of words? Applying metaphors is crucial, and metaphoric drawings contain compressed meanings. The first part in this text is separation of meanings. An overview of different types of metaphor in drawing is presented following the cognitive linguistic metaphor theory. Metonymy and elements of narrative also furnish the separation. A second part where metaphoric drawing is viewed as a language, is based on the foregoing. Different kinds of visual elements and members of categories of meaning systems are brought in interaction and a systematized organization and structure is presented. Method for the research is examples of newspaper drawings brought in contact with a throughfare of the cognitive linguistic metaphor theory in a visual optic. Cognitive linguistic theory, narratology, pictorial semiotics, and rhetorical tropology are auxiliary disciplines in addition to a platform of pictorial competence. This text is made of extracts translated from my PhD thesis on metaphoric drawing, Metaforbasert tegning ? undersøkt som et språksystem gjennom avistegninger av Finn Graff og Saul Steinberg med kognitiv metaforteori som hovedredskap. The Oslo School of Architecture and Design (2008). http://hdl.handle.net/11250/2390055