Bond..Jordan Bond: February 2011

Sunday, February 13, 2011

5a

The image I chose to re-frame for class is a painting by Salvador Dali. In this painting, there is an eye, clouds, a path and a mountain. What attracted me to me to this image were its style, imagery and the images subtext of God looking down and seeing nothing but bare and stripped land. The subtext is further established by the contrast of the warm color of tan ground and the cold color of light blue and dark blue of the eye. The warm colors give the feeling of earth and very plain setting, where the eye is “glowing” with the light blue sky surrounding it yet the eye itself is dark blue and black. Thus representing God’s sadness as he looks at the earth. Seeing also the contrast of lines, the straight vertical lines of the path running into the horizon line giving the appearance of it being a long and never ending path. While the eye is a circular line that is looking down at the rest of the image, giving the impression of distress. I liked how Dali shows the limited space in the painting by adding a variety of shades of blue into the sky and the darker colors of shading from the eye peering down. In this picture there is also visual intensity specifically at the eye. While everything else in the image is a basic brown or blue, the eye adds a very light blue glow, and white streak in the eye. I noticed how the eye is pretty much in the center of the picture, making it impossible to over look. The use of lines also makes the eyes focus on the eye. The vertical lines that meet at the horizontal line, all lead viewers to look at the eye in the sky. Even the shading on the ground, makes viewers look to the left to see what is causing a shadow, all lines leading to focus on the eye. The lines leading to the eye, gives the feeling of God is watching everything and is sadden by the world He sees. I chose to re-frame the image just focusing on the eye. By taking away the sky, path and mountain, the image is clearly just focusing on what I believe is the most important part. I used the rule of thirds to suggest that the eye is God’s cheerless look at what he sees.

I think that Dali framed the original piece the way he did because he wanted to represent the plain dead world, and the gloominess of it all. The background and ground give the elements of depth and contrast in warm and cold colors. Thus giving the overall effect of the depressing feeling to the piece.