Pajarillaga, Jason Lynyrd READING VISUAL ARTS GE 20 (4866)

Let’s Check
Activity 1. Now that you know the important concepts of reading the visual, let us try
to check how well you understand the topic. Read the following sentences carefully.
Write TRUE if the statement is correct and FALSE if otherwise.

FALSE1. Reading is both an active and creative process while reading the visual
draw our general and specific knowledge, tastes, habits, and supernatural contexts.
FALSE 2. Visual culture is a field of study and a set of ways of understanding these
physical and social phenomena.
FALSE 3. Semiotics is an analytical approach and a research methodology that
examines the use of what we are called visuals in society.
FALSE 4. Text is a collection of signs organized in a particular way too devoid of the
meaning of visual art.
TRUE 5. Habitus is a set of values and dispositions gained from the cultural history
that stay with us across contexts.
TRUE 6. Cultural history and trajectories naturalize certain values and ideas, and
effectively determine worldviews.
FALSE 7. Cultural literacy presupposes an understanding of how to think and see in
a manner that is inappropriate to the imperatives and context of artworks.
TRUE 8. Things needing to happen twice means that we sometimes fail to see the
significance of something until we are aware of what could call a pattern.
FALSE 9. If we are attending closely or carefully to an event, person, thing, or scene,
we create a text made up of what we call continuum elements.
TRUE10. Genres are text-types that structure meanings in a certain way through
their associations with a particular purpose and social context.
Pajarillaga, Jason Lynyrd READING VISUAL ARTS GE 20 (4866)

Let’s Analyze
Activity 1. Guided by the lessons on the introduction of reading visual, it is best to
note that you can articulate the sub-topics in a manner of explanation. Now, it is your
chance to explain the following succinctly.

1. Text and Genres

- The association of text and genres create meanings, particularly for
the purpose and the context of an art. Genres involves with
characterization, discourses, values and worldviews. This provides
us a frame of reading and understanding the text specifically on
visual reality that can also relate to our lives.
2. Text and Intertext
- When we say Intertext, it is the use of texts to create new texts.
This has a meaningful part of the visual arts because upon seeing
the signs or an artwork we would be able to easily understand what
it means or what it wanted to imply to the readers.
3. Seeing as Reading
- Seeing things are very important part of reading text. As we look
and focus attention to the world around us, we would be able to
understand what the context wanted to inform us and actively
engaging with our environment. Compare to not seeing things, we
lack of understanding the world or may misinterpret the information.
4. New Technologies of Seeing
- Technology played an important role in visualizing reality since this
era encompasses an incredible range of tools, instruments, and
devices. This makes us gained more understanding throughout the
world and provides us more knowledge and skills.
5. Tacit Seeing
- According to Pierre Bourdie, “the relation to the world is a relation of
the presence in the world”. This typically means that the way we
gaze and perceive our world is already part of us and we have a
sense of belongingness of this world. This connects to the principle
of constancy that our past experiences include how we perceived.
6. Techniques of Seeing as Reading
- Techniques of Seeing as Reading was discussed and these are:
Selection and Omission, Framing, and the Evaluation which means
that every act of looking and seeing is also an act of not seeing.
With these mentioned techniques, these will produce a visual text.
Pajarillaga, Jason Lynyrd READING VISUAL ARTS GE 20 (4866)

7. Seeing as Literacy
- Seeing as Literacy is how we make sense of what we are seeing
and it is an analogy of communicating in the language. The way we
see things helps us to understand the context and to embody
knowledge. In this manner, we could compare it to our school
system wherein we learn language, shapes, words, literately and
etc. Just like seeing text, signs or symbols, we would be able follow
instructions or learn something from it.
8. Arresting Reality
- Arrested reality is associated with photography since photographs
are perfectly freeze in time and motion that no other art is formed.
9. Seeing in Context
- Seeing in Context is a broad perspective since it exhibits how the
environment affects us on how we see the world. In connection to the
reading arts, it comprises Habitus and Cultural Literacy wherein the
former means that our understanding and set of values are learned
from our cultural history that stays with us while the latter is the general
familiarity of rules, genres, knowledge and discourses. This also
included our understanding based on how we think and see at the
moment.
Pajarillaga, Jason Lynyrd READING VISUAL ARTS GE 20 (4866)

In a Nutshell
Activity 1. Base on the essential terms and operational definition of concepts in the
study of reading visuals, please feel free to write your arguments or lessons learned
below.

1. I learned the importance of Reading Visual Arts to our daily life since it gives
us more understanding of our surroundings and how to interpret the message
of the context. Through the concept of Visual Arts, we can also yield a more
information and appreciate the contexts that are also significant on our
everyday actions.
2. I learn about Seeing as Reading, seeing in Context, and Seeing in Time and
Motion. These approaches make the context makes more understandable
and meaningful that helps us to gain more information and knowledge.
Specially on seeing things, I also learn to pay attention because they are
some instances that things remain invisible to us if we are focused about it.
3. I also agree to the statement of Pierre Bourdieu “the relation to the world is a
relation of presence of the world…” For me, the way we perceive and look our
world affects based on our relation and connection to it. We easily understand
what the context because of our past experiences or we are already part of it.