Signification of the Uncanny: Frida Kahlo’s Surreal Paintings against the Background of Semiotic Codes
Abstract
In semiotics, codes, at the simplest level, are a systematic framework for interpreting the meanings of different kinds of communication in which the meanings are not easily discernible. In a Saussurean signified relationship, there are two requisite factors, namely the emitter and the receiver. The emitter encodes and the receiver decodes. For this reason, in socio-cultural communications, encoding and decoding are one of the most fundamental processes in interpreting the meaning and studying the meaning-making processes. The initial aim of this paper is to look into the set of four suggested communication codes by Arthur Asa Berger (metonymic, analogical, displaced and condensed) by reviewing their manifestation in advertising industry and next in order examine the function of this set codes, with a semiotic approach, in the paintings of Frida Kahlo the Mexican surrealist artist.References
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