Copyright by Laura Mareike Sager 2006 - The University of Texas at ...

would depend on how they are used in the film, and what role they play in the
narrative.
That differentiation could be effected by a more systematic application of
Heinrich Plett’s categories for the analysis of quotation, which Poulton discusses,
but has not applied to her category outline. Plett’s theory is relevant for ekphrasis
insofar as the visual image in ekphrasis is “quoted” in the text or film. However,
verbal ekphrasis, unlike quotation, transforms, transmedializes and interprets the
image as it quotes it. In so doing, it appropriates the image to a greater degree
than quotation does and is thus a more violent and domineering device. By
contrast, a mostly visual form of ekphrasis can resemble quotation to a greater
extent, as a filmic quotation of an image on the film screen will appear more
direct and unmediated than a verbal quote of an image (which can never be more
than a paraphrase, a description, or an interpretation).
To be sure, a filmic quotation still transmedializes and appropriates the
image even when it seems to leave it intact. In embedding the image in the filmic
discourse, filming it in a determined position, from a particular angle and in
relation to other objects in the same frame, a filmic quotation also assimilates the
image it quotes. However, unlike verbal texts, film can quote images in two
different ways. Whereas verbal quotations of visual images will always be purely
verbal, for the viewer of a film there is a significant difference between an actual
painting reproduced on the screen, and a tableau vivant of that painting by the
film’s actors. While the latter is clearly a transformation and transmedialization,
and thus ekphrasis, of the painting, the former will need verbal and/or auditory
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