Scripta 9_2_link_final.pdf - Uniandrade

evoquer la lune and Seeing Dutch, Louvel uses ekphrastic excerpts from the
novel Girl with a Pearl Earring to illustrate how literature has been borrowing
elements from different semiotic systems. Louvel’s levels of pictorial
saturation are the following:
1. Tableau Effect: produced by the most diluted memory, herefore the
most subjective of the levels, in which a “suggestive effect is so strong
that the painting seems to be haunting the text” 5 (LOUVEL, 2001, p.
177).
2. Picturesque View: 6 The scene is detailed, the background and the form
are distinguished; the repertoire of shapes, colors and dimensions turn
the scene into a tableau.
3. Hypotypose: Descriptive narrative, direct reference to the painting. It is up
to the reader to make, or not, the association.
4. Tableaux vivants: The characters reproduce a painting or a historical scene
presented by the narrator.
5. Aesthetic or Artistic Arrangement: 7 Composition which leads the character
to contemplation, such as a still-life; there is no direct reference to a
specific painting. This arrangement favors the reflexive effect.
6. Pictorial Description: 8 “The text frames the description of a painting” 9
(LOUVEL, 2006, p. 204). The narrator’s linguistic competence is tested,
as it highlights his ability to paint with words (LOUVEL, 2006, p. 202-
03). A description is like an expansion of the narrative. It justifies the
character’s gaze by leading the readers through his eyes (HAMON. n.d.,
p. 58). A pictorial description takes place “when the text dreams with
the image” 10 (LOUVEL, 2006, p. 217).
7. Ekphrasis: “The highest level of pictorial saturation. . . . It is a high level
literary exercise in which a work of art evolves from the visible to the
readable” 11 (LOUVEL, 2001, p. 184).
I chose to divide the novel’s ekphrastic moments into three different
categories of description in order to optimize my analysis. These categories
are in accordance with recurrent patterns I identified among the ways the
characters describe the paintings. I call the first category ‘Post-work
Descriptions’, they refer to existing artworks being described by one of the
characters. The female protagonist, Griet, describes some works to her
blind father, a great admirer of the master. I chose to use two examples
Scripta Uniandrade, v. 9, n. 2, jul.-dez. 2011 15