On the Multiple Signifiers of Art Symbols

Abstract: A famous viewpoint of literary semiotics represented by Ernst Cassirer and Susanne K. Langer is that “Art is the creation of forms symbolic of human feeling”. Such a viewpoint, ever since it was raised, has exerted tremendous influences on people’s views of symbols. Thus, a final conclusion has been reached that art symbols have signifiers representing human feelings. But do art symbols merely represent human feelings? The answer is a NO whether given by Susanne K. Langer or inferred from the historical facts of art. In fact, art symbols have multiple signifiers. And the intricate interrelations between these signifiers cause works of art to create new signifiers — second-layer signifiers. This paper attempts to expound the phenomenon on the basis of the theories of literary semiotics and those of other relevant schools of semiotics combined with the analysis of the historical facts of art in traditional Chinese opera, painting, literature, architecture, etc.

Keywords: art symbols; multiple signifiers; abstract form; second-layer signifiers

  Yongxiang Wang: Research Center of Linguistic Signs, Application and Communication, Tianjin Foreign Studies University, Tianjin, China; School of Foreign Languages & Cultures, Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing, China