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ABSTRACT
Translation is by nature interdisciplinary and traditionally envisaged in relation to other arts and humanities disciplines. From social sciences to literary, art and media studies, Translation Studies incorporates their problematics and methodologies, as a way to advance the thinking about these other disciplines. However, such an outwardness is rarely recognised outside the realm of Translation Studies where translation tends to be relegated to its statutory role as purveyor of semiotic paradigms. How can such a tendency be reversed? To what extent can translation export its fundamental concepts and theoretical models in a productive dialogue with other disciplines?
Taking two artworks by Wolf Vostell as examples, this article proposes to explore such fundamental questions. It seeks to show how translation can help us envision art as a space not only of dialogue, but of confrontation of beliefs, perceptions and memories. Translation has indeed great potential to have a leavening effect across art and media studies in defining our relationship not only to texts but to the world in all its contingencies. This article thus seeks to delineate the phenomenology of visual art and the elusive space in which the interpreter’s memories confront Vostell’s mediated images.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 Please note that all translations, unless attributed in the references, are my own.
2 Please note that requests for permission to reproduce images of these artworks were made to the appropriate rights-holder. They are not supplied here – due to terms and conditions – but are widely available for viewing online.
3 This interdisciplinary relationship is marked by the cultural turn which defines culture as a dynamic process involving differences and collusions, and requiring constant negotiations – see, for example, Bassnett, Susan and Lefevere, André, eds. 1998. Constructing Cultures: Essays on Literary Translation. Clevedon and Bristol, PA: Multilingual Matters; and, more recently, Maitland, Sarah. 2017. What is Cultural Translation? London: Bloomsbury Academic. Other versions of translation theory propose to define translation as a cultural process, from the deconstructionist that considers that all translation involves transformation, to the postcolonial and its emphasis on cultural hybridity and power relation (Bhabha, Homi. 2004. The Location of Culture. London and New York: Routledge Classics; Niranjana, Tejaswini. 1992. Siting Translation: History, Poststructuralism and the Colonial Context. Berkeley: University of California Press).
4 See, for example, Peeter Torop’s conceptualisation of ‘intersemiosis’ in ‘Intersemiotic and Intersemiosic Translation’ (Citation2003, 274); and Henrik Gottlieb’s ‘Multidimensional Translation’ and his classification of no less than 33 types of intersemiotic translation (Citation2008, 39–66). Other references may include: Gorlée, Dinda L. 2004. Translating Signs: Exploring Text and Semio-Translation. Amsterdam: Rodopi; Petrilli, Susan. 2003. ‘The Intersemiotic Character of Translation.’ In Translation, Translation, 41–51. Amsterdam: Rodopi; Toury, Gideon. 2010. ‘Translation, a Cultural-Semiotic Perspective.’ In Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Semiotics, edited by Thomas A. Sebeok and Maral Danesi, 1127–1138. Berlin: De Gruyter Mounton.
5 I am referring to the belief that images belong to the world of appearances and, as opposed to true ideas, are imperfect copies of a perfect, intelligible model. Plato’s famous Allegory of the Cave underpins this illusion within which humans are trapped. While it is true that certain images alienate us from reality, one can also argue that images with a real intrinsic dignity lead to intellectual emancipation.
6 The German school of hermeneutics considers, in a general manner, interpretation as understanding in relation to modes of communication. Advocates of such a school hold the view that interpretation is a mediated understanding and holds the possibility for social transformation and criticism (Bleischer Citation1980; Schmidt Citation2006).
7 Peirce’s semiology establishes a tripartite division: firstness (sign), secondness (object), thirdness (interpretant). The sign itself is divided into icon, index and symbol which overlap in ways that cannot be pre-determined (Wollen Citation1979, 122–124).
8 Venuti’s two-way approach is reflected in his distinction between two types of interpretants as integral parts of the hermeneutic model. The formal interpretants are mainly concerned with the surface of a text (i.e. its direct, non-mediated expression) and the thematic interpretants with the historical context, from within which the interpretation emerges (i.e. what is expressed as a mediated understanding).
9 A press pack compiled for the promotion of a retrospective exhibition at the Musée d’art contemporain de Nîmes provides a detailed overview of the artist’s life http://pedagogie.ac-montpellier.fr/Disciplines/arts/arts_plastiques/carredart/vostell/VOSTELL-Dossier_de_presse.pdf.
10 I have slightly altered the English translation which omits the rather crucial ‘more modestly’ from the French original.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Laurence Besnard-Scott
Laurence Besnard-Scott has obtained her Ph.D. in Translation Studies at Queen’s University Belfast in 2016, having examined film adaptations of classical myths through a concept derived from ekphrastic discourse. Focusing on translation as an aesthetic mode of representation, her current research examines how translation ethics can contribute to intellectual emancipation in other mode of artistic productions. She has published articles in the Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance, the Journal of Arts Writing by Students and Film International.