Interpretacje wierszy i obrazów – o świadomości dzieła sztuki

Abstract

In the context of problems connected with the modern didactic inclination to complementary reading of literary and visual texts, the author emphasizes the question of the awareness of an artwork, referring to Martin Heidegger’s phenomenological reflections. An image, whether literary or visual, is rooted in thought (the field of philosophy), in a system (the field of aesthetics), and in language (the field of rhetoric). Hence each text has its philosophy and its independent existence, and this determines its essence. Awareness of what a text is, and what makes it a masterpiece is crucial, elementary and primary. Truly great art and literature records and eternalizes, in its language, “the essence of things”, their metaphysics, a moment, gesture, movement, emotion, or the internal spiritual state. A teacher should direct the reflections on the essence of true art in such a way that, in the language of poetry and painting, pupils could find the tools to express the visible and the invisible. Wisława Szymborska’s and Adam Zagajewski’s poems, which “record” Vermeer’s works in the language of poetry and interpret the visual masterpiece in poetic phrases, show that eternalizing simple, everyday activities, which existed for a moment ages ago, must be seen in the universal and timeless dimension. This is the essence of true and great art.