Rhetoric In Art

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Rhetoric is defined as an art of persuasion and has been used for a long time either when giving a speech, writing a text, or taking a picture. Due to the many changes over the years, it is only natural that it will further develop as an art. The conventions and rules simply add value to the art of rhetoric and the way in which it is currently perceived by changing and adapting over time. There are several ways to explain what an art is however; The Oxford Dictionary says art is ‘the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power.’ In my opinion, art is a form of expressing ones feelings in a creative way either through…show more content…
When watching adverts on television, glancing through a magazine or simply walking down the street, there is a form of persuasion that triggers a new creative understanding of the ways in which visual images communicate. A simple picture transforms into an image with a range of human emotion that cannot be experienced in speech, giving it a whole different meaning. Jean Y. Audigier (1991) said, “Discursive language has definite limits to its usefulness because each word has a relatively fixed meaning, it can only refer to the neutral aspects of our world of observation and thought.” Therefore, in the light of new technological developments, visual rhetoric and more specifically photographs and images as forms of art in my opinion will survive as a contemporary art. They will always transcend borders and will subconsciously push us to question our core beliefs thus leading us to create our own interpretations without really losing the creative ability of a piece of…show more content…
Photographs and the images produced, have always struggled to become recognized as a real form of art over the years and only in the last couple of decades has it been able to hold the name of a traditional art form. Photos can persuade and argue many things, the same way a traditional form of rhetoric would. The initial impact a picture has may not have been the desired one but has still managed to have an effect on the personal interpretation of the image created by the viewer, showing the power visual rhetoric has in our world today. This does come at a price though, that price is not just the time and effort put into a photograph, but the creativity and artistic understanding needed beforehand to truly capture the moment and be able to have that be expressed and experienced by the world once it is made public. A common phrase used in photography is that of Ansel Adams, “You don’t take a photograph, you make it.” It has been argued that it is not the photographer who makes the photograph but rather, those who view it and bring their own values and ideas to the art. In this way, the image resonated personally with each

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