The Author and His Reality

I came across the above art work by M.C. Escher titled “Hand with Reflecting Sphere” produced in January 1935, during my course of study in Communication Culture and Media, and in attempt to make meaning out of the image I did a critical analysis adopting Michael Foucault's  theory which talks about the notion of power, identity, and truth and notions of other scholars like Strinati and Barthes. I am sure you will find this interesting….Read on below ….

According to Barthes, R (1988: 168), “the description of a work is always sought in the man or women who produced it, as if it were always in the end, through the more or less transparent allegory of the fiction, the voice of a single person, the author ‘confiding’ in us”. 

The Dutch artist Maurits C. Escher was a draftsman, book illustrator, tapestry designer, and muralist, but his major work was as a print maker. Born 1898 in Leeuwarden, in a house that forms part of the Princesseh of Ceramics Museum today, Escher spent most of his childhood in Arnhem.  He was the youngest son of civil engineer George Arnold Escher, aspiring to be an architect, Escher enrolled in the School for Architecture and Decorative Arts in Haarlem. While studying there from 1919 to 1922, his emphasis shifted from architecture to drawing and printmaking upon the encouragement of his teacher Samuel Jessurun de Mesquita. In 1924 Escher married Jetta Umiker, and the couple settled in Rome to raise a family. They resided in Italy until 1935, when growing political turmoil forced them to move first to Switzerland, then to Belgium. In 1941, with World War II under way and German troops occupying Brussels, Escher returned to Holland and settled in Baarn, where he lived and worked until shortly before his death in March 27, 1972, at the age of 73.

Escher is commonly recognized for his “so-called impossible structures”, but he also did several magnificent, more realistic works while he was in Italy; his creative expression was formed from images in his mind, rather than directly from observations and travels to other countries. He did most of his work mainly in the media of lithographs and woodcuts, though the few mezzotints he made are considered to be masterpieces of the technique. In his graphic art, he portrayed mathematical relationships among shapes, figures and space. Additionally, he explored interlocking figures using black and white to enhance different dimensions. Integrated into his prints were mirror images of cones, spheres, cubes, rings and spirals. M.C. Escher’s exceptional thought process and opulent graphic work has continuously influenced science and art work and also being referenced in culture.  He frolicked around with architecture, perspective and impossible spaces, in his work, one could identify his intense observation of the world around us, how he put it too work, made fascinating meaning of it and the expressions of his personal imaginations. M.C. Escher makes us aware that reality is wondrous, comprehensible and fascinating. (Escher, M.C 2012)

Taking a look at M.C. Escher’s “Hand with Reflecting Sphere” the first thing that comes to the mind of the viewer is that it is an art work in black and white, a picture, one that depicts a person or a man holding a transparent round object, a man looking at the reflection of himself in a round shaped transparent object in a sitting room which can be argued to be his seating room, the image of a living room, a man sitting alone in the room because he appears to be the only one there, an academician or a man who likes to read because he has quite a number of properly arranged books on his shelf and also someone who likes art works because he has a few distinct art works on his wall. The representation of what is seen is just an image of a man in his living room staring at the reflection of himself to someone who hasn’t heard about Escher, is not familiar with his works or seen him, but for someone who is familiar with his art work, it will be easy to understand that it is representation of Escher and will be more likely to understand his point of view and the message he is trying to pass across.

The motif behind the reflective sphere and the setting can be said be an act by the artiste to paint a picture of the message he is trying to pass across in a somewhat real form and make the viewers see exactly what he wants them to see from his point of view. A reflection can be said to be the replication of a thing or an image on another, The Law of Reflection describes it simply as "The angle of incidence is equal to the angle of reflection."  (Hutton, C. 1815:295) Escher can be said to have used reflection as a means of gaining the trust of the audience with the notion that anything being reflected is said to be a replica of what it is reflected on and the mirror effect which is generally known to everyone as what you see is the exact image. The use of the sphere can also be said to be deliberate, considering that the world is spherical in shape in its totality, Escher can be argued to have used this in order to portray the totality of a man’s being, the world of a man in its entirety. The image, however, can be said to be a representation of various ideologies such as: Identity, self, Control, Power, State of being, Reality and fiction, Space and time and entirety.

The image can be seen from two different angles; the hand holding the sphere is one and the image inside the sphere is another, however, they both rely on and complement each other. The hand is what the sphere relies on to get the angle of image that it reflects; giving the image in the sphere its desired reflection which can be said to be what Escher sees himself and also wants his viewers to see. According to Schroeder, A. (2009), “representation could be thought of as means of depicting or portraying of a subject, which relied upon the connection between the rendition and the original”. Escher’s work can be said to be an illustration of how a man/Escher sees himself, it connotes this is who he is, the image of himself, what he looks like and his makeup. It identifies him as a man, probably in his 60’s or 70’s, an European, whose dress sense in the image identifies as a professional. This could suggest that your identity can be determined by your appearance, the way you live, what is found around you and the way you dress. But is that really how Escher sees or how he identifies himself or what he wants his viewers to see him or identify him as? As Minh-na (1989) noted, our search for meaning is almost the same as our quest for our different forms of being.  Foucault cited in Gauntlett, D (2002) similarly stated that people are often referred to as though they have certain characteristics as 'things' within them, they have an identity, for instance, there is the notion that in a person’s heart, there is a fixed and real identity (even if we're not sure that we know quite what that is, for a particular person). There is an assumption that people have an inner underlying essence and qualities that define the person’s real attribute. It is also said that certain people have (different levels of) power which means that they are probably able to achieve their desired objective in the course of their interaction with people and the society in general. (Foucault cited in Gauntlett, D.  2002)

The image is also a representation of time and space. There is an illumination from the window in the picture behind the image of the hand other than the one holding the sphere, this illumination which is as a result of the sun reflecting from the window indicates that it is a sunny summer afternoon, it gives the image a form of reality as to when the event occurred and the time of the day, also as a form of reflection, the sun helped give the image the reflective effect. The window which appears as the only source of illumination can be said to have been targeted and used deliberately by Escher to create the desired effect as the window through the sphere could be seen to appear directly behind him with the curtains shifted open at both sides. As Strauss (1958) noted, all representations have ideologies behind them and certain paradigms are fixed into texts while some are left out with the aim of achieving a desired representation. (Levi Strauss 1958)

Reality is one of the major things Escher tried to make evident in his work, because the whole concept of the art work can be argued to be as a result of trying to present a picture of what is happening around him in reality. The singular act of drawing a picture of himself is a form of the reality that he exists, he went beyond that to paint a picture of what is around him and his own little world in which he exists in “The author-function is therefore characteristic of the mode of existence, circulation, and functioning of certain discourses within a society” (Foucault 1977: 108). The representation of the hand seen in a somewhat half form holding the sphere and the other part of it reflecting inside the sphere gives the viewers the impression that the act is real because in reality when a person is holding an object like that the same form of reflection will be derived. However,  one of the hands in the image which is meant to be the hand of the artiste is seen placed on his lap while the second hand is holding the reflecting sphere, a keen viewer looking at this image is left with different assumptions of what the artiste is trying to derive and what form of reality or fiction is being portrayed because it can be argued that Escher’s image was as a product of a different medium i.e. probably someone took the picture, he set a still camera or just a product of his imagination because it can be argued to be impossible for him to have both hands engaged at the same time and also be involved in the painting. There is the notion that it was after the modern era the people became anxious about the representation of reality, which has become mixed up and made us have imitation, parody and intertextuality. As Strinati, D (1995) stated, “reality is now only definable in terms of the reflections of the mirror”. This mirror image is a medium Escher used in a good effect to present his reality and gain a certain degree of trust from the viewer.

Taking another look at the position of the hands, the outer hand that is holding the sphere appears to be the left hand, while the reflection inside the sphere shows that it is the right hand that is holding the sphere. This is an accurate representation of reality, as the mirror effect would appear to change the left to be the right and vice versa, confirming Escher’s representation of ‘reality’. On the other hand, in the quest of trying to understand which hand is actually holding the sphere, one could assume that it is both hands, which can be argued to be Escher’s motif of trying to portray that both hands are in control or that it doesn't matter which hand is holding it or how you handle or position your life, it is in your hands and can be controlled in any form. It can also be argued to be a way of gaining the viewer’s trust and convincing them that it doesn't matter what hand is holding the sphere, or what direction it faces, the same view will still be portrayed and thus gaining their trust.

“Truth is a thing of this world: it is produced only by virtue of multiple forms of constraint.  And it induces regular effects of power.  Each society has its regime of truth, its “general politics” of truth: that is, the types of discourse which it accepts and makes function as true; the mechanisms and instances which enable one to distinguish true and false statements, the means by which each is sanctioned; the techniques and procedures accorded value in the acquisition of truth; the status of those who are charged with saying what counts as true” (Foucault, in Rabinow 1991).

Nevertheless, the form reality projected by the image can be questioned at this point, if Escher’s objective was to actually make the viewers see him the way he is, that intention might be lost at this point as the viewers will think he just produced a version of what he wants them to see, because it is  not just the position of his hands that is seen as deliberate or deceiving but also the position of the sphere against the plain wall which could be argued to be an attempt to keep the viewers from seeing the actual entirety of his world in contrast to the motif of the sphere which represents wholeness. It is easy for the viewers to read their own meanings to this image as they are left conflicted as to what to accept as the actual representation due to the elements involved, the concepts that could be understood or verified only by the author and as Barthes (1977) said, “the death of the author is the birth of the reader”. However, to Escher that is the representation of his world and how he wants the viewers to see it whether or not the real intent is lost it is believed as a ‘reality’, it is the author’s ‘reality’ even if it is just a product of his imagination. Hammonda (2012) mentioned that, “We often judge a text’s realism against our own ‘situated culture’. What is ‘real’ can therefore become subjective”. The image can be said to be a representation of the mental picture of what Escher makes of himself or what he thinks of himself and how he wants to be seen. Escher in this image provides awareness into his world that describes him as an artist. Here, the subject is presented as an object in its representation in order to generate different denotation which should appear real. This at this point could suggest that the way you are seen is determined by the way you see and present yourself, which means you are in control of your life and hold it in your hands. Though, David Gauntlett (2007) debates that “identity is complicated, everybody thinks they've got one and Artists play with the idea of identity in modern society” but in Escher’s work, the identity created is of himself and if at all he is playing with the idea, it appears to be the identity he has created or is creating for himself.

Control and power is evident in the image, it show that a man is responsible for what becomes of him, how he lives his life and his entire being. It can also be said to depict that you hold your life in your hands and in control of how you are seen and the way you want people to see you. It shows absolute control and power because Escher depicted himself holding the sphere in a particular direction in such a way that only what he wants the viewers to see could be seen, he also held the sphere in a one dimensional angle towards a plane wall leaving only the desired angle to be seen, he could have easily placed the sphere on a table or an object but he decided to have absolute control of what he intends to portray. He had absolute control of what he was thinking or what he had in his mind and presented it as such without interference. Escher in his work did not just represent himself as being in control of his life and being but also in control of what he wanted the viewers to see and the way he wanted them to see it. According to Foucault (1998), power is not a possession that a person can acquire; but it is used during interactions. He sees power as something that links relationships and that it is somewhat impossible to assert that a person is powerful but they are more likely to find themselves in the position of power or had chances to exercise power. “Power is everywhere; not because it embraces everything, but because it comes from everywhere … Power is not an institution, and not a structure; neither is it a certain strength we are endowed with; it is the name that one attributes to a complex strategical situation in a particular society”’.  (Foucault .M in Gauntlett .D, 2004 : 117-118) this suggests that power is situational and can be exercised in different forms depending on the person in control and situation in which they find themselves in despite their state of being, social or racial class. This is manifest in Escher’s work as he can be said to be using the image to convey a message of a situation he has power over.

The image depicts his exact state of being, it reflects him seating on a chair stretching out his hand holding a spherical reflective abject in his hand towards his face to get a clearer view and staring intensively into it looking at himself with a somewhat straight and serious face, gazing at his image into the reflection of his world and entire being. Escher, popularly known as an artiste that often engages in art works that are spherical, could be said to be engaging in the act of reflection, putting himself in the act and trying to capture his world in a spherical point of view and could be trying to reveal that his world is spherical. Different things can also be said to be running through his mind as he gazes at himself e.g. he could be wondering if this is really him, or asking himself if this is what he truly looks like, or probably a sense of disappointment in his being because the image also depicts desolation and loneliness. He appears to be alone in the house as there is no one else seen in the living room and the neat and void appearance of the room suggest that there is hardly anyone living in the house besides him, despite the books on his shelf and paintings on his wall which suggests that he is not totally an island of his own, he still appears lonely. He can also, just as the viewer be as confused as to who he really is or in a quest for self-discovery and could also be said to engaging in the act of reflection, trying to reflect on his life thus far and his experiences/achievement, what could have been, what should be and what it has become. The form of reflection here is as defined by Amulya, J. (2011) which states that, “Reflection is an active process of witnessing one’s own experience in order to take a closer look at it, sometimes to direct attention to it briefly, but often to explore it in greater depth”.  Escher putting himself in the same position as the viewer might also be an attempt to come in terms with his own being and reality and the reality he wants the viewers to see.

Escher’s work “Hand with Reflecting Sphere” raises questions in terms of his techniques of representation and the authenticity of his so called ‘reality’. The author may have died so many times in the text but had to be resurrected or reincarnated because in him lies the real meaning of the text and the message he is trying to portray can actually be sort out mainly in him as he is the only one who has access to the ‘truth’ because what may be ‘true’ to him, might not be true to the viewers and as stated above, “all representations have ideologies behind them and certain paradigms are fixed into texts while some are left out with the aim of achieving a desired representation by the author”. (Levi Strauss 1958), and as Foucault (1988:200) noted, it is compulsory that the space left empty by the author’s disappearance is found, trail the spreading of gaps and breaches, and watch the openings that this  disappearance reveals.