Matter and expression in pastel drawings

Abstract

The significant material structure of a plastic text has long been left in the background of the fine arts. Even nowadays, analyses of the expression plane tend to focus on eidetic, chromatic and topological categories, which are traditionally responsible for the manifestation of artistic discourse. The concept of materic category, coined by plastic semiotics, provides a series of material contrasts, such as /pasted/ vs. /diluted/ to an ink or /rough/ vs. /smooth/ to a surface, for example. However, the use of materic oppositions can be observed in means of expression whose materiality is less clear; for instance, in the case of work done with pastel crayons. A plastic analysis of the expression plane of pastel drawings can shed light on the role that material properties have in the creation of meaning in plastic texts. Through the articulation of semantic categories on the fundamental level with categories on the plastic level, and tensive concepts related to the notion of rhythm in Zilberberg (2004; 2006), this article aims at highlighting the value and the role of materic contrasts in the construction of meaning in the works of masters of drawing and painting such as Monet, Toulouse-Lautrec and Redon.