Saint Nicholas and Iconic Realism

The Charity of Saint Nicholas 

by Girolamo Macchietti, c. 1580

Saint Nicholas ia an obscure individual, but the man that many Christians honor on December 6 was most likely the Bishop of Myra during Constantine the Great's era in the 4th century A.D.  It has been said that he performed various miracles in regard to saving children from the harsh realities of that time. Eventually, he was honored in Holland, where he was known as Sinterklaas and on to the American colonies, New Amsterdam particularly. New Amsterdam would become New York City. 

Now, how does this saintly man illustrate my semiotic theory of iconic realism? 

1. He is a realistic, iconic figure. 

2. His legend presents him as one who was able to perform miracles, placing him in iconic, realistic settings, not associated with those in power at that time. 

3. Even though he had certain administrative powers within Church Law, he chose to help innocent, less fortunate children in order to transform people's hearts and bring them closer to the Mind of God. 

James Joyce's 'Ulysses,' Winds of War, and Iconic Realism

Winds photo from Google Images

Inhaling and expelling of air exists in James Joyce's Ulysses chapter, Scylla and Charybdis, with the obnoxious expelling of high verbiage between Stephen Daedalus and the other scholars. Here, Joyce employs the use of linguistic empowerment of those who 'have' against those who 'have not'…or very little. Joyce, through Stephen, refers to those who do not understand the human spirit as the ‘vegetable world.’ He decides to stay firmly planted in the present, “through which all future plunges to the past” (Blamires 77). Here, Joyce reveals an interesting foreshadowing of worldly events with which only the current reader can relate, for within 25 years of this writing, the world will revisit Joyce’s own recent experience with WWI through WWII. 

How does this foreshadowing illustrate iconic realism? Joyce reveals highly intellectual ideas through intelligent characters who have issues communicating with those less intellectual, in other words, those who may view their world with a more common sense approach. Through this juxtaposition, Joyce actually pokes fun at the 'highly educated' as a group of snobs who have trouble relating to the majority of society. This was written between WWI and WWII, and much miscommunication was occurring in the higher echelons of governments worldwide. Joyce breathes his own consciousness through Bloom’s passages through time. He creates his personal ‘winds of war’ as he journeys through the dissonant aspects of his life on this June 16th. 

Blamires, Harry, The New Bloomsday Book: A Guide through Ulysses, Routledge, New York: 1997.

Walt Whitman and Iconic Realism

Adler Planetarium Astronomy Museum, Art Institute of Chicago

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1053/5097973137_718735c9c6.jpg

When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer

by Walt Whitman

When I heard the learn'd astronomer,

When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,

When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide,

and measure them,

When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with

much applause in the lecture-room,

How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,

Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself,

In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

In Walt Whitman's poem, "When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer, the speaker leaves an astronomy lecture to step outside the fixed parameters of the building. Subsequently, this individual learns first hand of the beauty when viewing the same firmament of which the lecturer speaks but viewed simply with the naked eye in silence. By leaving the lecture, the speaker, with scientific information gained from the the astronomer's lecture inside, now enjoys the silent beauty with appreciated knowledge, but more importantly, with appreciation of the significance of the stars’ natural condition. 

This poem illustrates iconic realism in that the subject, real examples of constellations in a contrived, yet realistic setting, bring the audience and the speaker in the poem to a recognition that education of natural phenomena includes the experience of the real connection between humanity with nature. 

I warmly thank the Art Institute of Chicago for purchasing a copy of my book, The Theory of Iconic Realism: Understanding the Arts through Cultural Context.