Semiotic analysis of Klee's “Blumen-Mythos”

Central Problem

How does figurative painting produce meaning? Thürlemann addresses this fundamental question through a rigorous semiotic analysis of Paul Klee’s 1918 watercolor Blumen-Mythos (Flower Myth). The challenge is to develop a methodology that can describe both the plastic level (pure visual expression: color, form, position) and the figurative level (recognized objects: flower, bird, stars), and then identify the codes that connect these two planes. Unlike impressionistic art criticism, semiotics seeks to formalize the mechanisms through which pictorial surfaces generate complex meanings, including mythical and symbolic dimensions.

Main Thesis

Figurative painting operates through a dual articulation: a plastic plane (expression) composed of elements defined by chromatic and eidetic categories, and a figurative plane (content) where these elements are recognized as objects. The relationship between these planes is governed by connector-codes (codici-connettori)—systematic homologies such as curved:straight :: celestial:terrestrial. Klee’s Blumen-Mythos exemplifies how painting can achieve a “semi-symbolic” system where plastic oppositions correlate with semantic oppositions. The central composite objects—the “flower” and the “bird”—function as mediating figures that bridge the cosmic (‘inanimate’/‘celestial’) and the animated (‘terrestrial’/‘human’) realms, thus embodying the formal structure of myth as defined by Lévi-Strauss: a mediation between logically irreconcilable categories.

Historical Context and Intellectual Background

Thürlemann’s analysis emerges from the Paris School of Semiotics founded by A.J. Greimas, which sought to extend Saussurean structural linguistics to all sign systems. The 1970s-80s saw intensive efforts to develop a visual semiotics capable of analyzing images with the same rigor applied to verbal texts. Key influences include:

1. Hjelmslev’s glossematics: The distinction between expression and content planes, and between form and substance at each level
2. Greimas’s narrative semiotics: The concept of figure as minimal units, isotopies, and the semiotic square
3. Gestalt psychology: Especially figure/ground distinctions and perceptual organization principles
4. Lévi-Strauss’s structural anthropology: Myth as a logical structure mediating binary oppositions
5. Panofsky’s iconology: The pre-iconographic level corresponds to the plastic level

This approach reacts against impressionistic art criticism, seeking instead to describe the formal mechanisms of meaning production in visual texts.

Philosophical Lineage

flowchart TD
    Saussure[Saussure] -->|Structural linguistics| Hjelmslev[Hjelmslev]
    Hjelmslev -->|Glossematics| Greimas[A.J. Greimas]
    Greimas -->|Visual semiotics| Thurlemann[Thürlemann]
    LeviStrauss[Lévi-Strauss] -->|Myth structure| Thurlemann
    Gestalt[Gestalt Psychology] -->|Figure/ground| Thurlemann
    Panofsky[Panofsky] -->|Pre-iconographic level| Thurlemann
    Thurlemann -->|Plastic/figurative analysis| VisualSemiotics[Visual Semiotics]
    Greimas -->|Semiotic square| VisualSemiotics

    class Greimas,Hjelmslev,Thurlemann internal-link;

Key Thinkers

Thinker	Dates	Movement	Main Work	Core Concept
Greimas	1917-1992	Paris School Semiotics	Sémiotique. Dictionnaire	Figure, isotopy, semiotic square
Hjelmslev	1899-1965	Glossematics	Prolegomena to a Theory of Language	Expression/content planes
Lévi-Strauss	1908-2009	Structural Anthropology	Mythologiques	Myth as mediation structure
Panofsky	1892-1968	Iconology	Studies in Iconology	Pre-iconographic level
Klee	1879-1940	Bauhaus	Blumen-Mythos	Pictorial poetry

Key Concepts

Concept	Definition	Related to
Plastic level	The plane of visual expression analyzed independently of object recognition; composed of chromatic and eidetic categories	Hjelmslev, Visual Semiotics
Figurative level	The plane where plastic elements are recognized as objects (flower, bird, star) through cultural codes	Panofsky, Iconology
Element	Minimal unit of the plastic level: a combination of chromatic figure and eidetic figure(s)	Greimas, Visual Semiotics
Chromatic categories	Constitutive qualities that discriminate elements: hue, value, saturation, texture (matte vs glossy)	Thürlemann, Color Theory
Eidetic categories	Form-related categories: straight vs curved, angular vs rounded	Gestalt Psychology
Topological categories	Non-constitutive positional categories: high vs low, left vs right, central vs peripheral	Visual Semiotics
Connector-code	A rule establishing homologies between plastic oppositions and semantic oppositions	Greimas, Thürlemann
Semi-symbolic system	A sign system where expression and content planes have correlated, non-arbitrary relations (like poetry)	Greimas, Semiotics

Authors Comparison

Theme	Thürlemann	Greimas	Panofsky
Unit of analysis	Element (chromatic + eidetic)	Figure (minimal unit)	Motif (pre-iconographic)
Method	Formal decomposition + code identification	Narrative grammar	Historical interpretation
Goal	Describe meaning mechanisms	General theory of meaning	Cultural meaning of images
Relation to content	Codes connect planes systematically	Isotopies structure content	Symbolic values from tradition
Myth	Structural mediation (Lévi-Strauss)	Narrative structure	Iconographic tradition

Influences & Connections

Predecessors

• Saussure: Sign = signifier + signified; langue vs parole distinction
• Hjelmslev: Expression plane / content plane; form / substance distinction
• Panofsky: Three levels of iconographic analysis; pre-iconographic = plastic

Contemporaries

• Greimas: Narrative semiotics, semiotic square, isotopy
• Barthes: “Rhetoric of the image,” anchorage function of text
• Foucault: “Ceci n’est pas une pipe” — image/text paradox

Successors

• Groupe µ: Traité du signe visuel — systematic visual rhetoric
• Floch: Applied visual semiotics to advertising and design
• Fontanille: Tensivity and semiotics of perception

Summary Formulas

1. Dual Articulation: Painting = Plastic plane (expression) + Figurative plane (content), connected by codes.

2. Constitutive Categories: Chromatic categories (color, value, texture) constitute elements by creating contrasts; eidetic categories (straight/curved) define form.

3. Connector-Codes in Blumen-Mythos:

   • Code 1: curved : straight :: ‘celestial’ : ‘terrestrial’
   • Code 2: high : low :: ‘celestial’ : ‘terrestrial’ (peripheral zone only)
   • Code 3: linear elements : surface elements :: ‘animate’ : ‘inanimate’

4. Mythical Mediation: The “flower” is a complex object combining ‘animate’/‘inanimate’ and ‘celestial’/‘terrestrial’ traits, functioning as mediator between cosmic and human realms—embodying myth’s structural function.

5. Pictorial Poetry: When plastic and semantic oppositions correlate systematically (semi-symbolic system), painting achieves the motivated relationship between expression and content characteristic of poetic language.

Timeline

Year	Event
1918	Klee creates Blumen-Mythos watercolor
1943	Hjelmslev publishes Prolegomena to a Theory of Language
1964	Barthes publishes “Rhetoric of the Image”
1966	Greimas publishes Sémantique structurale
1968	Foucault publishes “Ceci n’est pas une pipe”
1970	Greimas publishes Du sens
1979	Greimas & Courtés publish Sémiotique. Dictionnaire
1982	Thürlemann publishes Paul Klee. Analyse sémiotique de trois peintures
1992	Groupe µ publishes Traité du signe visuel

Notable Quotes

“La pittura figurativa, manipolando dei mezzi propriamente pittorici, può giungere a mettere in relazione campi del mondo che la logica comune manterrebbe distinti.” — Thürlemann

“La pittura, nello spazio di alcuni decimetri quadrati, è capace di dare l’illusione di un mondo nuovo, di un mondo dove tutte le contraddizioni appaiono come risolte.” — Thürlemann

“Un quadro è una cosa molto complessa, costituita da un insieme di elementi che occorre prima denominare, per sottometterli in seguito ad una gerarchia, al tempo stesso, sensibile e razionale.” — Lhote, cited by Thürlemann

---

Warning

This annotation was normalised using a large language model and may contain inaccuracies. These texts serve as preliminary study resources rather than exhaustive references.