ON THE PHENOMENON OF THE �WAGNERIAN PAINTING�: THE DIALECTICS OF SENSE-MAKING, PERCEPTION AND INTERPRETATION

Abstract

Having given the concept of �absolute music� a negative connotation in 1846, Richard Wagner not only inspired discussions about the correlation of form and content in music, but also affected painters, who were looking for the ideal of non-mimetic meaning-generating strategies in music, and whose art was specified as the �Wagnerian painting� by French critic Theodore de Wyzewa. Using the historical and the comparative approaches, as well as the semantic and structural analysis of the expressive means in music and painting, the paper: 1) considers Wyzewa�s programme with regard to certain correlations of his ideas with the thoughts of his predecessors; 2) interprets three steps of Wyzewa�s gnoseological algorithm (from �reality� to �consciousness�) as the correlate to components of sense-making in Wagnerian dramas: the �sensation� is generated by the pure sense of musical material, the �notion� is similar to the extra-musical meaning of leitmotifs, the �emotion� is the essence of an artwork; 3) projects this algorithm onto the Wagnerian painter�s creative process; 4) demonstrates various non-mimetic strategies of the meaning formation in painting, close to the algorithm for connecting extra-musical and immanent musical meanings in Wagnerian dramas; 5) discusses the epistemological mechanism in the process of perceiving the �Wagnerian painting�: from a purely visual impression (like �sensation�) � through actualizing cultural memory and an artist�s intentions (intellectual mediation, �notion�) � to super-intellectual reflection (synthetic �emotion�). The paper will specifically concern itself with the creative process in the fin de siecle era and to renew the ideas about the basis of synthesis of arts. As it is the art of Henri Fantin-Latour that is considered as the example of the Wagnerian painting by Wyzewa himself, the article will focus on this oeuvre in particular.