Word AND Image, Word IN Image, or Word AS Image? Visual/Verbal Options for the Writer, Artist, and Audience

“Ut pictura poesis”: this phrase from the Roman poet Horace has been widely invoked down through the ages: “As is the picture, so is the poem.” For centuries poets have written about paintings, and painters have illustrated scenes from the poets. But Horace seems to be claiming something more profound than that, provoking perennial arguments about the fundamental similarity—or difference—between the two arts. In this essay I will look at some of the most common ways that literary works and visual images have been perceived as parallel yet intersecting enterprises. Then I will focus specifically on the role that words have played within works of visual art, particularly in the past century. Finally, I will offer my own interpretation of Horace’s phrase, suggesting that words and images do not just lead parallel lives. Rather, they simply cannot do without each other.