Understanding Visual Culture Essay

This essay analyzes two visual works: a Paco Rabanne fragrance advertisement and Diego Velázquez's painting, Las Meninas. The analysis of the Paco Rabanne ad focuses on how the image constructs masculinity and uses visual codes (such as the strong, muscular man and the women positioned below him) to sell the product. The essay argues that the advertisement reinforces traditional gender roles and uses rhetorical strategies to persuade the male audience. The second part analyzes a contemporary reimagining of Las Meninas, comparing it to the original. The comparison highlights changes in visual codes, such as dress, proximity of figures, and color palette, reflecting shifts in cultural values and artistic techniques. The essay concludes by discussing how these changes in visual codes affect the meaning and interpretation of the images, emphasizing the role of cultural context in understanding visual communication.

Running head: UNDERSTANDING VISUAL CULTURE
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Understanding Visual Culture
Name
Institution

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Understanding Visual Culture
Question 1
The Paco Rabanne Invictus fragrance for men advertisement illustrates a strong, muscular
and a tattooed man sending the message of an ideal man in the present society. The advert
signifies that masculinity revolves around the strength of a man and his success with women.
The image is likened to the perfume advertised thus giving it an upper hand similar to the
position of the man in the picture. The image connotes to the audience a modern man with a fit
body and preferably that of a model which remains adorable among many.
The advertisement relates the perfect feeling of the ideal man and relates it to the
fragrance product up for advertisement (Ruiz, 2015). The connotation deduced from the image
tends to persuade men to consume the product with the superior feeling likened to that of the star
in the image. The visual coding illustrates that the product is specially meant for men given the
depiction of gender from the masculine image.
The advertisement depicts superiority of the product in the illustration of what other
commercial use in similar advertising products. On the other hand, text imagery can be deduced
resulting from the bruised-like cheek which suggests the fact that the trophy victory came from
determination and spirited fight to win the best. The image of the crown alludes to the fact that
the product up for advertisement is an award-winning one whose value compares to no other
(Hazotte & Roy, 2016). Therefore, the advert serves its best purpose in marketing the product
given that the character is a well-known sportsman admired by many. The fact that he is

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respected by many relates to the prowess and the ability to win a considerable number of
consumers.
On the other hand, the image is rhetorical in the way it depicts the women at a position
lower than that of men. The image illustrates a man holding a trophy on one end and below two
ladies hanging on. In a way, the information can be relayed to mean that by using the product up
for advertisement, one can easily win the hearts of the beautiful angels holding on to the crown.
In a way, a female audience may find the image rhetorical as it tends to encourage masculinity as
higher compared to feminist as depicted in the order of occurrence in the picture (Barthes,1977).
Plainly, a male audience would find it rhetoric to glorify and associate a tattooed person to the
ideal man based on the stature of the sportsman advertising the product.
Paco Rabanne, as a product in the market, remains glorified and advertised as superior
compared to other products even those associated with women. The image displays the
superiority of the product and asserts the fact that it can be used to lure women towards men due
to the superior fragrance therein. As such, much glorification can be deduced from the image due
to the visual codes present in the image ranging from the gender, age, model aspect, and the class
of the individual.
Question 2
Las Meninas is one of the most famous paintings created by Velazquez towards the end
of his artist’s career. The image represents an intimate moment in the times of the Spanish royal
fraternity. Grizzle remakes Velazquez’s painting makes use of visual codes to make his images
more appealing and with a message that communicates with the viewers. In the image, there is
the use of dress code where the type of dressing represents the present generation as opposed to
the creation by Velazquez which indicated an old fashioned or the past century type of dressing

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code. All the participants in the first and the second image illustrate the differences, and thus
meaning can be drawn from the case to represent the change in dressing code that has been
reconstructed (Press,1999).
The images differ in the way they display meaning based on the portrayal of people in the
images. In the first picture, there is a mixed gender and age based on the image with the social
class evident displaying that of an upper-class level. However, the second image displays a
mixed gender with females dominating where the age is composed of young individuals. The
messages can be seen through the images and the dressing embraced by the people (Jeffrey,
2008). Thus, the visual coding from the dressing to the looks assists in driving the interpretation
of the images.
At the same time, the reconstruction is observed in the manner in which nonverbal codes
have been used speaks volume of the image. In the first image, the proximity between the people
indicates a coherent family who does things together as opposed to the second creation (Arizpe
& Styles, 2004). The second image reconstructed uses proximity where people can be seen apart
with some in separate rooms thus displaying the message of a far distance observed among the
parties in the image.
The first image is composed of a colored image which embraces less of special codes. In
the reconstruction, the image appears in white and black which relay the aspect of realism in the
image thus demonstrating the change in use of technical codes (McKee, 2003). Further, the
image of the walls and the different rooms raise the possibility of denotation where the reader of
the visual image is forced to assume that the people in the picture are in a house despite the fact
that not all areas are shown as in the previous image (Arizpe & Styles, 2004). At the same time,

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the transformation raises a different perception on the connotation of the images. The meaning of
both images can be a arrived at through the cultural experiences from the side of the reader.
In the first picture, there is the presence of a more coherent family synonymous with a royal
family context with the second image transforming the same to a lesser consistent family where
everyone is apart and trying to do their activities.
Thus, there is a connotation element being observed in the second image which differs
from the case in the first image (McKee, 2003). Lastly, the presence of technology is present in
the latest reconstructed image as opposed to the last which is more of a renaissance painting
improvement as compared to the digital media art where elements bring out more meaning and
clarity.

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References
Arizpe, E., & Styles, M. (2004). Children reading pictures: Interpreting visual texts. routledge.
Barthes, R. (1977). Rhetoric of the Image.
Hazotte, C., & Roy, M. (2016). Portrayals of men in advertising.
Jeffrey, I. (2008). How to read a photograph. New York: Abrams.
McKee, A. (2003). Textual analysis: A beginner's guide. Sage.
Press, R. O. (1999). Art, common sense and photography Victor Burgin. Visual Culture: The
Reader, 41.
Ruiz, I. F. (2015). The Fragrance of a New Man? Masculinity and Fashion in Young Males’
Cologne Commercials. A Journal of Identity and Culture, 3, 86-104.
Sonka, M., Hlavac, V., & Boyle, R. (2014). Image processing, analysis, and machine vision.
Cengage Learning.