Introduction
Ekphrasis means “to explain,” literally from the Greek ex--out + phrazein-- declare, tell. In ancient times, it was considered a rhetorical technique, a test of a speaker’s ability to evoke not only the likeness of a person, place, or thing, but also the emotional aura of that subject.1 Successful rhetoricians must have realized the value of figurative language and abstractions in capturing the essence of say, Mount Parnassus, or Aristotle’s cousin George. Nowadays, the term refers to “a literary description of or commentary on a visual work of art,” as defined in Merriam Webster, but the purpose is still the same, especially in that sense of evoking the emotional essence of the thing described for the listener or reader.
A key word here is “evoke.” Evoke means “to call forth” and “to bring to mind or recollection.” It is reminiscent of the phrase “call to me,” as in, “this painting calls to me.” A poem or a painting calls to me because it calls something forth in me--a memory or an emotion. In recording that memory/emotion, we participate in ekphrasis.
Ekphrasis inherently values the subjective response of the viewer, in this case, my student-poets. It is such a suitable genre for middle school students because it allows so much room for self-exploration. This ekphrastic poetry assignment asks students to interpret their moods in order to interpret the art.
Putting their subjective response front and center may be novel and interesting enough to engage even the most reluctant ELA students--if they have the right tools. So, my seventh graders will first develop toolkits of emotion words and color words (since colors are so connotative of emotion) to convey their feelings about a work of art. Happily, all of this results in what I will call a “secondary curriculum” of social emotional learning (SEL). The subtext of this unit is that our moods interpret the world for us.2 We can develop emotional intelligence (EI) as we learn to accurately describe them and understand how they work.
This unit will have four main layers that support aesthetic experience and the production of ekphrastic poetry: 1. ) social emotional learning through the development of a “personal lexicon of emotions,” 2.) aesthetic education through the study of art terms and color theory, as well as a guided tour of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 3.) small group work in close reading of ekphrastic poetry and detailed observation of each poem’s “muse” painting, and 4.) recursive creative writing in the form of poetry that responds to a student-selected work of art viewed at the museum.
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