The eyes and speeches. Crosses between the poetics of Rubén Darío, Luis de Góngora and visual culture.

Abstract

The study of «visual culture» has remarkably developed in the first century of the twenty-first century. This is a promising fact that brings forward more organic conceptions of cultural history. Yet it is still a matter of debate whether the images produced by certain spheres of «power» are exclusively oriented to political propaganda. Some researchers claim that more attention should be paid to cultural groundings, scientific ideals, religious perspectives and the role of individual or collective identities. This paper is inscribed in this wide perspective and postulates the need to consider, in the context of reception processes, those literary texts consisting of comments to visual images. As a contribution to this proposal, we shall examine Darío and Góngora’s compositions whose poetic referents are structured around the visual arts. We shall analyze the intertextual links and other aspects regarding the reception of images in both poets’ contexts.