MEANING 1

Representation: 'what we see and recognize from environment and and experience.' This picture demonstrates representational aspects because it shows the artist creating her rendition of how she wants to represent the world to the viewers of her works.  In her paintings she takes real people and paints onto them, and thereby creating a 2D image out of 3 dimensional things.  This particular photo is very 'lifelike'- it takes aspects that the artist wanted to focus on (the shape and position of the person, the casualness of the moment) and plays down other aspects (like the color).  But the resulting photograph of the subject is not an exact portrayal of reality, instead it represents it.  It visually reports a feeling or conveys a message that the artist hoped to evoke.  What is emphasized is not the details of reality, and so such details are ignored.

Abstraction: 'simplification toward a more intense and distilled meaning.'  This example of abstraction, which I found at an art store where I purchased a sketch book, has stripped away realistic detail (save for the cable car).  The majority of the painting is a mix of shapes and colors which have little or no connection with familiar visual data that we see and experience in reality.  This is not a painting that specifically references any one realistic visual experience; it is more general and can encompass a larger field of the imagination.  The designs within the painting are simplified down to their basic elements.  I think the desired result was more to create a sense or a feeling rather than to portray an image.  This is not concept-, function-, or thought- based abstraction, but instead, at least for this particular painting, it's intended purpose is to convey the message that this store is an art store, and this is the kind of work you can create with the supplies they sell.

'A symbol, in order to be effective, must not only be seen and recognized but also remembered and even reproduced'.  This particular image is a symbol because it is recognized by large numbers of people around the world to stand for the coffee establishment Starbucks Coffee.  It is not the image itself that Starbucks wishes people to see, but the desired effect is for people to see the image and then associate it with a hot coffee drink.  Over the years, the company has redesigned the symbol and has made it more and more simplified; by making it less detailed it is easier for the viewer to quickly decipher what the symbol is and what it means to them, the consumer.  This kind of symbol is a logotype; a trademarked icon that refers to the company symbolically.