My Interpretation of the Flower Picture based on Van Leeuwen's Theory

Based on my personal background and life experiences which I posses thus far, I would see this picture of flower as the following:

With the flowers fore-grounded, it is the most salient object in this whole picture. Hence, it is apparent these flowers are the main subject in the picture. To me, the fresh flowers symbolise life, as we see the live flowers growing healthily, stretching themselves high up towards the direction of the sky. This is like a metaphor of an individual’s life, as the individual lives and constantly tries to reach new heights in his/her life. I’m not sure what the orangey parts of the flowers are, but I assume them to be the pollens. From this, we see that the “main body” of the flowers (the white petals) may only be able to reach a certain height, but the pollens seem to be helping the flowers to achieve a greater height by growing out of the “main body” & continuing to surge higher. This may be symbolical of how an individual would push himself/herself really hard to maximise his/her potential in order to attain more than what s/he thinks s/he is capable of.

Moving along the line of an individual’s life, we also see flowers which have wilted near the lower half of the picture. This seems to foreshadow what might happen to those healthy flowers. These wilted flowers also serve to remind us that life is really fragile and that everyone is believed to be constantly living at the edge of the precipice. So, we ought to live life to the fullest.

I think it would be apt to add that the colour white on the flowers would be symbolical of the innocence, purity and all things good about what white colour connotes. And in my case, these features are representative of the humans. I want to remind everyone, however, that the connotation of white colour is condescending due to its history – the perpetuation of the Whites discrimination against the “coloured people”. Thus, I am unwilling to add this connotation of white colour into my interpretation of this picture.

Do note that the aforesaid interpretation of the picture is only one of the many potential meanings the picture presents. There are, in fact, more affordances but these affordances are not teased out due to the limited life experiences and knowledge of the interpreter.