Roland Barthes Rhetoric Of The Image Analysis

Roland Barthes’ Rhetoric of the image breaks down the ways in which individual signs in advertisements work. The first, linguistic message is literally what is written in the advert and is useful for bringing the advertisements overall meaning in context. The second, the uncoded iconic message is the tautological qualities of everything within the frame; the photograph itself and the objects it contains. The third, is the coded iconic message, essentially the connotative meanings of the ad that the signs work together to create which, in turn illustrates Thomson’s idea of a rational core and a decorative periphery. Goddard suggests that advertisements have become art (Thompson, 212), therefore, one should interpret them as such, taking into …show more content…
Take for example the 100% Pure (Tourism New Zealand) tourism campaign that uses commercials and still images to emphasise New Zealand’s natural landscape and an ‘outdoorsy lifestyle’, (Stahl, 237) or the Mitre10 Sandpit commercial which explicitly states that “DIY is in our DNA”. Skellerup’s advertisement, through signifying practicality and ‘usefulness’ ties into this notion of DIY, and, gumboots are a form of interacting with New Zealand’s natural landscape. These advertisements avoid certain connotations as deliberately as they include them. Skellerup traditionally is tied to New Zealand’s dairy industry (skellerup.co.nz) and as with te 100% Pure advertisement the choice is made to exclude the issue of the dairy industries pollution of New Zealand’s Riverways, (Stahl, 237) Thus, this ad further contributes to the problematic confirmation of the myth used in New Zealand’s advertising industry when trying to capture identity and nationhood. The interrelationship of Barthes three key messages used in this ad privilege a certain cultural image of New Zealand, thereby applying it to their brand persuading the consumer to purchase their ‘Red Band