Similar to Barthes but apply on paintings, Erwin Panofsky37 noted that paintings have three levels
of meaning: pre-iconographical description, iconographical analysis, and iconological
interpretation. The pre-iconographical description consists of recognising lines, colours and
volumes in a painting that represents objects and events. This primary level of understanding
allows ‘everyone can recognise the shape and behaviour of human beings, animals and plants’.38
The iconographical analysis deals with stories, allegories, themes and concepts. The secondary
level of understanding depends upon knowing the stories, concepts and so on.39 The iconological
interpretation is the tertiary level of understanding relates with placing elements of the paintings
into the social, philosophical, religious and political contexts of the times and places that one
wishes to understand.