As is painting so is poetry: Use of text in visual arts

Since ancient times, text has found its place in the visual culture, therefore in visual arts. As the social, economic, geographical and political structures of the societies changed, the impacts echoed in the art scene. As a result, text was used for several different reasons in different time periods in art history. This thesis, presenting a chronological examination of use of text in art history (i) seeks an answer for how text has become an autonomous art form and (ii) defines its function of use in the history of art by examining the examples from the different periods from art history. (iii) When examining the examples from history, the function of text and its relation with the form are considered. The political and social shift in society and how it affected the relationship between text and image are clarified. (iv) The findings have shown that related to the historical and politic events, text has been used for different aims in art, revealed these functions according to the period, and exposed how text has become an autonomous art form Keywords: text art, visual arts, text, language, image, image and text relationship