Scott McCloud's Unifying Quadrants
I got pretty excited when I saw the following quadrants in Scott McCloud's TED talk on Understanding Comics because it ties together a lot of big ideas.
The first slide of quadrants showed four categories of comics, which he cleverly labelled classicist, animist, formalist, and iconoclast:
![FliA9](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uoDgpAKM9n4RNt3rIakPruNrx2FT_ORv2MRTCiI-iSZQLje4kVSa_STGbhHfceZhGGb6Bl_Qa80KS5HYxkLBZB1ig4KamAu4x27OQQDc5YUBqxbNUiismozWDF3NLAkSmJWQ=s0-d)
But then he pointed out how they correspond to Jung's four subdivisions of human thought: sensation, intuition, thinking, and feeling.
![SNAG-0003](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_t2KExPzVEA6O-2iGzrO8BoloJssETIcL6AQTfmjo43fhLCSpg-iAa7xJd3k14IHOdNhLhZmOA1v9rJcgO6RE8JVH8PoInNhBW4jxHuNt2gvNEOnfw8AmrUCF6j4FrOW7i64g=s0-d)
The upper and lower halves correspond to tradition vs. revolution:
![SNAG-0000](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uLrDDErzrpdor_KCK7C-pnKlnU_F_zsM3iJeoQwakbrSLhR94cS5enpvJM8iRLxcv5yvmkf1f4fHTE9k6egxIVU11p_iRVSc4OUJrMjZpbbWF2pNIT6hm5NegVJ88PZTp7=s0-d)
The left and right halves to art vs. life:
![a](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_vcrE75v9QlFIzEX7z4MMgDA93yNXu1sV_OtXUmlqkQWKAK9InZgyE1HujCu5IFmCQWwWfmTDQfFj6ytwam_PpamWF8JJlN6xM73ODCHeUk1UPiub69wI1X_-ml_XP0b7sZ=s0-d)
One diagonal contrasts form and content:
![SNAG-0001](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_vuaDI5LFVrWH_qnuVFK8L6V7O2gdLzk5P-yMF0G_mJfxSOyaqDhHj_zMzhLb1b22zWCLRJOn1I8k7AT_8Y1kdUc5Od2oNPZVMtIHo2e6XlzBKCJClWcr54oYtDjZ7XAC5TQg=s0-d)
The other contrasts beauty and truth:
![SNAG-0002](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uvjTC6st2uqhjyLPWB_TAdEIJ23-CXY6UWAHHgdAQah21UyLCTRgjay29mWKuNt-KMSC21fnenxak8qwMyc4Oncq-d8WBZ_GVGCzUKFHN9AmsUhZ51MQb_C2-1KIaY2k3gIQ=s0-d)
Playing around with this, it's interesting to deduce that:
Putting it all together:
![FliB7](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_vWqAwjLqFONLOtRyPfSWSzDGi9xe6xPUlnAlP2wSjtBeI26-UpCR3995cWStehm0zRcOyYUlDBOBdKlKxfvk0yg2jB294gly9CWHtbnb_KyBFk56zzDP2KJiaNjzhhY5GKRQ=s0-d)
Music:
![FliAA](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_t4pd6fTVxuwjWjUG9obuTrwIPT7ZWh27LRT0V6FT7TZebId_Fd-51H8TKqrrD7BJGRpc8aAUvs4-l1FqQtEQfTV9KWEyZWMY58AasNFbk5CiHqvLWKSya6ZYzJj4rxxvn6Fw=s0-d)
Movies:
![FliAB](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uubqrTwFtzAGQ5ZB-qZOdgCUblu426MzYryweLafV5kVLU2-LQ9EgRTgkNKX5yJc3s16kpL0Bu7RBO9HOfiyA_dV3tCRS8bSLKS-Iueoq550LIZYE7gXyOn8phi5c8LuFe=s0-d)
Fine Art:
The first slide of quadrants showed four categories of comics, which he cleverly labelled classicist, animist, formalist, and iconoclast:
But then he pointed out how they correspond to Jung's four subdivisions of human thought: sensation, intuition, thinking, and feeling.
The upper and lower halves correspond to tradition vs. revolution:
The left and right halves to art vs. life:
One diagonal contrasts form and content:
The other contrasts beauty and truth:
Playing around with this, it's interesting to deduce that:
- Tradition = Sensation + Intuition
- Revolution = Thinking + Feeling
- Art = Sensation + Thinking
- Life = Intuition + Feeling
- Revolution + Art = Form
- Tradition + Life = Content
- Art + Tradition = Beauty
- Life + Revolution = Truth
Putting it all together:
Music:
Movies:
Fine Art: