SOURCE: Mussari, Mark. “H. C. Branner and the Colors of Consciousness.” Scandinavian Studies 71, no. 1 (spring 1999): 41-66.

In the following essay, Mussari studies H. C. Branner's use of pictorial language in his writings as a means to evoke images underlying human consciousness.

                                                  Time past and time future What might have been and what has been Point to one end, which is always present. 

T. S. Eliot

Commenting on the power of the image in his essay “Kunst og virkelighed” (1962), H. C. Branner observed that “de store forandringer viser sig altid først i kunsten, hvad der er en simpel følge af at billedet går forud for tanken” (30) [the great changes always appear first in art, a simple result of the fact that pictures precede thoughts]. In expressionistic language, Branner often struggles to capture the pictures of the multivalent dimensions of consciousness and creates antimimetic imagery that, especially...