"Ut pictura poesis". The rendering of an aesthetic artistic image in form and content

The chapter provides a theoretical focus on the way people who are visually impaired process images translated into words and into sensorial experience. In particular, it describes the controversial issue of the role and the effect of metaphor in poetic language (a type of language that characterizes the language of art) and the complexity of communicating metaphors to blind people. This in fact requires the deconstructing and reconstructing of the complex associations typical of metaphors and – on the part of the end-users – of challenging mental exercises. A deep understanding of the mechanisms of language is crucial in contexts of special pedagogy, built around the needs of users who wish to explore unknown realities. This is made possible by a wise use of words, silence and specifically of touch. This cognitive function is therefore illustrated in detail both theoretically and practically. In fact, the chapter devotes a full section to the way touch is used and trained through new didactic and pedagogical methods at the Italian Anteros Tactile Museum. Such applications relate both to the visually impaired and the normally sighted.