I'm writing a paper on artwork, what does it represent when the artist uses bowls? What do Bowls symbolize?

Answer 1

Well, they are containers. And what are containers, vessels. you are a bowl because you have the capacity to contain something like knowledge, understanding, emotion, spirit, a Soul. A bowl could be anything that holds sustainance and sustainance is food. And what is food. Food is something that we need in order to sustain ourselves. Food could be knowledge or understanding so a bowl could be a book or a classroom or a library or an entire civilization. What an object sybolizes has to do with its function. Think about its function and try to follow my reasoning. The important thing is not what I think a bowl represents but what does the artist who made it think that it represents.

Answer 2

Each piece of art must be analyzed individually. Each artist has their own language, there is not an agreed-to language for each item. Artists are very free spirited, and don't agree to those ways. But, that said, some items, like a bloody knife, have pretty predictable effects on an audience.

Bowls would have lots of meanings, so you have to see what other symbolism the artist uses to convey their message. Besides the meanings mentioned previously, bowls could symbolize hunger when empty, and fulfillment when full. This could further represent any kind of need or desire for something, the full bowl conversely symbolizing satisfaction of desire. That's how you critique any art, and find your own meaning in a piece.

Answer 3

I would suppose that bowls would symbolize femininity, given the spheric shape. Smoothe, curved, hollow, like a womb. Similar feelings represented by a bowl could include protection, security, warmth. Being hugged, being enveloped. On another level, it could obviously imply sex.

A similar but not completely identical comparison would be a symbolism related to food, dining, the kitchen, nourishment, sustenance. A mother or a grandmother's cooking. Childhood.

Of course the context would change the meaning of the bowl. A bowl could symbolize a longing for or a lack of these things.

I think a bowl could also symbolize earth, or water, depending on the context. An environment or a vessel for life, blood, water, food, necessity.