Reconstruction of multimodal aesthetic critical discourse analysis framework

Altogether, there are four photographic pictures in Light show held in Xi’an, China's Shaanxi. We will analyse them from the three major categories, namely, reproduction, interaction and composition. For reproduction category, no reaction, speech and mental processes are found. Only action process is present. Three intransitivity vectors, that is, the lantern floating in the night sky, the flashing ‘Fu’ character and two Crested Ibis lanterns flying high can be seen in the four pictures, which are of good temporal and spatial stability, and are relatively quiet and serene. Ziyun Tower, ‘Fu’ and Crested Ibis are the main participants, playing the role of commander, and the rest are subordinate roles. The pictures mainly reflect the theme of the lantern festival that blends history and modernity through hints, symbolising the extensive and profound traditional culture, sound ecological environment and high-tech technology of the ancient city of Xi’an. In the interaction category, there is no contact with the audience that can be witnessed in the four pictures. There are close-range, medium-range and long-range shots. There are drones and the word ‘Fu’ in the near scene; in the near scene, there are Ziyun Tower and floating lanterns, and in the middle scene there is a Crested Ibis lamp. Judging from the attitude, it can be found that the viewer has always to look down at the drone, look up at Ziyun Tower, the character of ‘Fu’ and the Crested Ibis lamp. The colour saturation and distinction are high; there are not many types of colour, except yellow, green, blue and dark night; the vividness is not high, and the colour matching is fairly harmonious. The close-up closes the social distance between the viewer and the drone and the word ‘Fu’. Although the distant view has widened the social distance between Ziyun Tower and the viewer, together with the near view, a time tunnel is created, which shocks the viewers. The head-up view with the character ‘Fu’ and the Crested Ibis lamp make the viewer feel like living in the blessing and nature. The main reappearance participant is always in a haze, so its manifestation is limited. The background and environment displayed in the four images have the characteristics of the ancient city. The inability to form eye contact between the reappearance participant and the viewer keeps the viewer in the position of a third-party spectator and reduces the appeal of the picture. As all the participants in the reproduction appear relatively fuzzy and hazy, causing the beauty of the pictures to be greatly reduced which, unfortunately, makes it impossible to create a better aesthetic experience for the viewer. As for the composition category, it can be found that the Ziyun Tower and the drone are arranged on the upper and lower parts of the centre line of the picture, respectively. The most prominent feature is the large, neatly arranged green drones. The word ‘Fu’ occupies two-thirds of the picture, while Ziyun Tower is located in the most prominent position in the picture. Ziyun Tower and the drones are in the most eye-catching position. The four pictures have a clear frame, and viewers can easily recognise that these are four independent pictures with related content and consistent themes. The four pictures have successfully achieved their intended meaning, that is, Xi’an is a metropolis where tradition and modernity coexists. However, the colour of the four pictures is blurred and their sharpness is extremely poor, which affect the beauty of the pictures.

The verbal part of Light show held in Xi’an, China's Shaanxi is the text below the four pictures, which are composed of the following three clauses: ①

Drones are about to fly for a light show in Xi’an, capital of northwest China's Shannxi Province, February 20, 2018.

According to the framework in Table 1, we describe and explain their aesthetic characteristics from three aspects: conceptual, interpersonal and text functions. Clause ① is a relational process clause with two participants, namely, ‘drones’ and ‘to fly for a light show’. Clause ② is an innovative material process clause. The actor is ‘a total of 300 drones in two groups’, the verb is ‘performed’ and the object is ‘a light show’ in the past tense, and the object is the result of innovation, that is, a light show. Clause ③ is also an innovative material process clause. The actor is ‘drones’ and the verb is ‘form’. In the present tense, the result of innovation is the shape of a Chinese character. It can be seen that the journalist uses clause ① to establish a connection between the drone and the light show, so that readers (who are also the viewers mentioned above) can understand that the drone is the protagonist of the light show. The journalist uses clauses ② and ③ to describe the machine that performed unprecedentedly in the lantern show. As for the interpersonal function, the subject of clause ① is ‘drones’, plural; the qualifier is of present tense. In clause ②, the subject is a nominal phrase, the qualifier is performed, generally of past tense, active, positive, and neutral. Clause ③'s subject is the plural of drones, and the qualifier is of present tense. Clause ① is used to express the action that will take place, indicating that the journalist intends to use clause ① to create a kind of presence for readers in the space-time dimension. Clause ② is of the past tense, which means that the journalist is reporting what happened to the reader. Clause ③ shows that the journalist intends to create an immersive feeling for readers in the space-time dimension. As for the textual function, the themes of the three clauses all choose a non-iconic single theme, that is, the drones. Compared with clauses ① and ③, clause ② has a slightly more complex theme structure. The structure of two prepositional phrases is used cleverly to explain the total number and grouping of drones. There are no explicit cohesive words in the text, only semantic cohesion and coherence are used. Since theme is the starting point of information, it can be judged that the three clauses are all based around the drone. Drones are the starting point of information and the topic. As mentioned above, drones symbolise modern technology, so the aesthetic message conveyed to the readers by the three clauses is that Xi’an is a city with high-tech technology and thus, a city of technological beauty.

The brightly lit Ziyun Tower and drones create a new and wonderful mood of a time tunnel for the viewer. They make people wander between history and modernity, fall into a state of ecstasy, successfully manipulating the spiritual world of the viewer. They mainly reproduce a beautiful visual experience for the viewer and; at the same time, they perfectly fit the theme of the light show, that is, to create a magical journey and establish an international metropolis image of Xi’an by blending tradition and modernity.

However, the participants in the pictures are too complicated and violate the scientific aesthetic principle of Occam's razor, that is, ‘in the field of knowledge, if it is not necessary, the number of entities should not be increased’ [8]. In addition to the square, night sky, lanterns floating in the night sky, tree shadows, Furong Lake and the small boats floating on Furong Lake, there are even black outlines of equipment debugging vehicles, dark shadows of several equipment debugging people, railings, distant places, half of a chimney, two photographers standing and squatting, etc. It is difficult for these participants to create meaning in the context of this news, which weakens the aesthetic impact of the pictures, affects the visual enjoyment and emotional pleasure of the viewers and are certainly, of no aesthetic value. In addition, the colour of all the four pictures is very blurred, which affects the viewers’ visual aesthetic experience to a certain extent.

Close text reading found that the text description does not have the obvious features of form beauty, and did not help create the neat beauty of sentence patterns and the beauty of phonology. This shows that news writers did not deliberately use the formal beauty of speech to create interest and enjoyment for readers.

Through a relational process clause, the news writer associates the drone with the light show in the text description. This is a perfect application of deviation rate, because common sense tells readers that the use of drones is nothing more than data collection, media broadcasting, environmental monitoring, aerial photography, etc. The use of light performances can be described as unreasonable and clever, far beyond the reader's common perception, which really counts as a move out of the box and by the use of new methods. The reader's interest is instantly attracted and their spiritual world is enriched. The freshness of novelty emerges spontaneously, the beauty is conceived in this variation. However, there are many shortcomings in the text description. For example, the theme of the three clauses is drones, and the residues are either the time and place of the light show, the explanation of the word ‘Fu’ or the explanation of the administrative status of Xi’an, with no doubt in them. This choice can perfectly focus the reader's attention on drones and light shows. However, there is no mention of the imagery constructed in the pictures such as the mysterious time tunnel, the harmonious ecological environment and the long history and culture of the ancient city of Xi’an, which failed to match the pictures to stimulate and strengthen the readers’ aesthetic experience. Therefore, we believe that the collaboration between the text and the pictures in the Light show held in Xi’an, China's Shaanxi did not collide with more social and aesthetic meanings. In addition, the text description neither did not further alienate the emotional experience stimulated by the pictures into a perceptible and concrete external feeling nor did it highlight the theme of this lantern festival. In short, Light show held in Xi’an, China's Shaanxi presents both positive and negative beauty, with the negative beauty slightly winning over the positive beauty.