Visual Motifs in Ingmar Bergman’s Cinema

Abstract

Ingmar Bergman’s film work is characterized by the mastery of the use of different visual motifs, that is to say, the symbolic concepts expressed in the images, continually repeated and capable to contain all the reflections which define the creative genius of the artist. Therefore, we can certainly speak about the existence of cinematographic iconography that, although it originates from the pictorial iconographic sources, also develops its own motives. The objective of this article is the study, the identification and the analysis of the most representative visual motifs in Ingmar Bergman’s films: the mirror, the eroticism, and the death. Through these symbols, we can understand how Bergman conceived the ideas of love, sex, woman, family, the world of appearances, postmodern society, the transcendence of life and the uncertainty about the existence of God.