Translation has firmed its roots in every industry. Be it technical, legal, or medical industry or to deal with the numeric values in the business and finance translation it has been there for the people to take help from while expanding their operations. Art translation has also become one of the demanding domains following the bandwagon of localizing and expanding businesses. Localizing as we all know is significant to reach potential users and customers. Not many people are aware of art translation but it is the process of translating artistic content and artwork. This may include translating the content relevant to paintings, sculptures, movies, and films, from one language to another. It goes without mentioning that it is an extremely challenging task. The translators need to be professional with subject matter expertise as this subject requires a deep understanding of the subject.
Moreover, understanding the original work and its intent along with its significance and cultural context is a must. The translation company that the people and artists hire to translate their artwork should be professional and good enough to work diligently. Moreover, the need for translators with proven experience is evident due to the complexities that this subject involves. Art is intangible and it can only be felt when it is dealt with creatively. The people who have to deal with the artistic text should have an insight into art and artistic activities. Only then can they feel the aesthetics involved with the work.
Moreover, the hired art translation company should also ascertain that the people they have assigned the task of translation understand the challenges that come with this type of translation and also know how to navigate with these.
Here are some of the challenges of art translation.
The need for cultural and linguistic knowledge
The artists produce the art under a certain cultural impression. It gets challenging for the translators to deal with cultural indication as well as linguistic knowledge while working on it. Art has deep ties and is intensely rooted with cultural factors and translators have to go through certain informative sessions to get away with it. The client and art translation company should work on multiple sessions where translators sit with the artists and get to know the work of the artists in order to develop an understanding to translate content effectively. A painting that talks about a certain religion or mythological scene can have different meanings in different cultures. Therefore, to deal with such challenges translators should make sure that they have enough language and cultural knowledge.
The difficulty of capturing the nuances of meaning
Art is a complex subject and not everyone has a taste for it. A painting that one considers a marvelous work can be a piece of mere canvas with some strokes for another. Getting the crux and context becomes challenging for the translators. There are techniques of symbolism and metaphors in art’s realm, that can be hands down, the toughest aspect of translation. A painting that they paint using red color to reflect the feeling of passion and joy can struggle to depict similar significance in other regions. Also, people there could be allergic to red color considering it a color of danger. Thus, this whole scenario makes the translation challenging for the translator. It is important that the translators have the profound knowledge and are able to creatively find a way out to captivate the nuances and meanings of art.
Therefore, it is important that the translation company finalized for the task should also understand the need to get nuances and should guide their translators accordingly.
Creative differences
Art is all about creativity. It involves creativity and innovation and is a creative process rather than a robotic exercise. Therefore, it is important that the art translation company that has been hired for the job takes care of this factor. However, this often becomes an element that makes the translators strive. They have a hard time connecting to the creativity that this work demands. The translation vendors hence should ensure that they only hire people who admire creativity and are creative souls themselves to appreciate the efforts and dedication that artwork involves.
The lack of resources
Translating artwork is relatively a new domain of translation and hence experienced translators are not available commonly. Also, there are limited resources available for art translation. This factor makes it tough for the translators to deal with the art translation. The businesses as well as the onboard translation company should take this fact seriously. They should make the helpful resources accessible for the translators so that they can have the relevant information when needed.
Conclusion
Art translation is an important task however, it has many challenges involved. Translation companies and clients should collaborate and take certain initiatives that can help to make art more accessible to a wider audience and promote cross-cultural understanding. The main challenges include understanding the need for cultural and linguistic knowledge and capturing the nuances and meaning of the work intended to translate. Translators also have to challenge creative differences and the lack of resources also makes the task testing difficult.
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