Italo Calvino - "Visibility"

After reading Italo Calvino’s “Visibility,” I have gained new insight to imagination and its importance. One point that particularly stands out to me is “We may distinguish between two types of imaginative process: the one that starts with the words and arrives at the visual image, and the one that starts with the visual image and arrives at its verbal expression” (83). To me, this reminded me of reading a book before it is adapted into a movie, or vice versa. Personally, I feel that the first imaginative process, starting with the word, is so much more powerful. There have been several times I have read and been in awe of a book, but find myself extremely disappointed and almost angry when I watch the movie-version because the visual representation before me just isn’t what I imagined it to be; as it is the visual representation of someone else’s imagination. This article reminded me of Saltz's point of art being an escape from reality. To me, imagination can have the same effect; getting "lost" in a book being a perfect example of this notion. in addition, I feel that art and imagination are, in many ways, one in the same and that one can't really exist without the other.