Meaning-making in the European semiosphere

The aim of the paper is to examine how to bring together the general, large area of "semiosphere"(Lotman), the detailed ("close") analysis of cultural objects, and the point of the flexible methodology we call interdisciplinary. The semiosphere I address is the (uncertain) one we call "Europe". The starting point is the semiotic status of the exclamation mark as I have used it to connect two preoccupations in the title of a film I made in 2020. The heart of the analysis is ambiguity, in language as well as in other domains. This serves to enhance the uncertainties that always accompany semiotic analysis, which in my view is for the better. After the comments triggered by my film, I turn to visual art as the apparent "other"of language, but through a reflection on colour, I reject that binary in favour of the more flexible concept of the figural (Lyotard). Throughout the article I also undermine the opposition between still and moving images.