To see without understanding is to see with a closed mind. To be visually literate, the mind must draw on a memory storage, perceive relationships, make comparisons. If an individual's experiences and education are shallow and limited, so are his perceptions shallow and limited.

Education in the discipline of literacy has not provided individuals with the basic quality of mind and knowledge with which to meaningfully control and order perceptual experience. Visual literacy is based on the discipline, the knowledge, of visual codes. A sophisticated literacy is necessary today in order to understand visual analogies and to avoid the consequences of visual illiteracy, random perception, and escapism through self-deception. The thesis of the present article is that a disciplined knowledge of visual analogies and to avoid the consequences of visual illiteracy: random perception and escapism through self-deception. The concern of communicators in all fields.