figuration

1. (art) Representation through visual forms.Examples: "To recapitulate: consider the human form—skin, bone, and flesh. Consider the painting—surface, structure, and pigment. With a little license, the first gives us the ingredients for what might be called human or “figurative” figuration; the second gives us the ingredients for abstract or “nonfigurative” figuration."countableuncountable

2. (sociology) A structure through which people are joined, or the process of constructing such structures.Examples: "Figurations of interdependent people make up many webs of interdependence, which are characterized in part by different balances of power of many sorts, such as families, states, towns or simply groups."countableuncountable