Jonathan,
Sorry I was so unclear. That's what you get when you leave the object out of a sentence!
I understand having a clear goal as a path to better images. Even there, I suspect we disagree, but I get it.
Here's what I was trying to ask: Why should an artist's intent matter to the viewer?
Take your images (You're batting two-for-three, in my book ): I only see what you've shown me, not what you intended to tell me.
I can, however, just by looking, try to infer a bit of your visual intent. The arch clearly looks different-- and quite nice, BTW. The wall very eloquently contrasts solidity with evanescence and becomes something of an elegy set in stone. Your Seussian scene, though, fails, to my eyes at least, in that there's not enough of the real in there to let me judge just what you're making un-real.
Then again, had I not known your stated intentions, I'd hardly be lost in evaluating those images. They work, or don't, in and of themselves. They suggest their own meanings, intended or not, true or not, and leave themselves open to each viewer's projections.