Academic literature on the topic 'Art, Modern – 20th century – Political aspects'

The titular problem of Croatian political poster, regarded as an art of margins, is treated by the author, according to the order of chapters, in four main aspects: historical, aesthetic, socio-political, and cultural one. The development of poster art, correlated with national history in 19th and 20th century Croatia, is presented in the chapter “In the vapour of history”. In the next chapters some particular sections of the searching field are described. These sections are as follows: technique of montage of the pictures, modern iconoclastic practices, chaos vs. order, and the place (“From margin to centre”).

The year 1998 marked the centennial of the birth of artist Ben Shahn (1898–1969). Coupled with the approach of the millennium, which many museums celebrated by surveying the cultural production of the 20th century, the centennial offered the perfect opportunity to mount a major exhibition of Shahn's work (the last comprehensive exhibition had taken place at the Jewish Museum in New York City in 1976). The moment was also propitious because a renewed interest in narrative, figurative art, and political art encouraged scholarly and popular appreciation of Ben Shahn, whose reputation within the history of American art had been eclipsed for many decades by the attention given to the abstract expressionists. The Jewish Museum responded in 1998 with Common Man, Mythic Vision: The Paintings of Ben Shahn, organized by the Museum's curator Susan Chevlowe, with abstract expressionism scholar Stephen Polcari (Figure 1). The exhibition traveled to the Allentown Art Museum in Pennsylvania and closed at the Detroit Institute of Arts in 1999.Smaller Shahn exhibitions then in the planning stages (although not scheduled to open during the centennial year) were to focus on selected aspects of Shahn's oeuvre: the Fogg Museum was to present his little-known New York City photographs of the 1930s in relationship to his paintings, and the Jersey City Museum intended to exhibit his career-launching series, The Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti (1931–32). Knowing this, Chevlowe smartly chose to focus on the later years of Shahn's career and on his lesser-known easel paintings of the post-World War II era. In so doing, Chevlowe challenged viewers to expand their understanding both of the artist and his place in 20th-century American art.

This paper deals with some of the sociological implications of a major cultural high-water point in the African American experience, the New Negro/Harlem Renaissance. The paper concentrates on the cultural transformations brought about through the intellectual activity of political activists, a multi-genre group of artists, cultural brokers, and businesspersons. The driving-wheel thrust of this era was the reclamation and the invigoration of the traditions of the culture with an emphasis on both the, African and the American aspects, which significantly impacted American and international culture then and throughout the 20th century. This study examines the pre-1920s background, the forms of Black activism during the Renaissance, the modern content of the writers' work, and the enthusiasm of whites for the African American art forms of the era. This essay utilizes research from a multi-disciplinary body of sources, which includes sociology, cultural history, creative literature and literary criticism, autobiography, biography, and journalism.

Artists’ studios turned into museums are always specific representations of thepast – spatial images reflecting some idea of art and the artist, as well as his or herworks, and even the position of the spectator imagined as a visitor, admirer, insider,outsider or pilgrim.When a studio is shown through a film, its status of representation comes to theforeground very distinctly just because of the properties of the medium. A filmic representationof the studio is a result of combining images into a sequence, while individualimages attract the spectator’s attention to particular places, areas or aspectsof the space of creation, thus making him or her follow a certain trajectory of meaning.What is more, such a sequence does not have to be limited to the studio’s interiorsince the cinematic montage allows the director to expand it freely by adding somehistoricizing or contextualizing frames. Finally, film allows one to meet the artist inhis or her space through an interview, representation of the creative process or anactor-impersonator.In the first I discuss briefly three issues: the general idea of the present paperand its historical and theoretical contexts.First, my objective is to provide information on my research on Polish documentaryfilm on art in 1948–1989, which was financially supported by the Ministry ofScience and Higher Education. I was doing this research with help of a small team ofyoung scholars – phd students and a younger collegue from Institute of Art History atAdam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. In this article I will not address generalproblems related to the filmic representation of artists’ studios, but discuss severalindividual cases.Second, the historical context is connected with the hopes of totalitarian statesto use mass culture, and particularly film, to manipulate the masses. Even though inparticular decades of the 20th century, and in different countries, those hopes wereput into practice in different ways, their ideological and practical implementation hada common basis. That basis can perhaps be best described by Walter Benjamin’s ideathat a modern wish to regenerate the world requires the destruction of the auratic artand influencing the masses with some other kind of artistic creation that could organizethem according to a fixed political purpose. Benjamin believed that the most usefulin that respect would be film, which in his opinion was both technical and massoriented.The masses could receive film with little effort so that it would imperceptiblyform their mental and imaginative habits, and therefore also a political bias.My point is that the filmic representations of artists’ studios must be approachedin the general context of the role assigned to film in the communist Poland, eventhough one should also remember that artists had various attitudes and censors keptchanging their criteria of appropriateness. Still, the research focused on the representationof the artist, his or her studio, and the ideas of art will reveal an officially acceptedpicture to be transmitted into the public space. One the other hand, oneshould remember that within precisely defined political limits Polish documentary(and other) filmmakers could ignore commercial aspects and refer to the acknowledgedhigh position of art, experimenting in different ways with a relationship betweenfilm and the visual arts.Third, my theoretical context is related to the status of the documentary or, thatof reality represented in documentary films. In my view, shared also by a number ofscholars, documentaries have an element of creation and their reality is alwaysprocessed in one way or another. My examples will include studio as office, nature,space of imagination, village hut or cottage, and engine room.

The exhibition entitled The Family of Man, which was designed by Edward Steichen and presented for the fi rst time in 1955 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, belongs to the most famous and most controversial photographic expositions of the 20th century. Usually perceived in the light of the anachronistic, West-centric vision of humanism, i.e. as an embodiment of Modernist views on photography, it constitutes a good example of the museum’s infl uence as a Modernist “social instrument”. However, contemporary theories in exhibition studies offer a more complex interpretation. The present work provides insight into this process by referring to the views of Mieke Bal (on the “cinematic effect” of photographic exhibitions, the narrative and relational aspect of expositions), Fred Turner (on the space of an avant-garde exhibition as the realisation of the political and social idea of a “democratic personality”) and Ariella Azoulay (on exhibition space as a “visual declaration of human rights” and the fi eld for a “photographic social contract”). The primary aim of the present article is to set The Family of Man within the framework of Polish exhibition practices. The complex origins of the American project can be traced back to avant-garde experiments with exhibition space conducted in the Bauhaus movement and in Soviet Constructivism (the psychology of perception, “photo-murals”); the analysis focuses on the political and propagandistic aspects. An analysis of the above issues provides the starting point for considering the signifi cance and probable reception of the exhibition’s spatial arrangement in the milieu of Polish architects and designers as well as its Polish variant as prepared by Stanisław Zamecznik and Wojciech Fangor. It was therefore useful to refer to Oskar Hansen and his theory of Open Form, as he cooperated with Zamecznik and Fangor at the time. Models of avant-garde and Modernist “utopian thinking” are juxtaposed, thus making it possible to perceive the process of reception in the light of its effectiveness. The article also discusses The Family of Man as a model for projects with propaganda undertones, i.e. the so-called “problem-oriented exhibitions”. It mentions attempts at adapting Steichen’s design of exhibition space to the needs of the offi cial narrative in the People’s Republic of Poland. Finally, it uncovers the ambivalent nature of the infl uence of The Family of Man and the dual status of the exhibition as both a propagandistic project and as an anti-systemic space supporting the ideal of a creative, free individual.

Abstract. The article explores the image of I. Mazepa in the context of numerous sources devoted to the personality of the Ukrainian hetman in historical science, literature and music. The analysis shows that the ideas of the great Ukrainian in the works of art evolve: from a traitor to a patriot. If in the 18th – 19th centuries artists created this image being inspired by myths, then from the early 20th century and up to the present time the historical approach has been dominant. In this paper the author suggests performing aspect basing on the vocal and scenic image of I. Mazepa created by him on the stage of Kharkiv National Opera and Ballet Theater named after M. Lysenko. The interpretation of the extraordinary personality of the Ukrainian hetman gives the audience an opportunity to look at Mazepa from a historical perspective. It is noted that his image in this performance is not limited to a national vision, but acquires a universal character. I. Mazepa’s personality is of great interest to modern Ukrainians living both in their historical homeland and far beyond its borders. At present, contradictory assessments of Mazepa’s role in the chronicle of Ukrainian history require the establishment of historical and artistic truth. P. Tchaikovsky’s opera Mazepa is perceived as a fruitful material to search for a new interpretation of the image. It was first performed on the stage of Kharkiv National Opera and Ballet Theater named after N. V. Lysenko on July 2, 2017 to mark the 330th anniversary of Ivan Mazepa’s election as hetman of Ukraine. This fact gives a chance to bring into focus a relevant performing interpretation of the image of this outstanding figure in Ukrainian history. Among the numerous historians and literary critics cited in the article, we find a new interpretation of Mazepa’s image in contrast to music studies (N. Lupak’s dissertation). The method of analysis is conditioned by the creative practice of the KhNAOBTh and its own performance experience. The purpose of the study is to substantiate the reinterpretation of Mazepa’s vocal and scenic image in the production of the P. I. Tchaikovsky’s opera of the same name on the stage of KhNAOBTh named after M. Lysenko (2017) basing on the critical analysis of scientific historiography. The attitude towards I. Mazepa as a historical personality and a person has always been ambiguous. He combined the incomparable: on the one hand, he was a great military and political figure who fought for the creation of the Ukrainian state, on the other hand – a treacherous traitor; at his initiative, 26 Orthodox churches were created throughout Ukraine and, at the same time, he was an apostate devotee who took part in the destruction of Ukrainian cities and villages; a person capable of loving in the broadest sense of the word. He had everything that attracted and aroused great interest of writers, composers, artists, directors not only in our country but also far beyond its borders. And each author interpreted the image of Mazepa in their own way. In the 19th century, the image of the Ukrainian hetman fell into the area of artistic interests of M. Staritsky. He, like Voltaire and Byron, used the Western European legend of Mazepa in the novel “Mazepa’s Youth”, which was appropriate for its genre (historical-adventure). Naturally, the idea of “independent Ukraine” did not fit into Russia’s interests. In Tchaikovsky’s opera Mazepa (1883), based on A. Pushkin’s story (libretto by V. P. Burenin) everything is quite complex. It is important to note that many researchers of Tchaikovsky’s creativity believe that in Tchaikovsky’s Mazepa historical facts are sidelined while lyrical love scenes dominate. There were a number of questions when the image of Mazepa was ctreated in the original Ukrainian version of the opera on the stage of Kharkiv National Academic Opera and Ballet Theater named after N. Lysenko. The main one is how to maintain faithfulness not only to historical but also to the life’s truth? The times of the Hetmanate in Ukraine were silenced for about 300 years, and, in particular, the true life of one of its most famous representatives was unknown. But in order to create an image, it is important to know the smallest shades of your character’s psychotype. As the lyrical scenes of Mary and Mazepa are the central line in the opera, it is necessary to understand what kind of relationship they really had. Kharkiv stage directors of P. Tchaikovsky’s opera (director Armen Kaloyan and conductor People’s Artist of Ukraine Garkusha) sought to convey this very episode from the life of Mazepa, who openly loves his darling and suffers from having to cruelly deal with her father and hurt her badly. In addition, there was created their own version of the text (by Victor Marinchak, Svetlana Oleshko and Mikhail Barbara) and changes were made to the musical dramaturgy of the opera. The main idea of stage directors was to transform the content of the opera into another field – to reveal the image of the hetman as a significant figure in the history of Ukraine, which was much more important for Mazepa than the alliance with Peter I. The difficulty of creating a vocal and scenic image of Mazepa lies in its multi-vector character, which should not interfere with artistic unity and integrity: Mazepa-lover (in the tradition of Western European romanticism), Mazepastatesman (Ukrainian national tradition) and, at the same time, in the interpretation of Kharkiv theatre Mazepa-traitor had to be neutralized (an enemy that is characteristic of Russian imperial thinking). The motives of torments, sorrow and, along with this, the rebellious nature of the protagonist become considerable in the opera, rising to genuine symbolism. Thus, in the vast number of works dedicated to I. Mazepa, his image is not limited to the national framework, but acquires a universal significance. Conclusions. Analysis has shown the evolution of ideas about the great Ukrainian: from traitor to patriot and legendary hetman. If in the 18th century the image of the Ukrainian hero was interpreted in many ways by its creators on the basis of myths, then in the 20th – 21st centuries the historical approach prevails in understanding performing interpretation of Mazepa. The creation of a complex, extraordinary personality on the opera stage requires from the performer, in addition to knowledge of Mazepa’s vocal part, a thorough study of various axiological judgments. The above given interpretations of I. Mazepa’s image reflect the irreconcilable confrontation and “blood” belonging of one or another author to different systems of values of the worldview. Such interpretations indicate that the image of I. Mazepa is interpreted as a symbol, an archetype of the national opera tradition. Undertaking further study of the theme can involve performing analysis of Mazepa’s image on the stages of Kyiv and Odessa opera theaters with a view of understanding the performing principles when teaching young vocalists in the class of solo singing.

The purpose of the study is the color as a phenomenon of semantic - cultural and educational potential in art and art education. In the article, the significance of color is revealed in the aspect of historical and national peculiarities taking into account the development of modern color didactics. It has been proved that the development of color thinking is an expression of the spiritual and cultural level of society, as well as one of the main aspects in the training of future professionals in artistic professions. A historical analysis of color education in art education was conducted, color concepts and methods of work with the color of some outstanding artists and teachers were considered. The cultural and educational significance of color in the picturesque legacy of V. Kandinsky, K. Malevich, M. Krymov and other artists was considered, the discovery and achievements of which, in the field of color education of specialists, formed the basis of modern color didactics. The methodology of the research is to apply comparative, historical and logical methods with the use of cultural approaches. This methodological approach allows us to reveal the problem under study from a philosophical, pedagogical, cultural and artistic point of view. Analysis, systematization and generalization of theoretical and empirical provisions allowed to determine the state of color education of future specialists of artistic profiles in its historical aspect. Conclusions It is proved that the development of color thinking is an expression of the spiritual and cultural level of society, as well as one of the main aspects in the process of color education of future specialists in artistic professions.

This is a review of the twenty-year-long publishing activity of Halychyna. Journal of Regional Studies: Science, Culture and Education, one of the first Ukrainian journals for historians, philologists, art critics that appeared in the independent Ukraine. In Halychyna, there has been published the works by well-known scholars of Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University and many other higher educational establishments of Ukraine. The Journal can boast an array of sections – archaeology, history, ethnology, political science, historiography, source studies, documents and materials, culturology, art criticism, historical biography studies, and others. Most of the studies published in Halychyna focus on the issues of the modern and contemporary history of Ukraine, ethnology. A special attention is given to the issues of the Ukrainian national liberation movement in the 20th century, the Ukrainian national revival in the 19th–20th century, the activity of the political parties in Galicia in the late 19th–early 20th century, source studies and historiography in Ukraine, historical regional studies, the problems of modern state formation in Ukraine, and others

Proceeding from the inseparable relation between ethics and aesthetics in traditional (and often also modern) Chinese thought, this article aims to illuminate two important approaches to the aesthetic foundations of Chinese modernity. The relation between the individual and society, which is a core question of modern ethics, is reflected in most of the ethical theories of 20th century China. In this context, the article first presents Li Zehou’s theory of aesthetics and his definition of aesthetic experience. In this way, it aims to illuminate Li’s interpretation of modern art and society, and to posit it into a contrastive position to Xu Fuguan’s ethico-aesthetic theories, especially the ones regarding modernity and Western culture. The basic approaches applied by these two important modern Chinese scholars reveal great differences in attitude towards the spiritual and material development of humanity in the 20th century, which is especially interesting since they are both rooted in the abovementioned belief that ethics cannot be separated from aesthetics. Besides, Li Zehou sincerely admired Xu Fuguan’s work on traditional Chinese aesthetics and referred to his comprehension of general concepts of traditional Chinese aesthetics in many of his own works dealing with aesthetics.

This article examines the phenomenon of Chinese realism, as well as the prerequisites and factors that influenced the processes of reception in modern Chinese art. At the beginning of the 20th century, under the influence of Western academic realism and the artistic system of social realism, a new direction and artistic method was formed — realism, which became mainstream in the art of China of the mid-20th century. According to its aesthetic and ideological motifs, Chinese realism is an object of social realism reception, which was determined by cultural and historical factors, and the development of political, economic and cultural ties with the USSR. Studying the realistic painting, which reflects the atmosphere of the era, the worldview, and the dialogue of cultures, is relevant for both Chinese and Russian contemporary art studies. The article examines the role of realism in the development of Chinese art culture of the 20th century, including its socio-political components, as well as the dynamics of artistic and expressive means and the iconographic system in the context of the historical and cultural situation. In the 1980s and 1990s, as a result of the liberalization of economic and political life, the artistic consciousness formed new concepts of realistic painting — neorealism and cynical realism, associated with a critical rethinking of the historical heritage. The neorealism and cynical realism, which would significantly enrich realistic painting with new forms and content, adopted Western postmodern concepts of pop art, and debunked, in a grotesque and satirical form, the political stereotypes of the past. The analysis of realistic painting of the 1990s demonstrates how the transformation of past painting canons reflects the desire of society to free itself from the pressure of totalitarian ideology and to rethink the value orientations of the previous era.The novelty of this study lies in the fact that it applies a systematic and holistic approach to the analysis of realism in Chinese painting, reveals the diversity of its forms and directions, and gives ground for the specifics of its evolution in the context of the artistic culture of the 20th century China. There are almost no comprehensive studies of this issue in modern art history, so this work is an attempt to create a scientific approach to the study of this artistic phenomenon and the formation of ideas about how the artistic consciousness of an entire epoch was changing.

Bibliography: pages 232-240.
This dissertation argues that abstract art is not ideologically neutral. In spite of many artists' anti-fascist stance early in their careers, the mantle of neutrality was assumed as a reaction to the protracted struggle between the two major ideologies confronting artists living in Europe and the United States of America in the period 1933-1953, namely capitalism and communism. These ideologies were not peripheral to artists lives, but were actively debated by both artists and intellectuals and resulted in the establishment of powerful cultural organisations. The ensuing growth in prestige and influence of left-wing artist's organisations was countered by a campaign which included direct suppression of left-wing artists as well as a form of ideological control. This control was vested in what has been called the specifics of patronage and is reflected in the establishment of the Arts Council in Britain and the private art museums in the United States. Changes in the art market have meant that, together with dealers and critics, these institutions wielded almost complete economic control over artists. The prevailing ideology of liberal humanism, which glorified individualism and defined democracy as a middle ground between the left and the right, favoured the development of a seemingly apolitical abstract art style. Analysis of the demise of the Artists International Association and the American Artist's Congress supports the conclusion that the figurative tradition lost prestige as a result of the stigma attached to Socialist Realism and the idealised realism demanded by National Socialism in Germany. Account is also taken of the attempt by well-positioned and influential commentators to identify all forms of realism with totalitarianism. It is not surprising therefore, that it was commonly believed that to paint in an abstract modern style was to strike a blow against fascism. In the same way that realism was identified with the regimentation of Soviet society, the avant-gardes' abstract experiments came to symbolize democracy. Drawing on the texts of writers, critics, artists and theorists, this dissertation shows that the force of the identification of progressive realism with totalitarianism, prepared the way for acceptance of the idea that freedom of expression epitomised freedom in general. In this way, anti-Stalinism and the post-war liberal philosophy of individual freedom, coupled with a search for 'essences' and the 'universal', directed artists inward to the medium of art as relevant subject-matter. This dissertation argues that this identification was ideologically motivated in respect to the balance of social and political power in America.

Scenario House, a gallery based installation, is comprised of a room constructed as a ???family room??? within a domestic space, a television with a looped video work and a sound componant played through a 5.1 sound system. The paper is intended to give my work context in relation to the processes leading up to its completion. This is achieved through clarification of the basis for the installation including previous socio-political discourses within my art practice. It then focuses on ways that the installation Scenario House is based on gun practice facilities such as the Valhalla Shooting Club. Further it gives an explanation of the actual production, in context with other art practices. It was found that distinctions between ???war as a game??? and the actual event are being lost within ???simulation revenge scenarios??? where the borders distinguishing gaming violence, television violence and revenge scenarios are increasingly indefinable. War can then be viewed a spectacle where the actual event is lost in a simplified simulation. Scenario House as installation allows audience immersion through sound spatialisation and physical devices. Sound is achieved by design of a 5.1 system played through a domestic home theatre system. The physical design incorporates the dual aspect of a gun shooting club and a lounge room. Further a film loop is shown on the television monitor as part of the domestic space ??? it is non-narrative and semi-documentary in style. The film loop represents the mediation of the representation of fear where there is an exclusion of ???the other??? from the social body. When considering this installation it is important to note that politics and art need not be considered as representing two separate and permanent realities. Conversely there is a need to distance politicised art production from any direct political campaign work in so far as the notion of a campaign constitutes a fixed and inflexible space for intellectual and cultural production. Finally this paper expresses the need to maintain a critical openness to media cultures that dominate political discourse. Art practices such as those of Martha Rosler, Haacke and Paul McCarthy are presented as effective strategies for this form of production.

It would be wrong to suggest that this essay is in any way a comprehensive study of brutal sculpture. Certainly not. There have been many deliberate omissions for reasons which become clear in the text. Very briefly, omissions of certain sculptors and their work are largely due to my wish to avoid repetitive ideas and images. My view in this essay is to provide a cross-section of ideas and works, whereby the reader might gain some insight into the varied nature of this kind of sculpture. Thus, there seemed very little need for endless similarities of concept and expression. It was the diversity which I felt was important. The chapter which discusses concepts of beauty is also not a comprehensive study. This subject demands more than a humble essay to do it any justice. However, my reasons for touching the vague and controversial outline of these concepts were, primarily, to suggest that notions of beauty as the sole criterion in the judgement of art are too limiting, and, consequently, to introduce the concept of vitalism, which I believe is more valid. Finally, I wish to mention the personal motive behind this work. Over the years, I have witnessed the emergence of brutal elements in my own work, which I found disturbing at times. I have never been able to answer satisfactorily the criticism I've received. All I knew was that these things came from a very deep source. It is with this in mind that I embarked on this project, hoping to achieve two things. Firstly, to provide an objective survey of an important development in art, and, secondly , to answer some of my criticism. Foreword, p. 1.

This thesis will examine the political and social significance of the new artistic language that emerged in Poland in the 1980s. The new artistic language pertains to symbols, imagery and themes that originated in the discourse of the opposition and can be defined as the amalgam of the traditional religious vocabulary and time-specific symbols of oppression under Communism. The most prominent in this category are the symbols of the cross, the flowers, the national red and white flag, exclusively contemporary symbols such as the "television-people" as well as an array of traditional religious vocabulary. This unusual relationship between symbolic language of art and the symbols of the Church and the Solidarity accounted for the inherently political nature of dissident art. This thesis will discuss dissident art in context of the contemporary discourses: the discourse of the Communist Party, the Church, John Paul II and Solidarity.

This dissertation examines two controversies involving paintings of the female nude by artists Debora Arango and Carlos Correa during a period of political crisis in Bogota (Colombia) in order to open the political to cultural analysis and thus shed light on scenarios of change in the 1930s and 1940s. Unpacking the controversies lends insight into the unique ways in which modernity, the body, its representations, sexuality, gender and politics came together in Colombia during this period. Such an approach also shows that modernity in Colombia involved shifts in religious and secular frames of sense-making and morality. This dissertation argues that the controversies and the female nudes provide a window into the Liberal regime's creation of culture as an autonomous sphere as part of its cultural program, which bridged high and popular culture, as well as on aspects of private life concerned with sexuality and gender. It shows how such changes registered in the lives of the artists and how the artists translated the changes they experienced into modes of pictorial expression. This dissertation argues that the demands of the aesthetic and the demands of politics during this period pressed on each other, resulting in the wide-spread perception of moral breach that came to a head in the "scandals of the female nudes." This dissertation thus sheds light on dimensions of both the political and the private during this period.
Because art and politics were thus entangled, this dissertation shows that, in this particular Colombian modernity, society was not polarized, that the private and the private overlapped, that issues of intimacy surfaced in the public realm, and that Catholicism was the idiom shared by men and women who were grappling with change. It shows that the cultural program of the Liberal regime was the immediate referent for criticism in these events and, through it, of the Liberal regime's reforms of education of 1934 and 1936. Finally, it shows that this modernity and its attendant anxieties were played out through the body in the public and the private realms, within, not against, the Catholic tradition, in unprecedented ways. This thesis demonstrates that politics and issues of sexuality and gender were entangled in the public sphere and converged in the female nudes, turning them into a major threat to morality within both religious and secular frameworks. By unpacking the controversies, this dissertation marks a seminal break with historical accounts that describe Colombia's as a failed modernity, its society as polarized, and debates over sexuality and gender as the product of politics. This dissertation also contradicts art historical writings that account for the production of images and the reception of art in this period solely in political terms.

Born in 1938 in Poland, I epxperienced wartime Berlin and post-war Stalinism. My first job, at sixteen, was with the East Berlin States Opera and the Bertold Brecht's Berliner Ensemble. The play writes Betrtold Brecht and Buechner had the strongest influence on me. Brecht's play 'Mutter Courage and her children' and Georg Buechner's 'Woyzech' encapsulated the harsh realities of post-war Europe, and confirmed my desire for social justice and reform. Yet, the main influence on my work comes from my own life experience. My life in Australia has become a kind of exile-a deprivation of the origin of my culture and my cradle. After nearly forty years in Australia I feel a little displaced. Yet I left Europe voluntarily to escape from the very culture and history I now miss. I am experiencing a common dilemma of migration. I belong neither here nor there-a kind of dislocation. There exists a twilight zone in the in-between time-a discontinuity of my Berliner development. Artists such as Kaethe Kollwitz, John Heartfield, George Grosz, Otto Dix, and Max Beckman influenced my teenage years. Later, Joseph Beuys, Anselm Kiefer and Georg Baselitz. I work with found objects, such as toys crafted by human hand. I am giving them a new meaning, a new being. They are meditations on the conflict of war, where women and children are the primary victims of political fragmentation. My sculptures evoke memories of a childhood stolen. They take on a menacing character reminding the viewer of the effects war has on humanity. But Art is the reflector and searcher; it is our way to enlightenment. Joseph Beuys introduced the concept of an expanded notion of art ("der erweiterte Kunstbegriff???) to surpass the boundaries of modernism with in art, science, spirituality, humanism and economics. He drew attention to the potential of human creativity. Art, against all odds, is poetry to life.

This thesis explores various dilemmas in making theatre performances in the context of social disruption, trauma and death. Diverse discourses are drawn in to consider issues of body, subjectivity and spectatorship, refracted through the writer’s experiences of and discontent with making theatre. Written in a fractal-like structure, rather than a linear progression, this thesis unsettles discourses of truth, thus simultaneously intervening in debates about the epistemologies of the body and of theatre in context of the academy. Chapter 1: Methodological Anxieties Psychoanalytic theory provides a way in for investigating the dynamics of theatrical performance and its corporeal presence, by focusing on desire and its implication in the notions of loss and anxiety. The theories of the unconscious and the gaze have epistemological implications, shifting definitions of “presence” and “truth” in theatre performance and writing about theatre. This chapter tries to outline the rationale for, as well as to enact, an alternative methodology for writing, as an ethical response to loss that does not insist on consensus and truth. Chapter 2: (Refusing to) Look at Trauma This chapter examines the politics that strives to make suffering visible. Discursive binaries of public/private, dead/living, and invisible/visible underlie the politics of AIDS and sexuality. These discourses impact on the reception of Bill T. Jones's choreography, despite his use of modernist artistic processes in search of a bodily presence that aims to collapse the binary of representation (text) and its subject (being). The theory of the gaze shows this politics to be a phallocentric discourse; and narrative analysis traces the metanarrative that results in the commodification of oppositional identities, so that spectators participate in the politics as consumers. An ethical artistic response thus needs to shift its focus to the subjectivity of the spectator. Chapter 3: The Screen and the Viewer’s Blindness By appealing to a transcendent reality, and by constituting spectators as a participative community, ritual theatre claims to enact change. The “truth” of ritual rests not on rational knowledge, but on the performer’s competence to produce a shamanic presence, which director Brett Bailey embraces in his early work. Ritual presence operates by identification and belonging to a father/god as the source of meaning; but it represses the loss of this originary wholeness. Spectators of ritual theatre are drawn into an enactment of communion/community, the centre of which is, however, loss/emptiness. The claim of enacting change becomes problematic for its absence of truth. Bailey attempts to perform a hybrid, postcolonial aesthetics; but the problem rests in the larger context of performing the notion of “South Africa”, a communal identity hardened around the metanarrative of suffering, abjecting those that do not belong to the land of the father/god – foreigners that unsettle the meaning of South African identity. Conclusion: Bodies of Discontent The South African stage is circumscribed by political and economic discourses; the problematization of national identity is also a problematization of image-identification in the theatre. In search for a way to unsettle these interrogative discourses, two moments of performing foreignness are examined, one fictional, one theatrical. These moments enact a parallel to the feminine hysteric, who disturbs the phallocentric truth of the psychoanalyst through body performance. These moments of disturbing spectatorship are reflected in the works of performance artist Marina Abramovic. Her explorations into passive-aggression, shamanism and finally theatricality and the morality of spectatorship allow for an overview of the issues raised in this thesis regarding body, viewing, and subjecthood. Sensitivity to the body and its discontent on the part of the viewer becomes crucial to ethical performance.

While early 20th century Social Darwinism has been discredited, post-WW2 theories have re-emphasized Darwin's notion of the environment. On this basis, and substituting social systems for natural species, society has been analyzed as a system-in-evolution, a machinery that, reflexively or self-referentially, produces itself at every moment anew. Modern society, according to social systems theory, continuously makes itself, thanks to countless simultaneous communications taking place at once. There are two equally disquieting lessons here. On the one hand, modern law, understood as the communicative system that applies the distinction lawful/unlawful to everything that gets in its way, is placed within an environment constituted by other communicative social systems (the economy, politics, religion, art etc) and the conditions created by those. On the other hand, social systems at large are separated from the realm of human consciousness, i.e. of collective or individual identity (the ‘psychic systems’). While ‘social' and ‘psychic’ systems never meet, they rely on absolute indifference with respect to their other side, as only this indifference enables especially social systems to assure their (superior) fact-creating potential. Our own project consists in spelling out the implications of this scissile sense of ‘meaning’, at once understood as a shorthand for what is actually happening (fragmented communications) and as consciousness-as-identity (imaginary unity).

The research deals with phenomenon of mass art (mass culture) as one of the components of mass art modern world. An attempt to identify mass culture, mass art as a phenomenon is made and main approaches to its treatment and different aspects of its study in contemporary science are analysed. The first part of the work offers an overview of researchers’ views on the problem of definition of mass culture, mass art phenomenon and reveals ways of self-identification of it in the course of its development. Main features of mass culture, mass art are also studied. The second part of the work is devoted to the analysis of main approaches to the study of mass art and mass culture in early and in modern scientific works. As we see this phenomenon is widely examined by representatives of different research schools and scientific spheres. Philosophers, political scientists, writers, art critics, culturologists are involved in this process. The majority of the twentieth century researchers perceived mass culture as negative aspect of cultural social development because of its low level of quality and as a part of bourgeois culture focused on manipulating the minds of the masses. On the other hand the 21st century researchers realizing all the negative moments (idolatry, personality levelling) consider mass culture and mass art as natural necessary phenomenon of modern life, a base for development of professional art, a product of modern technology, show-business. The analyses of the phenomenon of mass art, mass culture gives us the picture of variety in opinions and approaches to this phenomenon as well as of the great number of aspects of scientific interest to the problem. In the majority of cases researchers’ concepts of mass culture, mass art clearly reflects the ideas of the periods they belong to.

Ruskin’s social criticism, which in Unto This Last (1862) harshly condemned the effects of industrialism by mythologizing medieval age and craftmanship, had a wide influence on social reformers of various political orientations: William Morris, J.A. Hobson, the Art and Crafts Movement, the guildism of Arthur Penty and GHD Cole and the New Age circle, with an impact that went as far as the early decades of the 20th century. While his work as an art critic was promptly received in the Italian cultural debate, his social criticism found little audience, at least until the turn of the centuries, and anyway not in the sphere of economic and sociological culture. In this contribution I intend to examine how the circulation of Ruskin’s social thought in the Italian cultural debate between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries was inscribed in the renewed interest in the social function of art, advocated in the Florentine literary journal Il Marzocco with particular reference to the work of Lev Tolstoy by young intellectuals such as Ugo Ojetti, Angelo Orvieto, and Enrico Corradini, as well as established critics as Angelo Conti. The debate became a watershed moment in Italian culture, involving crucial issues as identity and tradition, artistic heritage and national rebirth. By including in this cultural framework the reception of Ruskin’s social criticism, I intend to highlight its connection with the emergence of the movement for the conservation of the artistic heritage, in which Il Mazocco had a leading role, and to suggest it having mixed political implications. Ruskinian references were channeled in a perspective of national rebirth and regeneration; for a paradoxical but interesting twist, aspects of Ruskin's anti-industrialist and medievalist imagery converged within the new nationalist and nationalist dimension that crossed the Italian (and European) culture of the first decade of the century.

The issues associated with this study are both physical and intellectual, as are the factors in urban development. The correlation of known data from inscriptions (epigraphy), literary references (ancient history and more recent government and church documents), evidence from destroyed and rebuilt buildings (archaeology), and modern scientific and technical findings (several kinds of engineering and subfields of geology such as seismology and sedimentology) can give a more complete picture of each city’s development than does one kind of information alone. Most of the necessary site-specific studies, however, have not been done. Our problem parallels the study of global warming, where precise records of weather events have been kept for less than 200 years. Urban elements must be studied by experts in that building type and in social expression. Ramparts need more study by historians of warfare, theaters by scholars of drama and literature, stadia by those who study the history of sports, plumbing by hydraulic, civil, and fluids engineers, and temples by historians of comparative religion. Insights into institutional and political aspects of ancient studies and the historiography of all the disciplines involved in ancient studies would be both useful and fascinating (Kardulias 1994). The benefits and difficulties of interdisciplinary research are clearer now to us than when we started. In considering the physical setting and geological processes in the Mediterranean area, is description sufficient or should scholars strive for explanation, even if this involves theory building? “In much of art history and classical archaeology traditional practices have continued without explicit theoretical support” (McNally 1985; but cf. Preziosi 1989). The theorists of archaeology and urban history desire comprehensive and precise theories—even in the absence of enough data to make that possible. Some data may be rescued by followers of one discipline after being ignored or thrown out by followers of another. The awareness of theoretical difficulty is part of the increase in consciousness typical of the second half of the twentieth century when we began to question the nature of both knowledge and culture.

Exile is one of the central motifs of the 20th century European culture and literature; it is closely related to the historical events throughout this century and especially those related to World War II. In the culture of East Central Europe, the phenomenon of exile has been greatly determined by the context of socialism and post-socialist transformations that caused several waves of emigration from this part of Europe to the West or other parts of the world. It is interesting to compare cultures of East Central Europe, the historical situations of which both during World War II and after the collapse of socialism were different, e.g. Latvian and ex-Yugoslavian ones. In Latvia, exile is basically related to the emigration of a great part of the population in the 1940s and the issue of their possible return to the renewed Republic of Latvia in the early 1990s, whereas the countries of the former Yugoslavia experienced a new wave of emigration as a result of the Balkan War in the 1990s. Exile has been regarded by a great number of the 20th century philosophers, theorists, and scholars of diverse branches of studies. An important aspect of this complex phenomenon has been studied by psychoanalytical theorists. According to the French poststructuralist feminist theorist Julia Kristeva, the state of exile as a socio-cultural phenomenon reflects the inner schisms of subjectivity, particularly those of a feminine subject. Hence, exile/stranger/foreigner is an essential model of the contemporary subject and exile turns from a particular geographical and political phenomenon into a major symbol of modern European culture. The present article regards the sense of exile as a part of the narrator’s subjective world experience in the works by the Yugoslav writer Dubravka Ugrešič (“The Museum of Unconditional Surrender”, in Croatian and English, 1996) and Latvian émigré author Margita Gūtmane (“Letters to Mother”, in Latvian, 1998). Both authors relate the sense of exile to identity problems, personal and culture memory as well as loss. The article focuses on the issues of loss and memory as essential elements of the narrative of exile revealed by the metaphors of photograph and museum. Notwithstanding the differences of their historical situations, exile as the subjective experience reveals similar features in both authors’ works. However, different artistic means are used in both authors’ texts to depict it. Hence, Dubravka Ugrešič uses irony, whereas Margita Gūtmane provides a melancholic narrative of confession; both authors use photographs to depict various aspects of memory dynamic, but Gūtmane primarily deals with private memory, while Ugrešič regards also issues of cultural memory. The sense of exile in both authors’ works appears to mark specific aspects of feminine subjectivity.

This article covers some new forms of publicness in the field of art culture of the Russian city of Perm, e.g. dramatics as a performance in a street environment, and synthetic museum-theatrical form under the conditions of a stage box. The study was accomplished mainly via culturological method. At one time theatre left the urban environment, but in the 21st century theatrical forms have begun to permeate urban space again, the statement primarily concerns site-specific theatre. This is equivalent to the birth of new theatrical-city publicity, a new modality of the interpenetration of the public and the private. One of the best-known theatrical projects in this field is ‘Remote X’ (‘Rimini Protokoll’ band). Here, the close co-existence habitual to city dwellers turns into a social substrate, and a way to implement interpersonal artistic communication, thereby largely changing the disposition of the former, and transforming itself. Another new form of relationship between collective and individual aspects in the public sphere is the synthetic museum-theatre form, on the example of immersion dramatics ‘Permian Pantheon’ (Perm Academic Theatre, stager Dmitry Volkostrelov). The natural ‘calendar-seasonal’ tempo-rhythm of the dramatics creates a triple semantic effect risen from artistic reality. It immerses the viewer into the process of traditional subsistence in whole (actualisation of the cultural collective unconscious), represents cultural phenomena (which corresponds to the culture-focused paradigm of artistic consciousness of the second half of the 20th century to the early 21st century), reaches the level of worldview values, the philosophical generalisation of cultural-existential reality. Thus, on the example of two Perm theatrical plays the author can speak about the origin of new forms of publicness in contemporary culture to entail new relationships between publicity and privacy in the current realities.