Mity. Kilka tropów
Myths. A Few Tropes

Summary/Abstract: The text is mainly about some references to myth in the 20-21st centuryart. A rift in treatment of myth during this period is interesting. On theone hand, in popular literature and media a generic term “myth” is oftenused. But it is often understood as something substantially irrational andused with a certain disdain, as well as on the boundary of being pejorative. Whereas in serious anthropological and philosophical texts and in art,“myth” may be on the one hand specified (in the case of “classical” mythicalstories there are references by names to mythical characters in sequencesof events), and on the other fully rational elements are excavated fromit within its context, which significantly explain natural phenomena andcause and effect aspects of the surrounding world. Taking more rationalway of describing myth into consideration, I chose examples of myths:Oedipus, Androgyne and Pygmalion’s. Oedipus is burdened with interpretations and omnipresent in the surrealist art (for example especiallystrongly in Max Ernst’s works). Also, as an “out-take” of the myth, partabout Sphinx, carries interesting proto-feminist threads (in Leonor Fini’spaintings). A hermaphroditic Androgyne seems to draw out a new actuality and is interpreted in twofold unity, or completely entangled. In twofoldunity (as in Marc Chagall’s works or Magdalena Abankowicz’s) they areassociated but separated presence of personas. In the sense of negativerifting we may analyze genres of womanly act, which hides objectificationof broken Androgyne. However, entanglement is on the one hand a connection (as in lovers’ embrace) and on the other over-individualistic duos orbigger groups of artists, especially those who have been also performanceartists since the 60s of the 20th century. Pygmalion myth profusely used inart hides within, among others, a metaphor of illusion.

• Details
• Contents