The existential contexts of the so-called turns in the humanities

The existential contexts of the so-called turns in the humanities

Author(s): Roman Kubicki / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Man; culture; science; face; freedom; turns in the humanities

The starting point for my research is the famous statement of Leszek Kołakowski: “(...) in all the universe man cannot find a well so deep that, leaning over it, he does not discover at the bottom his own face.” I believe that no matter which of the turns we are dealing with, it is only our own face that, in fact, each of them has to offer to us. I ask about this face in the performative, iconic and posthumanist turns.

Change, break, crisis, or fulguration – what is a turn in art?

Change, break, crisis, or fulguration – what is a turn in art?

Author(s): Teresa Pękała / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Turn; transformation; radical change; negative and positive crises; continuity and discontinuity in art; contemporary art

The aim of the article is to find the main determinants of the changes/transformations in art that would satisfy the necessary conditions for defining some phenomenon as a ‘turn’. The first part of the study presents some attempts to specify the nature of a cultural turn, and the methodological positions offered by the contemporary humanities. The point of departure here is the conception of Doris Bachmann-Medick. Assuming that the inflation of cultural turns is a signal of profound change, we will ask about the impact of such processes on art. It is not a question of the response of art to changes, but of art as a fragment of the changed reality. In this context, the article refers to Umberto Eco’s concept of art as an epistemological metaphor of reality and Mieczysław Wallis’s theory of continuity/discontinuity, or gradual and abrupt changes in art. The concepts characteristic of the early stages of modern consciousness have been tested according to the criteria for the contemporary understanding of transformation in art, termed ‘a turn’. For this purpose, we have considered the different meanings of the concept of ‘change/transformation’ and of the concept of ‘turn’. The material used as an example is the history of the reception of Art Nouveau, and the problem of radicalness of the avant-garde turn. The final part of the study discusses different uses of the concept of turn, employed in art in recent years. Two ‘turns’ have been distinguished; an affective turn, linked with the somatic one, and a social turn. Both of them can be treated as constituents of a culture-wide turn: the performative turn. The postulated direction of the research on contemporary turns in art is finding a new formula of esthetic experience.

Empathetic turn in the reflection on art

Empathetic turn in the reflection on art

Author(s): Grzegorz Sztabiński / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Empathy; Robert Vischer; Theodor Lipps; Heinrich Wőlfflin; Wilhelm Worringer; David Freedberg; Michael Fried; cultural turns

At the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, scholars began to include the notion of empathy in their reflections on art, which was the hallmark of an extensive theoretical turn, whose consequences were to spread to other areas of the humanities and lead to the creation of a new research method specific to this field of knowledge. Such scholarly endeavors were characterized by psychological approach, expanded to include biophysiologica consid-erations, with an emphasis on the role of the body. Such a perspective was aimed at revaluing basic aesthetic issues, such as beauty and aesthetic experience, as well as key problems of the history of art (such as the notion of style). The article summarizes the core principles of the concept of empathy employed in the field of fine arts, and examines its use in the theories of such scholars as Robert Vischer, Theodor Lipps, Heinrich Wölfflin and Wilhelm Worringer. This will be followed by a brief consideration of the reasons why this idea was rejected by the researchers on art in the second half of the twentieth century. Against this background, my article will pose the question regarding a return to the concept of empathy (or a reemergence of the empathetic turn) in the reflection on the visual arts in this century. Its symptoms have been pointed out by some Anglophhone authors (such as Juliet Koss). One should, however, note the differences in the new approach. The former biophysiologica background has been replaced with references to contemporary research on brain functioning. Instead of concentrating on the expressive character of architecture, scholars explore e.g. an empathetic response to human images (David Freedberg) or to landscapes and still lifes (Michael Fried). The article concludes with some reflections that situate the concept of empathetic turn in the context of the theory of cultural turns proposed by Doris Bachmann-Medick.

"Theoretical turn” in post-avant-garde art and the aesthetics of de-differentiation

"Theoretical turn” in post-avant-garde art and the aesthetics of de-differentiation

Author(s): Iwona Lorenc / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Aestheticisation; aesthetic indistinction; aesthetic de-differentiation; aesthetics differentiat

In this article I use the term “theoretical turn” to refer to phenomena in contemporary art that incorporate theory into their body and mode of action. I understand this incorporation similarly to Arthur Danto, Robert Jauss and Scott Lash. Within the domain of aesthetics these developments are related to a new philosophical, conceptual framework, open to the changes taking place in contemporary culture (particularly its mediatisation and aestheticisation). This involves de-differentiation and the blurring of borders between the aesthetic and the non-aesthetic rather than the Kantian criteria of differentiation. It acknowledges the tendencies of late modernity (e.g. the avant-gardes) to autonomise the aesthetic and rewrites them as a temporary element of cultural transformations. The aesthetic no longer occupies a separate domain; it concedes the existence of borders, but at the same time, points to the processes in which they dissolve.

Nominalist re-turn in contemporary art

Nominalist re-turn in contemporary art

Author(s): Piotr Schollenberger / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Nominalism; feeling; sensus communis; Kant, Duchamp; de Duve

Hans Blumenberg has shown (Die Legitimität der Neuzeit) that the appearance of nominalism in the debates of the Middle Ages had laid grounds for modernity. Nominalism assumes that only individual, concrete objects exist and that common properties are not grounded in any kind of supra-individual properties or relations that would exist independently of what is singular. In Thierry de Duve’s interpretation, “pictorial nominalism” of Duchamp puts stress on a particular or a singular name, stops the process of reference and shows its “plastic being”. This aesthetic idea opens up a new field that we now call “art”, where art becomes a “proper name”. I would like to follow his analysis, but also to re-think it the context of the present, to explore the specificity of the nominalist re-turn in contemporary art. The contemporary aesthetic experience of art as such is nominalist in the sense I would like to examine in this article.

Thalers and „ephimek” coin with marks in the collection of the National Museum of History and Ethnography „Pereyaslav”, as a source for learning about the circulation of currency in the Ukraine in the 16th-18th centuries

Талеры и ефимок с признаками в коллекции Национального историко-этнографического заповедника „Переяслав”, как источник денежного обращения в Украине в XVI-XVIII веках

Author(s): Viktor Kocur / Language(s): Russian / Issue: 61/2015

Keywords: Ukraine; 17th-18th centuries; coin circulation; thaler; „ephimek”; Ukraina; XVII-XVIII wiek; obieg pieniężny; talar; „efimek”

Thalers struck by Central European rulers were in circulation in the Eastern part of Europe too. Among the numismatic holdings of the “Pereyaslav” National Museum in Ukraine are coins of this type, which were in circulation throughout Ukrainian territory. The present publication of the Museum holdings of coins of this type supplements our picture of coin circulation in Ukraine in the 17th and 18th centuries. Stałe zainteresowanie budzą srebrne talary wybite przez władców Europy Zachodniej, które szeroko obiegały również na rynkach Europy wschodniej. W zbiorach narodowego muzeum „Perejeslav” znajdują się dotychczas nieopublikowane talary, które trafiły na terytorium Ukrainy. Ich publikacja uzupełnia dane na temat obiegu pieniężnego na ziemiach Ukrainy w XVII i XVIII w.

Forgeries of coins of Augustus III (1733-1763) and Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski (1764-1795) in finds from the Ukraine

Кустарные подделки монет Aвгуста III Cаксонца (1733-1763) и Cтанислава Aвгуста понятовского (1764-1795) в находках украины

Author(s): Andrej S. Bojko-Gagarin / Language(s): Russian / Issue: 61/2015

Keywords: Poland; Ukraine; Polish coins; forgeries; coin finds

This article deals with the private forgeries of the coins of Augustus III (1733-1763) and Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski (1764-1795) founded in Ukraine. A description of the counterfeits and the topography of their finds are given. The technology of the production of the forgeries is established by the aid of XRF analysis. The main trends and the features of Polish coin counterfeiting during this period are illustrated. W artykule zaprezentowano znalezione na Ukrainie falsyfikaty monet Augusta III (1733-1763) oraz Stanisława Augusta Poniatowskiego (1764-1795) wykonane w sposób chałupniczy. Każde znalezisko opisane zostało oddzielnie, z uwzględnieniem danych o miejscu odkrycia. Ocena techniki produkcji falsyfikatów wsparta została wynikami analiz XRF. Uzyskane efekty stały się podstawą dyskusji na temat cech typowych dla wykonanych metodą chałupniczą falsyfikatów monet polskich drugiej połowy XVIII wieku.

Aesthetics and the political turn in art

Aesthetics and the political turn in art

Author(s): Rafał Czekaj / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Jacques Rancière; Zoon Politikon; Friedrich Schiller; Immanuel Kant; Berlin Biennale; Artur Żmijewski; socially engaged art

It was observed as early as the mid-twentieth century that aesthetics as a philosophical theory of art differs from its objects. The products of contemporary artistic practice go beyond the horizon of traditional aesthetics. Artists are involved increasingly often and on a wide scale in the actions aimed at transforming and constructing the common space. In the face of such activities as took place, for example, as part of the 7th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art in 2012, traditional aesthetics seems to be helpless. That is why, if art is to continue to be the focus of aesthetic investigations, it must, as it were, redefine itself. Jacques Rancière is one of the authors who have outlined the new horizon of aesthetics. In my paper I will briefly present his conception. It provides some theoretical tools which I will use for the description and interpretation of some selected examples of contemporary socially engaged artistic practices. I will show that his distinction of the „aesthetic regime“ of the interpretation of art reveals the competence that combines all artistic practices, past and present, into one concept of art: art as politics. The foundations for setting such perspective were already provided by Schiller and Kant – the classics of modern philosophical aesthetics.

Is it just a metaphysical turn?

Is it just a metaphysical turn?

Author(s): Rafał Solewski / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: contemporary art; metaphysics; escape from metaphysics; end of art; metaphysical turn; visual turn

The paper introduces the phenomenological definition of metaphysics in art and out-lines the relationship between metaphysics and 20th century art, suggesting possible "escape from metaphysics," and the reactions to this suggestion within the philosophical turn announcing “the end of art" and within the so-called “metaphysical turn”. As the illustration of those “turns”, the author analyzes the installations of Miroslaw Balka, James Turrell and Bill Viola. The analysis leads to the conclusion about the possible connection of the described works with the various "turns" and to the hypothesis that the methodologies of the “turns” in fact seek to unveil the metaphysics from which art had tried to escape. The metaphysics transcends the various turns. This confirms the philosophical truth that "there is no escape from metaphysics," pointing out at the same time that metaphysics in art cannot be reduced to a "turn".

The art of failure – the victory of the losers

The art of failure – the victory of the losers

Author(s): Tomasz Szczepanek / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: art of failure; end of art; queer

The article describes the phenomenon of the art of failure. Traditional narrative focuses on the experience of winning, while marginalizing everything that is weak, mediocre, lost. The change comes with the end of art understood as a decomposition of the historical structures organizing artistic discourse (cf. Arthur C. Danto, Gianni Vattimo, Jean-Luc Nancy). In the post-historical plurilogue, the art of failure becomes a means of expression of the groups which have been traditionally excluded (Judith Halberstam). This in turn leads to a multi-level game between the participants of cultural life and its institutions. The author goes on to present and analyse specific examples of the art of failure accentuating their subversive-emancipatory potential.

The “linguistic turn” and twentieth-century possibilities of conducting research on old architecture. Perception and reception of architectural pieces in South America

The “linguistic turn” and twentieth-century possibilities of conducting research on old architecture. Perception and reception of architectural pieces in South America

Author(s): Ewa Kubiak / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: inguistic turn; aesthetic of reception; semiotic in architecture; perception; colonial architecture

Language plays a leading role in describing, arranging and construing the social world, which also incorporates broadly understood culture. Research on language and its associated methodology is already the subject of interest of psychologists, sociologists, historians, and anthropologists. Attempts to employ the linguistic model in other domains have also included the analyses of the works from the domain of visual arts, such as painting, sculpture, film and architecture. The research that seems the most interesting involves elements of semiotics. With reference to architecture, it has been carried out for a long time and we may be tempted to review its results. On the other hand, it is worth suggesting other possibilities of conducting research based on other linguistic methods, such as the “aesthetics of reception”, which also seems to offer new interpretative possibilities. The analysis of some architectural pieces in South America will serve as an example of these explorations.

African contemporary art and the curatorial turn

African contemporary art and the curatorial turn

Author(s): Aneta Pawłowska / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: African art; curatorial turn; museum; exhibitions; contemporary art

During the fifty year period of the second half of the 20th century the field of African Art History, as well as the forms of art studies and art exhibitions have changed considerably. This article considers the evolution of the idea of African identity in contemporary arts. I would like to examine the different forms of art representation and interviewing of African fine arts in the last three decades. In order to illustrate the dynamic changes in the European approach to African Art, it is simply enough to recall the famous remarks of Carl Einstein and Roy Sieber on that subject or William Rubin’s controversial exhibition Primitivism in 20th Century Art at the Museum of Modern Art in New York (1984). It seems that the visibly growing practice of engaging curators of African origin in the creation of exhibitions of modern African art, particularly as a strategy to incorporate the voices of those represented, is one of the most important aspects of the “curatorial turn” of the 21st century.

The post-colonial turn and the modernist architecture in Africa

The post-colonial turn and the modernist architecture in Africa

Author(s): Błażej Ciarkowski / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Africa; modernism; decolonisation; post-colonialism; modernist architecture

Modernism as a trend in architecture is rarely associated with the colonial policy of the European powers. Nevertheless it was one of the tools of the "Western" expansion in Africa, simultaneously a constructive and a destructive force. It was a reflection of the changes in the modern world and at the same time it led to an unavoidable break with the local identity and tradition. “The Year of Africa" (1960), when as many as 17 states proclaimed independence, paradoxically did not bring any radical changes in architectonic solutions. Public facilities were still constructed according to "Western" modernist convention. Political dependence of the new countries on their respective "mother states" has been to a significant degree reduced and sometimes even broken. At the same time their relations on the level of architecture have remained almost unchanged, thereby pushing the "periphery" to the role of a "province". Critical analysis of the effects of colonialism merges post-colonialism with neo-colonialism, understood as control exercised by the metropolis over the decolonised peripheries.

A post-socialist city: a “turn” in shaping the architectural image of a city at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. The case of Łódź

A post-socialist city: a “turn” in shaping the architectural image of a city at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. The case of Łódź

Author(s): Julia Sowińska-Heim / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: post-socialist city; Łódź; urban regeneration; place promotion; city identity; polish contemporary architecture; architectural changes

Following the political breakthrough of 1989 architects were faced with completely new challenges. After the lethargy of the 1980s Polish architecture experienced a real turn. A remarkable transformation was taking place along with the general cultural, social, political and economic changes. The opening to the trends in Western culture, the establishment of numerous private architectural studios, the appearance of development companies or foreign investors, coupled with new technological possibilities resulted in the change of Polish urban landscape. As a result, Polish municipal authorities had to review their way of thinking about their cities. The paper aims at analysing the changes stimulated by the “turn” which took place in Polish architecture in the 1990s. It presents some observations on the transformation and the emerging challenges and problems of Łódź urban space.

Telling images? The self-reflexive turn in contemporary American graphic novels

Telling images? The self-reflexive turn in contemporary American graphic novels

Author(s): Małgorzata Olsza / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: pictorial turn; comics; graphic novel; visual narrative; self-reflexive turn

This article proposes to see graphic novel as the epitome of a twofold turn. First, as the genre of the pictorial turn, a form that demonstrates the transition from the verbal to the visual. Indeed, the graphic novel can be described as a verbal-visual compound whose power of expression arises from the tension between text and image. The burden of advancing the plot is primarily placed on the visual sequence: images in graphic novels serve to “tell” of the events. With its roots in the popular medium of the comics, the graphic novel embraces unequivocalness of the image as its main principle. This rule, however, is being increasingly violated. This development signals the second turn: the so-called “self-reflexive” turn, where the image is emancipated from the referent. This article examines instances of a play with the image and its representational status. I will analyze selected sequences from contemporary American graphic novels, including David Mazzucchelli and Paul Karasik’s City of Glass (1994), Chris Ware’s Jimmy Corrigan (2000), and Craig Thompson’s Blankets (2003), describing the strategies employed to render the narrative less straightforward. Such strategies as the use of color fields, non-standard page layout, or emphasis on the abstract character of the portrayed shapes and forms constitute significant additions to graphic tales. I will demonstrate how this subversive visual language enriches the medium of the graphic novel – a primarily self-reflexive form.

From painted decoration to the screen. The turn in stage illusion in the late 20th and early 21st century

From painted decoration to the screen. The turn in stage illusion in the late 20th and early 21st century

Author(s): Dominika Łarionow,Magdalena Raszewska / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Disillusion; illusion; projection; screen; space in the theatre; stage design; theater; turn

The painted decoration discovered in the Renaissance dominated the European stage for almost 300 years. In the second half of the nineteenth century, the so-called Great Reforms theater challenged this tradition, but it has survived in various guises until the present day. Today we perceive this form as anachronistic, as a quote from the past or an awkwardness of the set designer. Changing the perception of reality on the screen has also led to a change in the treatment of illusion and stage space. The screen has become not only an element of decoration, but it also shows or in extreme cases replaces reality. The impact of the new media on theatre today results not only from the introduction of technology, but also from the entrance into theater of artists from the world of the media. The new relationship leads in extreme situations to the denial of the basic definition of theater as an interaction between the creator and the recipient. The purpose of the paper is to show the interrelationships between the actor and the spectator, illusion and disillusionment. It seems that the described change will determine the direction of further development of theater. It remains an open question how the relationships between all of the participants in the interaction will be impacted by the use of screens and other electronic media. Describing and naming the attempts at qualitative change in the structure of the stage is important for the formation of new methodology for analyzing theatrical reality.

Intolerable ugliness. A turn in European fashion as a result of confrontation with Japanese aesthetics

Intolerable ugliness. A turn in European fashion as a result of confrontation with Japanese aesthetics

Author(s): Magdalena Samborska / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Japanese fashion; Issey Miyake; Yohij Yamamoto; Rei Kawakubo; fashion deconstruction; wabi-sabi; japonism

The article is devoted to the impact of Japanese aesthetics on European fashion. In the first part, I will present an outline of Japonism, a trend in 19th century fashion. It brought no significant changes then. The designers just used decorative ornaments originating in Japan or fabrics imported from Asia. At the turn of the century, influenced by reforms in clothing and inspired by the Japanese kimono, the feminine silhouette was radically modified. In the 1920s, these innovations were abandoned. The main part of the paper concerns Japanese designers who appeared on the Paris fashion scene in the second half of the 20th century. Kenzo Takada and Hanae Mori adapted to the European canons, introducing an aura of exoticism. It was only the emergence of such avant-garde designers as Issey Miyake, Rei Kawakubo, and Yohji Yamamoto, that was a turning point in fashion. It involved a confrontation between the Western aesthetics and the Japanese concept of beauty. The Japanese designers proposed a style completely different from what Europe was accustomed to. It featured asymmetrical, loose, often monochromatic cloth- ing, sometimes without traditional trimmings, frayed. In time, the initial shock they provoked turned into a shift in the understanding of what clothing can be.

Emigration as an artistic turning point – Ignacy Szczedrowski, Konstanty Kukiewicz and Tadeusz Gorecki at the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg

Emigration as an artistic turning point – Ignacy Szczedrowski, Konstanty Kukiewicz and Tadeusz Gorecki at the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg

Author(s): Agnieszka Świętosławska / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg; Ignacy Szczedrowski (1815–1870); Konstanty Kukiewicz (1817/18–1840); Tadeusz Gorecki (1825–1868); academic education; artistic emigration

The article describes a turning point in an individual artistic development as a result of emigration and study abroad. The discussion centers on three artists from Vilnius, who after receiving initial training, left to study at the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg. The decision to leave their home city was forced by the changes in the political situation. In 1832, as a result of the repressions in the aftermath of the November Uprising, the Vilnius University was closed, and so was its school of painting. For each of the artists examined in this article, the years of study at the Saint Petersburg Academy became a turning point in the development of their personal style, though each of them chose a different artistic path: Ignacy Szczedrowski was inspired by the so-called “Venetsianov school of painting”, Konstanty Kukiewicz learned from the old Dutch genre and battle paintings, and Tadeusz Gorecki was influenced by the approved academic doctrine. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate how a stay in Saint Petersburg completely changed the approach of the three painters to art, and left its imprint not only on their artistic achievements, but also on the course of their painting careers and personal lives.

In search of spirituality. Religious reorientation or radical assimilation? The case of Marek Szwarc.

In search of spirituality. Religious reorientation or radical assimilation? The case of Marek Szwarc.

Author(s): Irmina Gadowska / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Jewish art; identity; conversion; Judaism; Jesus

The artistic turn in graffiti practice: Szwedzki vs Mona Tusz

The artistic turn in graffiti practice: Szwedzki vs Mona Tusz

Author(s): Jakub Petri / Language(s): English / Issue: 17/2015

Keywords: Graffiti; street art; murals; aesthetics; performativity; pragmatism

Graffiti and street art are related in many aspects. However, in spite of their common origins, and similar techniques and strategies, modern graffiti is usually presented as a genre lacking an artistic factor. The aim of this essay is to show that the separation between graffiti and street art is less warranted than it would appear.