CONTENTS - VOL. 15, NUMBER 1, JUNE 2005

SYMPOSIUM

IMAGE VERSUS TEXT?

EMIL VIŠŇOVSKÝ: Introduction

MIROSLAV MARCELLI: Philosophy, Image, Arts
ETELA FARKAŠOVÁ: Poly(con)textuality of the Photographic Image
JÁN BAKOŠ: Prague Linguistic Circle's Contribution to Art History
KATARÍNA RUSNÁKOVÁ: The Correlation of Image and Text in Contemporary Media Arts
MICHAL MURIN: Signature Laboratory
NORA BARRY: Talking Pictures
EVA DOROTA UHROVÁ: When Images Start Talking: Text and Image in Psychotherapy

ARTICLES

ZDEŇKA KALNICKÁ: Caressing a Place "In-Between": The Imaginative and Conceptual Thought of Karel Čapek
SINAN ÖZBEK: Reflections on Racism in Turkey

BOOK REVIEWS

Ján Bakoš, ed. Minulosť v prítomnosti: Súčasné umenie a umeleckohistorické mýtý. The Past in the Present: Contemporary Art and Art History's Myths. Bratislava: Nadácia Centrum súčasného umenia, 2002, by NICHOLAS SAWICKI

Oľga Zápotočná: Kultúrna gramotnosť v sociálnopsychologických súvislostiach [Cultural Literacy in its social and psychological connections]. Bratislava: Album 2004, 121 pp. by BLANKA ŠULAVÍKOVÁ

Hannes STEKL - Elena MANNOVÁ, Heroen, Mythen, Identitäten (Heroes, Myths, Identities). Die Slowakei und Österreich im Vergleich. Wiener Vorlesungen, Konversatorien und Studien, Band 14. Herausgegeben für die Kulturabteilung der Stadt Wien von Hubert Christian Ehalt. Wien: WUV, 2003, by TIBOR PICHLER

ABSTRACTS

PHILOSOPHY, IMAGE, ARTS
MIROSLAV MARCELLI

E-mail: marcelli@fphil.uniba.sk

The article deals with some philosophical reflections of the image and its production. At the beginning it focuses on Plato's classification of the imaginative art and his negative characterization of simulacra. In the next part it moves to Deleuze's analysis of simulacra and their position in the social space. Afterwards Baudrillard's conception, which considers simulacra to be the dominant image expression of modern society, is invoked. In the last part the author mentions the critics of this conception (Lyotard, Latour) and calls attention to the conflicts and clashes connected with images today.

pp. 5-11

POLY(CON)TEXTUALITY OF THE PHOTOGRAPHIC IMAGE (On the philosophical aspects of photography)
ETELA FARKAŠOVÁ

E-mail: farkasova@fphil.uniba.sk

Some philosophical aspects of photography are indicated, chiefly the relation between the real object and its photographic image, between reality and fiction within it, as well as between the "truth" and "untruth" of the photograph. The author's contemplations on the indicated (and other) questions focus on the so-called family photograph, some factors that have impact on the formation and the interpretation of the photographic constellations. Contemplations are based on the idea that there is no "innocent" eye of the photographer/camera, every photographic image is (by the formation but also by every perception-interpretation) situated in a particular social, historical and cultural context and is co-determined by this polycontextual situatedness. In spite of the relative cognitive credibility, the author regards photography as an important means of representation of people and/or things and events.

pp. 12-21

PRAGUE LINGUISTIC CIRCLE'S CONTRIBUTION TO ART HISTORY
JÁN BAKOŠ

E-mail: dejubaja@savba.sk

The present paper deals with the impact of the Prague linguistic circle on art history. Following V. N.Volšinov's distinction between two notions of language, i.e. language regarded as "energeia" on the one hand and language conceived of as "ergon" on the other, it analyzes the application of W. von Humboldt's and B. Croce's idea of language as an expression to the history of art by J. Schlosser and H. Sedlmayr and compares it with the influence of J. Mukařovský's and R. Jakobson's ideas on art historical writing from E. Gombrich to the semiotics of the history of art.

pp. 22-34

THE CORRELATION OF IMAGE AND TEXT IN CONTEMPORARY MEDIA ART
KATARÍNA RUSNÁKOVÁ

E-mail: rusnak@marta.sk

The twentieth century witnessed the changeover from text (book) to image. The change of the paradigm from the textual to the visual is connected with the increasing significance of visuality and the importance of the modes of seeing in the field of visual culture. The boom in information technologies recorded since the 1990s has played a seminal role in the dynamic shaping of this phenomenon, which is characterized by the diverse forms now available: film, video, internet, post-photography, advertisements and the mass media. These not only accelerate the formation of new visual forms but they also help shape the changing perception of art. Within the context of digital visual culture, a change occurs in the relationship between text and image, which becomes more flexible, more diverse and more open. The increase in intertextuality and hybridity of media art is interlinked with these processes.

pp. 35-44

SIGNATURE LABORATORY
MICHAL MURIN

E-mail: michal.murin@ths.sk

The text "SIGNature LABoratorY" explores signatures (in their Derridean interpretation) in the context of works of arts. Signatures and their integration in the artistic process-specifically, the interactive communication socioproject titled Your Name in My Signature-originated as a long-term philosophic and conceptual strategy exploring the relationships between words, images, visualizations and ornaments, but also between subjects and objects, between depersonalization and a humanistic reinterpretation in a gesture of appropriation, between the act of giving and its reciprocal Baudrillardian nature. Signatures as signs of civilization, in this instance works of art, culminate in the need to encompass, accentuate, define and confirm, and are reflected in the urban nature of the architecture of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Signatures; here, a civilized gesture-the act of signing in an urban environment, bears the potential for a future Foucaltian archeologization. Texts are generated as authors' interpretations of works of art, as oral history enclosed in its own archive, and therefore also serve as Derridean alibis integrated in Beuysean social sculptures.

pp. 45-54

TALKING PICTURES
NORA BARRY

E-mail: norabarry@druidmedia.com

Mankind's earliest texts were, in fact, images. Written communication was based on a series of images, or pictograms, strung together. Even after the development of the written language, images dominated media communications. Now, at the dawn of the 21st century, society seems to be returning to an image based language: the written (electronic) language is filled with icons and images. Camera and video phones are rapidly replacing the spoken language.

pp. 55-57

WHEN IMAGES START TALKING: TEXT AND IMAGE IN PSYCHOTHERAPY
EVA DOROTA UHROVÁ

E-mail: d.uhrova@stonline.sk

In psychotherapeutic methods that use imagery, particularly where imagery is the focus, a close link between the imaginative and the verbal is not only self-evident but also indispensable. Imagery is closely linked to the internal world and the experiences of the imagining person. At the same time the imagery can be both represented and further processed and elaborated verbally. The imagery enables us to access both the contents of the declarative (explicit) memory but also, and especially, the contents of the (implicit) procedural and emotional memory, which are unconscious (but not repressed) and represent "internal images" of our early experiences. The contents, as a record of the early experiences of an individual, are very important in shaping an individual's personality. They are crucial for the character of perception and the way in which the external world is processed. Again, it is the verbal processing and elaboration of the imagined content that participates in this stabilization and the creative process during which the patterns of relating and understanding the surrounding world alter. We shall look at the problems outlined above from the perspective of the neurobiological findings that cast light on the importance of the procedural and chiefly emotional memory for the formation of our wishes, motives for actions, as well as for the final decision-making and its implementation.

pp. 58-71

CARESSING A PLACE "IN-BETWEEN": THE IMAGINATIVE AND CONCEPTUAL THOUGHT OF KAREL ČAPEK
ZDEŇKA KALNICKÁ

E-mail: zdenka.kalnicka@osu.cz

We face the world in which things are losing their firm contours and areas of life their static divisions. Therefore, we have to deal with the problem of how to re-think anew the relationships between chaos and order, continuity and discontinuity, unity and multiplicity, the relationship between concept and image being among of them. Many contemporary philosophers stress the importance of understanding the place where the mediation between two poles runs through, sometimes called a place "in-between". The aim of this article is to propose a hypotheses that Karel Čapek, the 20th century Czech writer and philosopher, addressed the problem in question in his literary works and philosophy, and to analyze what kind of solutions he offered. The first part examines two short stories by the Čapek brothers in order to propose the idea that an imagination plays an important role in the connection with the problem in question. The second part is based on the idea that philosophy itself is a place "in-between" conceptual and imaginative thought, and this section is devoted to determining how the imaginative part of Čapek's work is related to his pragmatic philosophical thoughts. The third part explores the particular linguistic phenomenon-the semi-colon-as an appropriate device to embody Čapek's world vision Weltanschauung.

pp. 72-83

REFLECTIONS ON RACISM IN TURKEY
SINAN ÖZBEK

E-mail: ss.ozbek@ttnet.net.tr

The paper gives an account of the sources of racist and nationalist attitudes in Turkey. The author explores some of the crucial historical, social, cultural and intellectual resources to provide the argument that racism is a phenomenon that is embedded in cultural rather than natural (biological) human condition and context. The analysis of racism seems to be a part of the critique of pre-capitalist as well as capitalist social relations.

pp. 84-95

Back > >

EUROPE | SLOVAKIA | BRATISLAVA

© Department of Social & Biological Communication Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava
Electronic version is available via Internet and GSM: www.humanaffairs.sk, wap.humanaffairs.sk
Reg. No. 648/92

MADE IN SLOVAKIA