A Driving Force
On the Rhetoric of Images and Power
open access | peer reviewed
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a cura di
- Angelica Bertoli - Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia - email
- Giulia Gelmi - Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia - email
- Andrea Missagia - Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia - email orcid profile
- Maria Novella Tavano - Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia, Italia - email
Abstract
The volume comprises a selection of papers presented at the 5th Postgraduate International Conference organized by the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage of Ca’ Foscari University of Venice (Venice, 4-6 October 2023): A Driving Force. On the Rhetoric of Images and Power. In the introduction to his well-known The Power of Images (1989), David Freedberg claims not only that images hold power over us, but they are also, inevitably, related to ‘power’ itself. Art is therefore a powerful and non-neutral tool. Its forms and expressions influence and manipulate the realm of the real. Throughout human history, the artist’s creative power gave form, substance, and meaning to otherwise inert matter. This process turned the artist into a demiurge. Furthermore, once images are given their final form, they circulate and live a life of their own. The 5th Postgraduate International Conference was aimed at investigating the rhetorical nature of the intersection between image and power. In 1979 Yuri Lotman claimed that “rhetoric” is the displacement of the structural principles of a given semiotic sphere into another semiotic sphere. The Tartu semiologist’s approach implies that the “correlation with different semiotic systems gives rise to a rhetorical situation in which a powerful source of elaboration of new meanings is contained”. In exploring these meanings from a multidisciplinary perspective, this volume investigates two main themes: the power of the image, as an autonomous device, endowed with a pervasive and persuasive character; the image as a form for representing power which addresses questions concerning the sense of authority, and its negation, namely a sense of dissidence and counter-narrations.
Keywords Renaissance • Salon dʼAutomne • The Peggy Guggenheim Collection • Politics • Byzantine Empire • Lucerne • New media installation art • Post-Representation • Russian Empire • Visual culture • Technology • French Revolution • Modern art history • General intellect • Propaganda • Portrait de la jeune fille en few • Materialism • New Formalism • Beirut • Image and power • Gaze • Surveillance • Postcolonialism • Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth • Arts and crafts • Symbols • Kodeń • Crossmapping • Revolutionary festival • Semiology • Holbein • Vittorio Viale • Folklore • The Bureau of Melodramatic Research • Occupational realism • Political iconology • Gendered bodies • Byzantine empire • Rhetoric • Saint George • Palaiologan Renaissance • Poor power Images • Melodrama • Iconography • Post-representation • Italy • Latin faith • Neoliberal imaginary • Contemporary art • Drone • Un’Ambigua Utopia • Sex • Decoloniality • Speculative design • Political iconography • Russian style • Image • Jan Fryderyk Sapieha • New Media Installation Art • Power • Visual identity • Dissidence • Alternative press • Our Lady of Kodeń • Venice Biennale • Countersurveillance Fashion • Directory • Historiographical bias • Nicolas Ibrahim Sursock • Pietro Aretino • Arts • Warfare • Portrait de la jeune fille en feu • Cittadini originari • Painted facade • Sapieha family • Palazzo Madama, Torino • Authority • Distorted portrait • Religious submission • Image theory • Labour of love • National image • Socially engaged art • Second Post War Period • Geographical personifications • Sixteenth-century Italian art • John V Palaiologos • Macedonia • Poor power images • Countersurveillance fashion • Allegory • Wood • Speculative Design • Power of the images • Optic Nerve • Lebanon • Coronation of Miraculous Images • Modern Art History • Scuole Grandi • Sursock Museum • Exhibition • Power representation • Salon d'Automne • Aby Warburg • Byzantine sculpture • Autotheory • Metaphor • Public sphere • Wearable technologies • Kustar • Design • Venice • Fascism • A/traverso • Visual Culture • Feminist art • Paraesthetics
Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-771-5 | e-ISBN 978-88-6969-771-5 | Pubblicato 22 Dicembre 2023 | Lingua en
Copyright © 2023 Angelica Bertoli, Giulia Gelmi, Andrea Missagia, Maria Novella Tavano. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.