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 Power representation • Feminist art • Gendered bodies • Italy • Sex • Our Lady of Kodeń • Warfare • Visual Culture • Countersurveillance fashion • Folklore • John V Palaiologos • Materialism • Portrait de la jeune fille en few • Lebanon • Vittorio Viale • Cittadini originari • Lucerne • Alternative press • Countersurveillance Fashion • Macedonia • Wearable technologies • Iconography • Renaissance • Symbols • Surveillance • Directory • Jan Fryderyk Sapieha • Politics • Kodeń • Power • Image • New Media Installation Art • Salon dʼAutomne • New media installation art • Speculative Design • Power of the images • Political iconology • Speculative design • Beirut • Decoloniality • Rhetoric • Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth • Sursock Museum • Allegory • Pietro Aretino • Sixteenth-century Italian art • The Peggy Guggenheim Collection • Sapieha family • Political iconography • Authority • Image theory • Salon d'Automne • A/traverso • Contemporary art • French Revolution • Autotheory • Latin faith • Painted facade • Arts • Modern Art History • Saint George • New Formalism • Public sphere • Byzantine sculpture • Occupational realism • Visual culture • Dissidence • Image and power • Paraesthetics • Gaze • Arts and crafts • Byzantine Empire • National image • Wood • Revolutionary festival • Coronation of Miraculous Images • Labour of love • Nicolas Ibrahim Sursock • Religious submission • Optic Nerve • Scuole Grandi • Palazzo Madama, Torino • Russian style • Palaiologan Renaissance • Technology • Drone • Holbein • Venice Biennale • Semiology • Postcolonialism • Melodrama • Post-representation • Distorted portrait • Socially engaged art • Visual identity • Propaganda • Design • The Bureau of Melodramatic Research • Aby Warburg • Second Post War Period • Russian Empire • Poor power Images • Poor power images • Post-Representation • Metaphor • General intellect • Un’Ambigua Utopia • Historiographical bias • Kustar • Modern art history • Neoliberal imaginary • Venice • Fascism • Byzantine empire • Portrait de la jeune fille en feu • Exhibition • Geographical personifications • Crossmapping
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.