Iconology: Art-historical and Philosophical Aspects Of Reading The Cultural Phenomena - YMSMK028PV

• Title: Iconology: Art-historical and Philosophical Aspects Of Reading The Cultural Phenomena
• Guaranteed by: Programme Electronic Culture and Semiotics (24-KEKS)
• Faculty: Faculty of Humanities
• Actual: from 2023
• Semester: winter
• E-Credits: 5
• Examination process: winter s.:
• Hours per week, examination: winter s.:1/1, Ex [HT]
• Capacity: 30 / 30 (30)
• Min. number of students: unlimited
• 4EU+: no
• Virtual mobility / capacity: no
• State of the course: taught
• Language: English
• Teaching methods: full-time
• Teaching methods: full-time
• Note: course can be enrolled in outside the study plan; enabled for web enrollment
• Guarantor: Mgr. Ondřej Váša, Ph.D.
• Teacher(s): Mgr. Ondřej Váša, Ph.D.
• Class: Courses available to incoming students
• Incompatibility : YBAJ223
• Is incompatible with: YBAJ223

Annotation

English

Last update: Mgr. Ondřej Váša, Ph.D. (29.07.2021)

What does Botticelli’s Venus have in common with the contemporary Instagram stars? How did the influential renaissance concept of “figura serpentinata” become a pornographic backbone of contemporary sexual imagery? How did Michelangelo’s infernal orgies survive into the present time, disguised as the images of destruction? While addressing these questions, the course will provide a practical introduction to iconology as it has been defined and practiced by Aby M. Warburg and Ernst Cassirer in the 1920s and 1930s. Concerning their mutually influenced methodology, the course will interpret the critical aspects of the “nameless science” by (and while) exposing and analyzing complicated genealogy of the specific spectrum of surprisingly interrelated images like selfies, underwear advertising, cloud imagery, abstract painting, war atrocities or hygiene-related illustrations.

Syllabus

English

Last update: Mgr. Ondřej Váša, Ph.D. (04.10.2021)

GENERAL OVERVIEW (selected topics):

 - Introduction: Representing Human Body

 

SECTION I.: From Renaissance to William Hogarth

 - Between Plato and Ficino: philosophical origins of “figura serpentinata”

- Between Michelangelo and Lomazzo: (de)erotizing bodies

 

SECTION II.: From William Hogarth to hygienic imperatives

 - Lomazzo’s influence on Hogarth

- Movement and eroticism in Hogarth’s “The Analysis of Beauty”

- Unexpected consequences of Hogarth’s mistakes: William Hogarth as the father of the “modern line”

- Hygienic discourse of the 18^th century: clean outlines of the healthy bodies

- Art Nouveau and its implications: “figura serpentinata” runs wild

 

SECTION III.: 20th and 21th Century Aftermaths

 - “Cloud turn” in art: the demise of the line and the victory of the flesh

- Uncomfortable bodies: architectural drawing imperatives

- Fascist reactions: individual erotic wilderness vs. hollow social bodies

- Figura serpentinata and the contemporary anatomical imagination: spirituality held in check

- Between war and pornography: contemporary survivals of the renaissance concepts

Czech

Last update: Mgr. Ondřej Váša, Ph.D. (21.09.2020)

GENERAL OVERVIEW (selected topics):

 - Introduction: Representing Human Body

 

SECTION I.: From Renaissance to William Hogarth

 - Between Plato and Ficino: philosophical origins of “figura serpentinata”

- Between Michelangelo and Lomazzo: (de)erotizing bodies

 

SECTION II.: From William Hogarth to hygienic imperatives

 - Lomazzo’s influence on Hogarth

- Movement and eroticism in Hogarth’s “The Analysis of Beauty”

- Unexpected consequences of Hogarth’s mistakes: William Hogarth as the father of the “modern line”

- Hygienic discourse of the 18^th century: clean outlines of the healthy bodies

- Art Nouveau and its implications: “figura serpentinata” runs wild

 

SECTION III.: 20th and 21th Century Aftermaths

 - “Cloud turn” in art: the demise of the line and the victory of the flesh

- Uncomfortable bodies: architectural drawing imperatives

- Fascist reactions: individual erotic wilderness vs. hollow social bodies

- Figura serpentinata and the contemporary anatomical imagination: spirituality held in check

- Between war and pornography: contemporary survivals of the renaissance concepts

Course completion requirements

Last update: Mgr. Ondřej Váša, Ph.D. (28.08.2020)

75% attendance, active participation in discussions, final essay on an individually selected topic

Learning resources

Last update: Mgr. Ondřej Váša, Ph.D. (21.09.2020)

Selected Basic Literature:

- CASSIRER, E.: The Logic of the Cultural Sciences. Five Studies. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2000. ISBN: 0-300-08114-6

- HESTER, H.: Beyond Explicit. Pornography and the Displacement of Sex. New York: SUNY Press, 2014, ISBN: 9781438449609.

- HOGARTH, W. The Analysis of Beauty. Ilkley: Scolar Press, 1969. ISBN: 0-85417-523-7

- MAES, H. - LEVINSON, J.: Art and Pornography: philosophical essays. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012, ISBN: 0198744080

- MAURER, E.: Manierismus: figura serpentinata und andere Figurenideale des Manierismus. Studien, Essays, Berichte. Zürich: Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 2001, ISBN: 9783858237910

- WARBURG, A.: A Lecture on Serpent Ritual. Journal of the Warburg Institute, No. 4, 1939, pp. 277-292. ISSN: 09592024

- WIND, E.: Warburg’s Concept of Kulturwissenschaft and its Meaning for Aesthetics. In: PREZIOSI, D. (ed.). The Art of Art History. A Critical Anthology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009, pp. 189-194. ISBN: 978-0-19-922984-0

- WOOD, CH. S., NAGEL, A.: Anachronic Renaissance. New York: Zone Books, 2010. ISBN: 978-1935408024

The excerpts and documents we will be working with will be available to download via SIS.