Everybody: A Transnational Iconography
Art History
Final Report Abstract
This research project was dedicated to the question of how the audience is addressed through images and how in this way public presence, authority and resonance are generated. The focus was on anthropomorphic image figures used as mediators in advertising and political propaganda, but also in films or in the visual arts and that tend to take a back seat to the message they are trying to convey – even if, in contrast to this mediating function, they sometimes become stars. A central thesis of the project is that such figuratively staged "everybodies" (Michel de Certeau) operate similarly to the sociological figure of the "third Person": they produce seduction and transitions, but can also overwhelm or have a transgressive effect. Such figures are accompanied by a powerful ambivalence, as they both cross friend-foe patterns and reinforce hatred and resentment. In the complex process of mediatised "claim-making" in public space, they link particular faces and modes of appearance with a universal address, and in this way at the same time provide the messages conveyed with a physical appeal that is close to reality. They also vouch for the truth and authenticity of what is portrayed and offer a stage for communicating seemingly unvarnished experiences or even emotional self-disclosure. In this way they are able to set the audience’s desire in motion and to keep it going, to generate resonance and to stimulate action. Everybodies thus play a constitutive role for historical and contemporary populisms as well as for activities of popularisation and agenda-setting in public space in general. Another core thesis of the project concerns the genealogy and iconology of such figures: this is characterised by lines of tradition that are marked by a long duration and encompass a wide variety of cultures. These lines of tradition range from the "Ship of Fools" and the "Everyman" plays of the late Middle Ages to the arbitrary, everyday figures that Michel de Montaigne addresses in his work, to images of Christ or Buddha figures. In tension with this long duration, everybodies are re-figured with the political upheaval associated with the great revolutions of the 16th to 19th centuries, in that they were fused with the political myth and authority of the people. A type of figuration emerged that continues to characterise political agitation today, in which an individual, singled out from the rebellious crowd but at the same time is staged as connected to it and is visualised as a kind of resonating body. In addition to this type of figuration – and this is a further core thesis of the project – there are three others: Everybodies are also figured as collective faces provided with names, which, like the Guy Fawkes mask, hold a collective body together and lend it recognisability and characteristic features, but also anonymity. Another type consists of the representation of figures such as clowns, tramps or messenger figures (angels or couriers) whose mask is more or less fixed and who traverse different contexts, guiding the audience to different social settings or generally leading towards society as such. A final type, which has become more prominent especially since the 1960s, consists of mise-en-scènes in which representatives of social otherness appear staged as a mirror of the self. Examples of this are depictions of women, of migrants or of figures that are hybrid in various ways as doubles of the audience and lenses of self-reflection and social observation. These four types of figuration rarely appear clearly separated from each other, but overlap or appear with different accents.
Publications
- “Everyday Life“. In: Kathrin Fahlenbrach, Martin Klimke und Joachim Scharloth (Hg.), Protest Cultures: A Companion Bd. 1: Elements of Protest, New York: Berghahn Books, 2016, 294–303
Anna Schober
- „Jenseits von progressiv versus konservativ. Nicht-konformistische Geschlechterinszenierungen und der neoliberale Zeitgeist“. In: INDES. Zeitschrift für Politik und Gesellschaft, Themenheft „(Non-)Konformismus“, Nr. 3/2016, 43–54
Anna Schober
(See online at https://doi.org/10.13109/inde.2016.5.3.43) - „Erotik, Gewalt und Folklore: Die Inszenierung geschlechtlicher und ethnischer Differenz im jugoslawischen Kino um 1968“. In: Aylin Basaran, Julia B. Köhne, Christina Wieder und Klaudija Sabo (Hg.), Sexualität und Widerstand. Internationale Filmkulturen und Literaturen, Wien: Mandelbaum Verlag 2018, 207–226
Anna Schober
- Popularisation and Populism through the Visual Arts: Attraction Images, London und New York: Routledge (Arts and Visual Culture Series) 2019, 222 pages.
Anna Schober
(See online at https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429467882) - Un vagabondo diventa un leader populista. Arriva John Doe come riflessione cinematografica sul ruolo degli "uomini qualunque" nei processi politici . In: Cinema e storia 2019. Cinema e populismo. Modelli e immaginari di una categoria politica. 2019, pp.57-74.
Anna Schober
- Wir und die Anderen: Visuelle Kultur zwischen Aneignung und Ausgrenzung.
Klagenfurter Beiträge zur Visuellen Kultur, Band 7. 2021, 288 S., ISBN 978-3-86962-395-5
Anna Schober und Brigitte Hipfl
