Television as a Cultural and Communicative System: Evolution Directions and Modern Boundaries

Russian science has not yet developed a stable understanding of the essence and generic affiliation of television, which continues to have a powerful multidirectional impact on the cultural and social processes of our time. The proposed characteristic of television as an independent cultural and communicative system allows highlighting its functioning as a separate cultural phenomenon that cannot be reduced to other forms of communicative activity. At the same time, in line with the system-cultural approach, the article substantiates the interaction of the main system-forming factors within the television system: those are artistic-entertaining, economic, informational, political, and technological. Constant consideration of all these factors when examining any aspect of television communication should become the methodological basis for studying television as a system.A system-diachronic analysis of television, revealing the main directions of its nonlinear development through the mutual influence of the system-forming factors, allowed drawing the following conclusions.Modern television is increasingly acting not so much as a means, but as a method of communication. This leads to a reduction in the significance of the content of a television utterance and, conversely, to the absolutization of the format, which determines both the content itself and the ritualized processes of television communication.Significant changes in television communication occurred in the first decades of the 21st century under the influence of Internet technologies: the individualization of television viewing and the spread of “out-of-studio” forms of television production, the improvement of image quality and the democratization of video recording technologies leads to the fact that television ceases to perceive itself as a utilitarian means of broadcasting off-screen reality, and is increasingly positioned as an independent cultural source.Television in the 21st century has expanded its boundaries, having absorbed the vast sphere of Internet and video communications. The modern television system can be understood as a set of audiovisual messages intended for public display and perceived in non-specialized everyday living conditions.

Educational Activities of the State Russian Museum in the 1940s

The relevance of the article is indicated by referring to archival primary sources that characterize the forms and methods of scientific and artistic educational activities of the State Russian Museum in the 1940s, in particular — during the Great Patriotic War (a museum tour, an exhibition session, a lecture, a conversation with slides). This makes it possible to more accurately identify the direction of work in the following years and at the present time and indicate the need to introduce other forms of work with visitors: lectures with slides, traveling exhibitions, concerts, cycle subscriptions, trips to villages and enterprises, lectures on the radio, cooperation with the museum’s publishing house and the country’s press bodies.The influence of the Department of Scientific and Artistic Propaganda of the 1940s on the State Russian Museum’s subsequent work on communication with the audience is expressed in the revision of the content of the excursion and lecture courses. In the 1950s—1970s, messages on the heroic past of the Soviet people, presentations of the activities of warrior artists, and communication with national unions of artists gained particular popularity. The State Russian Museum became a center for advanced training of tour guides for peripheral art museums.Documentary sources, which include archive materials, are of particular importance in the preservation of memory. Together with them, works of art created during the war or in the first post-war years play an invaluable role in restoring the truth.

Dutch Flower Still Life of 17th Century: Interest and Oblivion through the Centuries

Over three and a half centuries, the genre of flower still life created by Dutch artists experienced ups of interest and oblivion. There were the maximum assessment of society in the form of high fees of the 17th century artists; the criticism of connoisseurs and art theorists; the neglect in the 19th century and the rise of auction prices and close attention of art critics, manifested from the middle of the 20th century to the present day. In the middle of the 17th century, there was already a hierarchy of genres, based on both the subject and the size of the paintings, which was reflected in the price. Still lifes and landscapes were cheaper than allegorical and historical scenes, but there were exceptions, for example, in the works of Jan Brueghel the Elder and Jan Davidsz. de Heem. Art theorists Willem van Hoogstraten and Arnold Houbraken, resting upon academic tastes, downplayed the importance of still-life painting. Meanwhile, the artists themselves, determining the worth of their paintings, sought for maximum naturalism, and such paintings were sold well.In the 20th century, this genre attracted the attention of collectors in Europe and the United States. A revival of interest in Dutch still lifes in general, and in flower ones in particular, began in the 20th century, the paintings rose in price at auctions, and collecting them became almost a fashion. Art societies and art dealers of the Netherlands and Belgium organized several small exhibitions of still lifes. The course for studying symbolic messages in still lifes, presented by Ingvar Bergström, is continued by Eddie de Jong, who emphasizes the diverse nature of symbolism in Dutch painting of the 17th century. Svetlana Alpers, on the contrary, criticizes the iconological method and presents the Dutch painting of that period as an example of visual culture. Norman Bryson’s view of Dutch still lifes is formed against the background of the development of a consumer society, economic prosperity and abundance. Finally, there has been an increasing interest in the natural science aspects of flower still-life painting in the researches of the last twenty years. Curiosity, skill, and admiration for nature are the impulses that can still be felt in the images of bouquets and fruits.

Tools for Describing the Communicative Space of Scientific Schools

To manage research activities, it is necessary to develop up-to-date tools that allow to quickly and efficiently assess the effectiveness of the scientific space functioning. Contradictions between the new industry of scientific communication and traditional forms of preserving and multiplying intellectual capital have become more acute, new points of interaction between the institutional structures of science (scientific schools, “invisible colleges”, expert and experimental (real and virtual) laboratories, etc.) have appeared. The concepts of the cultural codes of representation and translation of the subjects (individual and collective) of scientific communication have changed, and there is a need to update the requirements for the culture of their identification and positioning in the age of digital technologies. A scientific school is a multi-purpose collective that simultaneously implements the functions of production, dissemination, protection of scientific knowledge and reproduction of scientists. The cultural traditions of its functioning, as well as the cultural norms of institutionalization, are being transformed.On the material of bibliographic description of the genesis and development of the cultural studies school of the Southern Urals (centered in the Chelyabinsk State Institute of Culture), the article shows opportunities for scientometric and informational analyses. The author offers to discuss and use two bibliographic publications (the catalog of the scientific school and the bibliographic navigator, which include information about research topics, successful scholars, scientific leaders, postgraduate students and applicants, opponents, leading organizations of the communicative field of cultural studies of the Southern Urals), as well as cultural researchers’ landmark publications, innovatively identified by the method of introspection. The publications are reviewed as tools in the system of cultural studies of the scientific school positioning.The article draws conclusions based on the study and comparison of the configurations of connections between persons (academic advisor, postgraduate student, opponent), leading organizations and scientific leaders and their geolocation, subject headings: “applicant — academic advisor — opponent”, “subject heading/topic — leading organization — opponent, specialty number”, etc. These connections are individual for the related concepts: “management — coordination”, “interpretation of a communicative challenge — adequacy of a communicative response”, “practical meaning — purpose of communication”. These areas of analysis of the scientific school functioning provide a vision of the scientific interaction communicative fields’ intersection, the increment and examination of scientific knowledge, the basis for making managerial decisions to organize science.

Additional Visuals: Current Trends of Filling the Screen Space of a Television Shot

This article reveals the phenomenon of multilayer of the television screen space, updated in the 21st century thanks to creative methods and technical means related to the information era. The relevance of the topic under study is based on the permanent changeability of the technologies for creating visual constructs on the screen. The author traces the evolution of the original techniques of supplementing the composition of the shot in a historical context: from the classical caption to the artistic and expressive computer embodiment of graphic or other visual objects, including a simulacrum, corresponding to the properties of the concept of “additional visuals”. During the study, a rigorous analysis of the screen space is carried out when additional visuals pass into the status of augmented reality. In the view of studying the visual component of the television footage, the article draws close attention to the extra-spatial nature of the objects of the expressive compositional structure of the frame, and the variety of presentation of the composition components in the context of the multivisuality of the screen. The vertical frame composition is another subject of this study related to the use of mobile devices with video recording function. The article provides examples of using smartphones with a vertically located screen in video shooting, taking into account not only convenience, but also changes in the visual range, concentrated audience perception of the content. The filling of the screen space reveals new aspects in the construction of multi-valued compositions of the frame. Against this background, further developments in the research field of additional visuals on the television screen are very important. In this regard, this publication may be of interest to specialists in the field of media, as well as a wide range of readers and viewers.

City’s Cultural Memory: Modern Practices of Symbolizing the Past

The article is devoted to the discourse of the city’s cultural memory. The relevance of studying this topic is determined not only by the fundamental aspect associated with the episodicity of existing studies of this phenomenon. From an applied point of view, the city’s cultural memory is a symbolic resource that can be used to create an appealing image, form a sustainable urban identity, and strengthen the citizen’s sense of belonging to the city. The accumulation and objectification of cultural memory take place in symbolic forms, which makes it important to study the practices of symbolizing the urban past, the essence of which is to generate the significance of the relevant or latent layers of cultural memory for the citizens.The article presents the results of the final stage of research related to the study of the process of constructing the cultural memory of the city. The purpose of the article is to analyze modern practices of symbolizing fragments of the urban past, which mean their significance for contemporaries. Basing on the culturological cross-section of the issue, the author integrates different research contexts. The methodological basis of the article is the communicative approach that focuses on the processes of meaning formation, and the constructivist method that considers memory as a multi-layered and dynamic construct. Analyzing the practices of symbolizing the urban past by the example of Russian cities, the author of the article demonstrates how the episodes of the city’s memory are updated in the modern world, how cultural meanings become memorable for citizens. The author uses the results of previous studies and identifies the following elements of the symbolization of the urban past: a) ways of encoding fragments of the past; b) communicative trajectories of memory symbolization; c) factors of producing meanings about the collective past of the city. The obtained results open up new frontiers in understanding the processes of formation of the collective ideas about the city, and prospects for empirical research, forecasting and constructing the cultural memory of Russian cities, giving them the opportunity to change their present and future.

The Image of Petrushka in Russian Children’s Books of the 1920s — Early 1930s

The image of Russian puppet theater’s main character, Petrushka, played an important role in the history of Russian culture and embodied some important features of the national character. His images are quite widely and variously represented on the pages of children’s books. At the beginning of the 20th century and in the first post-revolutionary years, publications about the adventures of Petrushka fulfilled an important mission: they recorded characteristic examples of folk art, preserved the memory of farcical performances, and supported the tradition of the art of “Petrushka makers”. The books served as manuals for novice puppeteers.In the 1920s — early 1930s, Petrushka continued to be one of the most popular characters of children’s books and aroused interest of many Russian writers and graphic artists. This indicates their desire to find a basis and support in the popular laughter culture, to continue its traditions, to bring elements of theatrical aesthetics into books.Using a complex of methods of book, art and source studies, the article aims to consider the transformation of the image of Petrushka in children’s books of the 1920s — early 1930s.The author draws attention to the significant differences between the literary component of such publications and their visual range. Writers, as a rule, sought to “re-educate” the areal joker and brawler, to ennoble his manners, modernize his appearance, and involve the popular character in solving actual ideological and pedagogical problems. Artists were more careful about the canonical, historically formed image of Petrushka, resisted too radical reinterpretation of it. Of particular interest in this regard are the illustrative cycles of I.S. Efimov, A.I. Sokolov-Asi, A.A. Radakov, V.M Konashevich, L.V. Popova, F.F. Kondratov.The best writers and artists of those years managed to preserve the most essential features of the character, breathe new life into him, save him from oblivion, from complete loss of identity, and pass him on to new generations of creators and readers of children’s books.

Paul Hindemith’s Cantata “Frau Musica” in the Context of the Participatory Musical Art Development

The article analyses the cantata “Frau Musica” by the German composer P. Hindemith. This work has come to be widely understood as an example of Gebrauchsmusik in the works of O. Leontieva, K.-D. Krabiel, M. Breivik. Gebrauchsmusik is often identified as utility music, which means that it is created for some specific purpose; but the purpose does not have to be utilitarian. In order to assess the profoundness of the composer’s concept and to clarify specifics of the descriptive term, it is necessary to go back to the basics of the theoretical debates about the social role of art that unfolded in the 1920s. Their main participants were H. Besseler and T. Adorno. A valuable source of information is the programs of music festivals in Donaueschingen and Baden-Baden, where Gebrauchsmusik was evolving as a multi-genre artistic experiment. Hindemith played the leading role in this process. It is also important to understand the reasons that prompted the composer to use M. Luther’s text in the cantata “Frau Musica”.Today the Gebrauchsmusik’s ideas — revitalization of the audience, expanding access to musical education and practical musical activities that evolve collaborative work — have gained the most relevance. According to the author’s hypothesis, “Frau Musica” can be regarded as an illustrative example of a work that combines different views on the nature of musical participation: a spiritual act, a collective work, the highest level of musical accessibility. In this particular composition, Hindemith intuitively found the most promising ways for the development of creative interaction between the composer and the listener, which subsequently led to the creation of a whole corpus of participatory works, including Tod Makover’s “City Symphonies”, Alexander Radvilovich’s “Baltic Music”, Paul Rissman’s “Supersonic”.

Culture, Humanitarian Knowledge and Self-Organization Theory

In the 1950s, Charles Snow wrote about the growing gap between the humanities and natural science cultures. He saw this as a great danger both for science itself and for all humankind. In Russia, it was complemented by a crisis of humanitarian knowledge. The article considers the ways to overcome this crisis and build a bridge between cultures.The solution of these problems is associated with the development of interdisciplinary approaches in general, and the theory of self-organization in particular. Synergetics today represents an approach that lies at the intersection of subject knowledge, philosophical reflection and mathematical modeling. It allows you to solve problems that go beyond individual scientific disciplines. Many of them require an analysis of processes and factors in rational, emotional and intuitive spaces.The article shows that the ongoing humanitarian and technological revolution, the tasks of designing the future, increase the role of humanitarian knowledge. The author substantiates the importance of a civilizational approach to humanitarian culture and considers the cultural issues of the unique civilization of Russia. There is outlined a number of specific steps to overcome the crisis of Russian humanitarian knowledge.The concept of cultural challenge is of particular importance among the problems for which solutions are proposed. The transition from the industrial to the post-industrial phase of the civilization development and the widespread use of artificial intelligence systems will free from work about half of people. The social stability and prospects for the civilization development are determined by the ability of culture to make their life complete, meaningful and creative. The use of interdisciplinary approaches in the education system of Russia is of fundamental importance in the course of the humanitarian and technological revolution. The organizational and financial reforms of the last thirty years have led education to a deep crisis. The interdisciplinary approaches are needed in order to balance the wishes of the programs authors, the opportunities of students and to correlate the training received with the prospects for the country’s development. The revision of the content and forms of education today is becoming a problem not only for teachers and scientists, but also for the entire national culture.The imperative of our country’s cultural development is the image of the future. In the industrial era, there was an idea of universality of the ways of social systems development. In the postindustrial reality, the world becomes more complex, diversity increases. At the current point of bifurcation, several development paths open up. A civilization’s cultural choice, based on tradition, scientific forecasting and the image of the future, becomes fundamental. Interdisciplinary approaches can play a fundamental role in shaping such a cultural choice.

Nikolay Karazin’s Graphic Series for the Amu Darya and Samara Expeditions of 1874 and 1879

The article examines the drawings and watercolors by the artist Nikolay Nikolayevich Karazin (1842—1908), based on the materials of the Amu Darya and Samara expeditions of 1874 and 1879. The paper aims at reviewing the graphic series “Amu Darya Scientific Expedition”, published in the magazine “Niva” in 1874—1875, and a series of watercolor portraits made during the Samara expedition, in comparison with the pencil portraits by Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin (1842—1904) in the album of photographs “Russian Turkestan”, published in 1874. This collection of artworks has not previously been the subject of a special art history study. Their examination introduces into the field of specialists’ view a significant stage of Nikolay Karazin’s creative path. The relevance of the article, in view of the investigations of recent years, lies in the representation of the image of an artist-traveler, a draftsman during expeditions in the second half of the 19th century.The study of the first series is based on the nature and national types of the Amu Darya delta. The analysis of individual examples of journal graphics is accompanied by a description of some of the author’s simultaneous graphic originals, as well as works of other artists interested in Central Asian ethnography. The article uses a comparative methodological principle, with the analysis of fragments of N.N. Karazin’s literary works — travel essays with a pronounced ethnographic component.The artist’s series of watercolors based on the Samara expedition also presents several images of the ethnotypes of Russian Turkestan, a region of Central Asia in its western part. As a result, there are identified the similarities and differences in the artistic methods and manners, as well as the conditions of creative work, of the two artists — Nikolay Karazin and Vasily Vereshchagin. The analysis is carried out using a comparative method and a socio-historical background.The Amu Darya and Samara graphic cycles represent N.N. Karazin as a mature creator who intuitively used the means of the approaching new time and modern style. At the same time, he did not leave the boundaries of the literary and artistic genre “voyage pittoresque”, overall successfully combining realistic tendencies with the vision of a romantic.