Life and Chimera: Framing Modernism in Poland
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Case Western Reserve University School of Graduate Studies / OhioLINK
2008
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| Online Access: | http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1212425287 |
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ndltd-OhioLink-oai-etd.ohiolink.edu-case12124252872021-08-03T05:32:35Z Life and Chimera: Framing Modernism in Poland Drozdek, Justyna Art History Slavic Literature Chimera Zycie Life Przesmycki Przybyszewski Young Poland Mloda Polska Szczepanski Polish periodicals modernism symbolism <p>Little magazines, literary and/or artistic periodicals that were self-consciously branded as avant-garde, proliferated in late-nineteenth-century Europe and were crucial in circulating concepts of modernism. This dissertation focuses on two little magazines, Krakow’s <i>Life</i> (1897-1900) and Warsaw’s <i>Chimera</i> (1901-1907), and their editors’ promotion of Polish artists as integral participants of an international artworld.</p><p>Both periodicals were published during a period in which Poland, having been partitioned among Russia, Prussia, and Austria in the late eighteenth century, did not exist. These partitions fueled a nationalist discourse in which art functioned as a tool for patriotic expression. However, the members of the artistic and literary movement of Young Poland challenged the notion of an instructive art. They strove instead to redefine national art by arguing that patriotism should be internalized rather than didactically conveyed and, furthermore, insisted that Polish art had to become modern to thrive internationally. <i>Life</i> and <i>Chimera</i> reinforced these goals through a deliberate visual and rhetorical program that underscored the supremacy of modernism.</p><p>This dissertation examines the chief polemical essays and visual programs of both journals to demonstrate their editors’ efforts to frame modernism in Poland and legitimize Polish art within the international artworld. Ludwik Szczepanski and Artur Gorski, <i>Life</i>’s first two editors, maintained that art could be both modern and national and configured the journal’s visual program around various national, and simultaneously universalist, tropes. <i>Life</i>’s last editor, Stanislaw Przybyszewski, however, argued that national identity did not belong in conversations about art since only pure, subjective expression should occupy artists. He structured <i>Life</i> around various artistic and literary "personalities," whose inclusion in the journal reflected his elevation of artistic identity. Like Przybyszewski, <i>Chimera</i>’s Zenon Przesmycki insisted that artists express their "inner states" but also argued for the artistic conveyance of metaphysical "truths" and beauty, which pointed not to some agreeable appearance but signified an attuned aesthetic sensibility. Both Przesmycki’s polemical essays and visual program emphasized these ideas while epitomizing the artist as a priest-seer, a distinctly modernist program. This dissertation emphasizes that modernism’s international character cannot be fully grasped without considering Polish art and periodicals within the modernist discourse.</p> 2008-07-07 English text Case Western Reserve University School of Graduate Studies / OhioLINK http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1212425287 http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1212425287 unrestricted This thesis or dissertation is protected by copyright: all rights reserved. It may not be copied or redistributed beyond the terms of applicable copyright laws. |
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English |
| sources |
NDLTD |
| topic |
Art History Slavic Literature Chimera Zycie Life Przesmycki Przybyszewski Young Poland Mloda Polska Szczepanski Polish periodicals modernism symbolism |
| spellingShingle |
Art History Slavic Literature Chimera Zycie Life Przesmycki Przybyszewski Young Poland Mloda Polska Szczepanski Polish periodicals modernism symbolism Drozdek, Justyna Life and Chimera: Framing Modernism in Poland |
| author |
Drozdek, Justyna |
| author_facet |
Drozdek, Justyna |
| author_sort |
Drozdek, Justyna |
| title |
Life and Chimera: Framing Modernism in Poland |
| title_short |
Life and Chimera: Framing Modernism in Poland |
| title_full |
Life and Chimera: Framing Modernism in Poland |
| title_fullStr |
Life and Chimera: Framing Modernism in Poland |
| title_full_unstemmed |
Life and Chimera: Framing Modernism in Poland |
| title_sort |
life and chimera: framing modernism in poland |
| publisher |
Case Western Reserve University School of Graduate Studies / OhioLINK |
| publishDate |
2008 |
| url |
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1212425287 |
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AT drozdekjustyna lifeandchimeraframingmodernisminpoland |
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