University of Glasgow

Soviet Hieroglyphics: Visual Culture in Late Twentieth-Century Russia by Nancy CondeeReview by: Mary Hannah ByersEurope-Asia Studies, Vol. 49, No. 3 (May, 1997), pp. 546-547Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/153663 .

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REVIEWS REVIEWS

obvious, for example, either from the novel itself, or indeed from the discussion of it here, that Aitmatov's Belyi parokhod 'demonstrates the incompatibility of the child's animist perception with a totemic understanding which puts the survival and glory of the group first' (p. 108), and the chapter on Amiredzhibi's Data Tutashkhia is less convincingly tied in with the general thesis than the others. There is the very occasional misprint or error: 'graduation' should be 'gradation' (p. 138), and 'smerch' is a whirlwind or tornado rather than a hurricane (p. 147). But overall this is a finely judged and scrupulously edited volume which is a credit to the MHRA series. Serious but never dull, erudite but written in comprehensible and jargon-free prose, this study should appeal not simply to specialists in Soviet literature; it will be of interest to all those who seek an understanding of the final decades of the Soviet regime, and of the pressures and tensions which were both symptom and part cause of its eventual fatal collapse.

University of Exeter ROGER COCKRELL

Nancy Condee (ed.), Soviet Hieroglyphics: Visual Culture in Late Twentieth-Century Russia. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1995, xxv + 179 pp., ?14.99.

THE ICONS OF SOVIET AND POST-SOVIET POPULAR CULTURE hold a seemingly ceaseless appeal for the West. The relatively recent advent of a true consumer culture in Russia has resulted in a vast and at times bizarre assimilation of 20th century imagery. This body of work provides a fairly thorough and lucid attempt at documenting these changes in post-perestroika Russian visual culture. These rather disparate contributions are grouped together under the single heading of 'hieroglyphics', defined here as 'sacred writings in picture form, a fusion of verbal and visual texts' (p. xii). Alternatively, the cultural hieroglyph can mean 'illegible' (p. xvii) or incomprehensible. This is a particularly apt title as, earlier this century, Russian futurists made explicit attempts at constructing a pictorial, written language by communicating the ideas of culture in a single symbol. In this heterotropic sense the hieroglyph stands for the collective iconography of popular culture.

A number of the contributions allude to the fact that cultural perestroika has resulted in the impoverishment of high culture and displacement of the urban intelligentsia as the market has become dictated by the concerns of the 'novel' or sensational element necessary for most items of popular culture to sell. An additional common theme is the transition away from the notion of 'timelessness' that has traditionally dominated Russian culture, which requires that any new material and the ideas associated therewith be deeply rooted in the cultural developments of Russia's 'golden age', Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist motifs, and so on.

Katrina Clark's chapter on Aural Hieroglyphics reviews the significant role of music in films throughout the Soviet era up until the present day, claiming that old Soviet anthems, particularly from the Stalin years, have experienced a resurgence in popularity. Apparently, anthems were used to convey political sub-narratives reflecting both irony and a utopian dreamworld in a manner that has not been utilised by the West for several decades. This is very much a part of the larger and well documented movement towards 'totalitarian kitsch' (p. 6) and subsequent attempts to separate merit from propaganda in current visual culture.

Victoria E. Bonnell & Gregory Freidin are concerned in 'Televorot' with the role of media coverage of the August 1991 coup, and provide an interesting look at ways the newly independent media manipulated public perception during the days surrounding these events. The use of the camera angle to shape public opinion in accordance with media sympathies functioned much like its counterparts in the West in creating the narratives and visual prerequisites for El'tsin's victory.

Documentary Discipline (Eric Naiman & Anne Nesbet) covers the political truths inherent

obvious, for example, either from the novel itself, or indeed from the discussion of it here, that Aitmatov's Belyi parokhod 'demonstrates the incompatibility of the child's animist perception with a totemic understanding which puts the survival and glory of the group first' (p. 108), and the chapter on Amiredzhibi's Data Tutashkhia is less convincingly tied in with the general thesis than the others. There is the very occasional misprint or error: 'graduation' should be 'gradation' (p. 138), and 'smerch' is a whirlwind or tornado rather than a hurricane (p. 147). But overall this is a finely judged and scrupulously edited volume which is a credit to the MHRA series. Serious but never dull, erudite but written in comprehensible and jargon-free prose, this study should appeal not simply to specialists in Soviet literature; it will be of interest to all those who seek an understanding of the final decades of the Soviet regime, and of the pressures and tensions which were both symptom and part cause of its eventual fatal collapse.

University of Exeter ROGER COCKRELL

Nancy Condee (ed.), Soviet Hieroglyphics: Visual Culture in Late Twentieth-Century Russia. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1995, xxv + 179 pp., ?14.99.

THE ICONS OF SOVIET AND POST-SOVIET POPULAR CULTURE hold a seemingly ceaseless appeal for the West. The relatively recent advent of a true consumer culture in Russia has resulted in a vast and at times bizarre assimilation of 20th century imagery. This body of work provides a fairly thorough and lucid attempt at documenting these changes in post-perestroika Russian visual culture. These rather disparate contributions are grouped together under the single heading of 'hieroglyphics', defined here as 'sacred writings in picture form, a fusion of verbal and visual texts' (p. xii). Alternatively, the cultural hieroglyph can mean 'illegible' (p. xvii) or incomprehensible. This is a particularly apt title as, earlier this century, Russian futurists made explicit attempts at constructing a pictorial, written language by communicating the ideas of culture in a single symbol. In this heterotropic sense the hieroglyph stands for the collective iconography of popular culture.

A number of the contributions allude to the fact that cultural perestroika has resulted in the impoverishment of high culture and displacement of the urban intelligentsia as the market has become dictated by the concerns of the 'novel' or sensational element necessary for most items of popular culture to sell. An additional common theme is the transition away from the notion of 'timelessness' that has traditionally dominated Russian culture, which requires that any new material and the ideas associated therewith be deeply rooted in the cultural developments of Russia's 'golden age', Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist motifs, and so on.

Katrina Clark's chapter on Aural Hieroglyphics reviews the significant role of music in films throughout the Soviet era up until the present day, claiming that old Soviet anthems, particularly from the Stalin years, have experienced a resurgence in popularity. Apparently, anthems were used to convey political sub-narratives reflecting both irony and a utopian dreamworld in a manner that has not been utilised by the West for several decades. This is very much a part of the larger and well documented movement towards 'totalitarian kitsch' (p. 6) and subsequent attempts to separate merit from propaganda in current visual culture.

Victoria E. Bonnell & Gregory Freidin are concerned in 'Televorot' with the role of media coverage of the August 1991 coup, and provide an interesting look at ways the newly independent media manipulated public perception during the days surrounding these events. The use of the camera angle to shape public opinion in accordance with media sympathies functioned much like its counterparts in the West in creating the narratives and visual prerequisites for El'tsin's victory.

Documentary Discipline (Eric Naiman & Anne Nesbet) covers the political truths inherent

546 546

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REVIEWS

in the depiction of interrogations in three films directed by Stanislav Govorukhin, No Way to Live, The Russia We Have Lost, and Solzhenitsyn. The interrogations symbolise the impotence of policemen, fallacies of state power, and farcical attempts at the establishment of order amidst a society in chaos. Though slightly less applicable to broader cultural configurations, this is nonetheless fascinating material.

There are two sections devoted to the depiction of gender specification in post-1985 visual culture, The Gendered Trinity of Russian Cultural Rhetoric Today-The Glyph of the H[i]eroine (Helena Goscilo) and Encoding Differences (Susan Larsen), both of which concern themselves with the archetypes befitting a Russian woman and the depiction of Russia as a metaphorical combination of these. Citing several recent films and publications as examples, Goscilo's article presents a dual conception of the motherland or rodina in which Russia is simultaneously viewed as traditional mother, and 'intergirl' prostitute selling herself to foreigners, suggesting that woman redeem Russia by ceasing her degrading relations with the West and returning to her natural role of caregiver and homemaker. Conversely, contemporary literature often conveys the dangerous seduction of the West in the image of an overtly provocative female. Larsen's article is modelled along the same lines although she chooses to focus on a single film as embodiment of all these traits, Kira Muratova's A Change of Fate. In both cases, the authors assert that these contemporary 'hieroglyphs' serve as meta-narratives regarding the tacit expectations of women's/Russia's roles.

Mikhail Yampolsky provides yet another approach to the study of ritual iconoclasm in his chapter In the Shadow of Monuments. Though this topic has been covered at great length, Yampolsky manages to shed new light on the interpretation of the spaces left behind, in the empty plinths of monumental art of older regimes. This is a remarkably original analysis of the traces of the plan for Utopia and the subsequent statement its ruins leave with us. Additionally, we are left with the idea that road systems and monetary units constitute a form of cultural monument in themselves, also making statements about contemporary society.

The final article in this collection, The ABC of Russian Consumer Culture (Nancy Condee & Vladimir Padunov) is by far one of the best documented and analyses the more prosaic elements of modern Russian visual culture with delightful veracity.

Although this book attempts to cover all areas of popular culture, mass media, cinema, fine arts, literature (high and low), monumental art, kiosk fronts, shopping bags and so on, its inability to do so creates a void, leaving the reader somewhat in doubt over the plausibility of the 'cultural hieroglyph'. Though published only in 1995, the vast majority of the work dates from 1993 or before from a meeting of the 'Working Group on Contemporary Russian Culture' (p. xii). Inevitably, many of the contributions are somewhat dated, and most fail to anticipate the cultural backlash that has occurred in the past year. Nevertheless, this work poses interesting, relevant questions and constructs, providing a perceptive read for anyone interested in the iconography of popular culture in both the East and the West.

547

IREES, University of Glasgow MARY HANNAH BYERS

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