Keyword – visual culture

Kaposi, Ildikó:

Histories of Gulf Cinema

Gulf cinema in all its forms was intertwined with the processes of negotiating modernity, within whose framework national identities were created and transformed, development goals were set and connections were forged with transnational cultural currents. Film was part of Gulf visual cultures that emerged in the mid-20th century, with art, architecture, fashion, media and advertising all contributing to local spectacles of modernisation. The new millennium saw the emerging region turn to film as a medium for expressing the “will to visibility” (Akil 2016), where both aesthetics and power relations manifested in various strategies of visibility. Power relations played a role in the acceptance, rejection or control of cinema as an instrument of modernity. Within non-linear patterns of development, competing practices and conflicting conceptions emerged regarding what the social role of filmmaking might be in the Persian Gulf.

Keywords: Arab film history, cinema, modernity, Persian Gulf, visual culture

Német, Szilvi:

The takeover of the mainstream – political agitation and postmodern visual strategies

This paper explores the emergence of postmodern visual strategies currently associated with online meme culture. It argues that the subversion of popular images has been a part of the toolset of predominantly leftist artistic, social and political movements since the historical avant-garde, but has resurfaced after the Millenium as a key rhetorical and visual device in the online culture of the (far) right. It also discusses the implications of the asymmetry in academic research in which the online left stays disproportionately off the radar when it comes to studying online political cultures.

Keywords: artistic and social movements, appropriation, internet meme, political discourse, postmodern, visual culture