Labyrinths of “Turns” in Contemporary Art: Linguistic, Iconic, Visual

Abstract

The author of the article focuses on the problem of correlation between the paradigms of “linguistic”, “iconic” and “visual” turns associated with contemporary art. The text discusses the history of the terms, analyzes the specifics of each of these turns, reveals their role and significance in art, history and culture, and provides specific examples of works of the 20th and 21th centuries. Attempts to overcome the methodological crisis in art studies have made the impact of these approaches felt throughout the world. The article pays special attention to a number of issues, which include changes in the concept of art and the boundaries of language; the expressive opportunities of the image and narrative; artistic vision; depiction of the “unimaginable”; the statuses of works of art, authorship, perception, symbols, as well as dialectical transitions of works of art from visuality to pictoriality. The article shows how, by studying the history of art as a phenomenon of culture, art studies have learned to find not only artistic characteristics, but also social and cultural features in the specifics of forms, structures and compositions. Carrying out a comparative analysis of the linguistic, iconic and visual “turns”, the author notes the dialectic of “reformatting” the view from the linguistic to the iconic and visual, and also comes to the conclusion that, the subtle modifications of the language of art demonstrate the constant evolution of artistic forms, art criticism, cultural and social meanings. Art contemplates the world directly, embodying it in images (semantic, visual, iconic, etc.). It is thanks to the peculiar integrity (interdisciplinarity) achieved in the artistic rethinking of historical reality that art reveals an amazing depth of meaning.