STAGE REFLECTION ON RUSSIAN CLASSICS (A CASE STUDY OF PERM THEATRES)

Abstract

Ongoing socio-cultural transformations have influenced the fact that the problem of stage reflection on Russian classics is becoming one of the major trends in the Russian humanities. The relevance of the problem under question is determined by general changes in artistic consciousness at the turn of the centuries and innovations dynamics in theatrical art (of the centre and regional culture) opening up new paths of cognition and interpretation of increasingly sophisticated reality through semantics and symbolism of Russian classics. The novelty of the study is a comprehensive culturological approach combining categories of philosophy, art studies, aesthetics, and semiotics. The most representative methodological grounds within the framework of this part of the research are general semiotic conceptions aimed at analysis of culture text, its logic-symbolic and semantic structure (R. Barthes, Yu. Lotman). The hermeneutic tradition (M. Heidegger) and post-structuralism (J. Kristeva) play a special role in reflection on the text of the performance and its semantic depth. The purpose of the article is to examine the nature of artistic reception as a dialogue and intensification of the spectator’s subjectivity in terms of the drama synthetism. The data are presented by Perm theatre directors’ creative practices. The analysis of the data reveals a directors’ trend not just to refresh relationships with the audience through an active dialogue between the theatre and literary classics (a remake, “postmodern classicism”) but primarily to consciously bridge the boundaries in facing new challenges of modernity.