Tracing the Russian Hermeneutic: Reflections on Tarkovsky's Cinematic Poetics and Global Politics

Abstract

This article makes a contribution to hermeneutic explorations in global politics. Taking as its points of departure the growing body of work on film and the turn to aesthetic and intertextual IR, the article argues that a further conversation with cinema and poetics can be used to develop the interpretive canon in global politics. In particular, the analysis draws upon the idea of cinematic poetics, and more generally the work of Andrei Tarkovsky, who, throughout his films and written work, articulates a particular form of Russian interpretivism. The article explores Tarkovskian cinema and engages in debates about artistic creativity and aesthetics, filmic representations of belonging and spiritualism, all shaped by a Russian hermeneutic tradition. The final sections apply these themes, illustrating how the icon presents a way to read the themes of suffering and salvation, inscribing the formation of identities in global politics.