Canonical art as informational paradox

Originally published as Лотман, Ю. М. 1973. Каноническое искусство как информа цион- ный парадокс. In: Муриан, Инна Федоровна (ed.), Проблема канона в древнем и средневековом искусстве Азии и Африки. Москва: Наука, 16–22

Несколько вводных слов

Нескольковводныхслов [A few introductory words

On the dynamics of culture

First published as Лотман, Ю. М. 1992. О динамике культуры. Труды по знаковым системам (Sign Systems Studies) 25: 5–22

Literary criticism must be scientific

Literary criticism must be scientifi

Маска в художественном мире Гоголя и маски Анатолия Каплана

Mask in an artistic world of Gogol, and the masks of Anatoli Kaplan. The paper deals with an intersemiotic problem — how it is possible to represent a verbal image by the means of sculpture. It was written as an afterword for a German edition of N. Gogol’s Dead Souls (illustrated by photos on mask-sculpures by Anatoli Kaplan) thus using a style meant for general reader. However, it includes a deep analysis and several important conclusions about the fancy worlds of Gogol and Kaplan, and about the possibilities to create connections between them. It is stressed that the very artistic illustration is possible only due to its independence, due to the subjective seeing of the author

Охота за ведьмами. Семиотика страха

Whitchhunts: semiotics of fea

The place of art among other modelling systems

This article by Juri Lotman from the third volume of Trudy po znakovym sistemam (Sign Systems Studies) in 1967, deals with the problem of artistic modelling. The general working questions are whether art displays any characteristic traits that are common for all modelling systems and which could be the specific traits that can distinguish art from other modelling systems. Art is seen as a secondary modelling system, more precisely, as a play-type model, which is characterised simultaneously by practical and conventional behaviour and constant awareness of the possibility of alternate meanings to the one that is currently being perceived. At the same time art has play-like elements but is not the same as play, since play is inherently rule-bound, whereas art is a more flexible model the purpose of which is truth. Art is a special type of modelling system, since it is on one hand suitable for storing very large amount of complex information, but on the other hand it can increase the stored information and transform the consumer

The place of art among other modelling systems

This article by Juri Lotman from the third volume of Trudy po znakovym sistemam (Sign Systems Studies) in 1967, deals with the problem of artistic modelling. The general working questions are whether art displays any characteristic traits that are common for all modelling systems and which could be the specific traits that can distinguish art from other modelling systems. Art is seen as a secondary modelling system, more precisely, as a play-type model, which is characterised simultaneously by practical and conventional behaviour and constant awareness of the possibility of alternate meanings to the one that is currently being perceived. At the same time art has play-like elements but is not the same as play, since play is inherently rule-bound, whereas art is a more flexible model the purpose of which is truth. Art is a special type of modelling system, since it is on one hand suitable for storing very large amount of complex information, but on the other hand it can increase the stored information and transform the consumer