The problem of classification of graphic art of anarchist periodicals of the turn of the XIX–XX centuries.

Velásquez Sabogal Paúl Marcelo Postgraduate student, Department of History of Western European Art, St. Petersburg State University (St. Petersburg State University) 199034, Russia, g. Saint Petersburg, nab. Universitetskaya, 7–9 st073511@student.spbu.ru Other publications by this author

The interrelation of anarchism and art at the turn of the XIX–XX centuries is of interest both in the domestic ^[1-5] and in foreign ^{[7, 12, 14, 15, 17, 18]} art history. Over the past four decades, several areas of analysis of this problem have been formed, focusing on various aspects of the theory and history of fine arts. The graphics of anarchist periodicals are one of the most striking aspects of the manifestation of this relationship and the topic of our article. The relevance of the research lies in the fact that this publication for the first time systematizes and characterizes the main trends in the study of the above-mentioned topic, shedding light on common places and existing gaps. The methods used in the work are as follows: a method based on the analysis of historiography, used to systematize existing approaches to the analysis of graphics of anarchist periodicals; as well as a method of comparative analysis, useful in order to compare the point of view of different authors with each other, finding common ways and determining the prospects for further study of the problem. The theoretical basis of the research is publications devoted to the relationship between graphic art and anarchism of the turn of the XIX–XX centuries, written in English ^{[10, 13]}, French ^{[8, 9, 11]} and Spanish ^{[6, 16]}. Unfortunately, there are no publications in Russian on the topic of graphics of the anarchist print culture of the last century, which once again emphasizes the important role of this article. The practical significance of the work lies in the possibility of using the materials of the article in analytical research, as well as in preparing for publication sources on the problem of dialogue between politics and aesthetics in the light of classical anarchism and its press. The scientific novelty of the research is determined by the fact that previously not systematized methodological tools are being ratified, which are necessary for considering the field of research, which remains marginal in modern art criticism to this day.

To achieve our goal, we propose to solve the following tasks: to analyze the trends existing in the classification of graphics of anarchist periodicals according to the thematic-iconographic and figurative-thematic principle, and thus demonstrate the need to search for new approaches.

The analysis of the chosen topic is based on knowledge of other types of art, such as painting and sculpture, and an understanding of the existence of certain geographical boundaries. The above hinders the formation of methodological and analytical groups, with the help of which the researcher can restore the panorama of graphics of anarchist periodicals in the form of an international and autonomous aesthetic phenomenon. We address the problem of classification with a view to defining this phenomenon as an independent research topic. Two points should be noted.

Firstly, the identification of iconographic tendencies, which, being associated with the anarchist worldview, arise not only from the theoretical, but also from the cultural environment, that is, common gestures, allegories and symbolism. Secondly, the unification of such iconographic trends according to the figurative-thematic principle, with attention to graphics from the point of view of its propaganda function, that is, as a carrier of a moral, military or utopian message. Both strategies for classifying our subject of study have not changed much over the years, hindering, to a large extent, the consideration of lithographs, woodcuts, etchings, linocuts, photographs, collages, charcoal and gouache drawings, beyond the narrow semantics of their direct political message.

Analyzing the first type of classification, we should refer to the publications of Robert and Eugenia Herbert, who distinguish three groups of works based on 1) romanticization of "agrarian themes", 2) rejection of "industrialization of urban life" ^{[13, p. 478]} and 3) on "utopian ideas of the future anarchist state" ^{[13, p. 480]}. Referring to the illustrations made for the publications of the anarchist periodicals Les Temps Nouveaux, Le P?re Peinard and La Sociale by artists associated with Impressionism and neo-Impressionism, such as Camille Pissarro, Paul Sinyak, Maximilien Luce, Henri Gabriel Ibels, Theophile Alexander Steinlen, Theo van Reisselberge, Henri Cross, Lucien Pissarro, the authors identify two main images.

Firstly, the image of a "peasant" inspired by Gustave Courbet and Jean Francois Millet, who is represented "always at work", which is seen as "a tribute to a healthy, albeit burdened existence" ^{[13, p. 480]}. Secondly, the image of the "urban worker", reflecting the concept of alienated labor ^{[13, p. 478]}. In turn, the image of the "stevedore" is a transit between the pre-industrial mentality of the XIX century and the sudden industrialization of the XX century, a transit in the context of which artists paid attention to "industrial suburbs" ^{[13, 478]}, including a whole rad of images of the working environment.

The third category includes types of "working peasants", "merry fishermen", "seascapes", "dancing nymphs" and other themes reminiscent of "idyllic landscapes" ^{[13, p. 480]} with an imaginary harmonious anarchist future. The conflict between the representation of urban, rural and bucolic landscapes indicates the constant tension existing in the anarchist worldview of the turn of the century and revealed by the example of the confrontation between nature and civilization, as well as culture and the state ^[18], a confrontation in which the search for the human condition before the emergence of social structures is expressed.

The same path was followed by Aline Dardel, who, analyzing the evolution of graphic art in Les Temps Nouveaux, offers three groups of images: 1) images expressing the "spirit of rebellion", 2) images of "social inequality" and 3) images - "references to a certain era (Past, present and future)" ^{[9, p. 25]}. The first group combines the images of the "destroyer" and "arsonist" ^{[9, p. 25]}, whose attributes are a pickaxe, an axe, a scythe and a shovel, as well as fire and a torch. In the second group, the author includes two images with which artists identify victims of social injustice. On the one hand, the image of a "tramp", which, in turn, groups around itself a number of heroes of that time, namely, "immigrant, fugitive, bohemian, saltimbank, beggars and bandits, blind and crippled, street musicians, small traders and peddlers" ^{[9, p. 31]}. On the other hand, the image of a "worker" connecting "a peasant, a miner, a weaver, a glazier, a docker and a boatman" ^{[9, p. 32]}.

According to Dardel and Lili Litvak ^[16], iconographic sources of such images in anarchist visual culture can be found throughout the history of art in the works of Francisco de Goya, Eugene Delacroix, Honore Daumier, Gustave Courbet, Jean-Francois Millet, as well as Rembrandt, Jacques Callot, Hieronymus Bosch, Hans Holbein, Lucas Cranach, Peter Brueghel, William Hogarth, Thomas Rowlandson and Theodore Gericault. All the above-mentioned images also hint at the tension existing between the ideal agar past and the decadent industrial future, which becomes clearer in the third group.

Regarding the third group, Dardel notes three points. Firstly, journalistic interest in domestic and foreign events. Secondly, the memory of past revolutionary projects, such as the Paris Commune. Thirdly, the desire for a "new world", a characteristic attribute of which is the "rising sun", accompanied by words such as "justice" and "anarchy" ^{[9, pp. 33-34]}. In the same row, Litvak puts "dawn" as a symbol of "social purpose" and "redemption of humanity", surrounded by the words "Freedom", "Truth", "Seed" and "Free Love" ^{[16, pp. 73-74]}. In addition, Dardel illuminates the image of the "liberator" ^{[9, p. 36]} (Fig. 1) as an allegory of justice, freedom and anarchy, the attributes of which are a torch, broken chains, a black or red flag, an olive branch, a Phrygian cap, the figure of the liberator, according to Dardel's observations, is usually represented completely naked or wrapped in a tunic, but with bare breasts, and raising one or both arms.

Illustration 1. Theophile Alexander Steinlen. LaLib?ratrice. Lithography. 40.4 x 49.3 cm. November 22, 1902. An album of Les Temps Nouveaux lithographs. Albertina Gallery. DG1914/318

Just like Robert and Eugenia Herbert, Dardel singles out individual works and names. One of the most discussed works is the painting of Signac In the time of harmony. The Golden Age is not in the past, but in the future (1894-1895), included in the third group. It is important to mention that, as Anne-Marie Bouchard points out ^[8], Signac turned the painting into a lithograph called Tomorrow's Libertarian Golden Age (Fig. 2) (1895-1896), intended for Les Temps Nouveaux. In the same row is the lithograph Destroyers (1896) (Fig. 3), also a Sign, which is a kind of symbol of the worker rebelling against capitalism, and combines the above-mentioned images of the urban worker and the destroyer. In the case of the representation of rural figures and the image of a tramp, the authors pay special attention to the illustrations of Pizarro (father and son) (Fig. 4).

Illustration 2. Paul Signac. L'?ge d'or libertaire de demain. Lithography. 37.5 x 50.2 cm. 1895-1896. National Library of France, AA4 R?s.

Illustration 3. Paul Signac. LesD?molisseurs. Lithography. 47 ? 30.5 cm. September 29, 1896. Album of lithographs Les Temps Nouveaux. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Illustration 4. Camille Pissarro. LesTrimardeurs. Lithography. 25 x 30.2 cm. April 2, 1898. Album of lithographs Les Temps Nouveaux. National Library of France, Gallica.

The image of the peasant is also discussed by Litvak, who in the Spanish anarchist press points to the tendency to represent "idealized and eternal peasants" as a prefiguration through "moral landscapes possessing biblical grandeur" of anarchist rural arcadia ^{[16, pp. 70-71]}. The book Red View by the already mentioned author is a study primarily on the graphic art of anarchist newspaper culture, written in Spanish. It should highlight the reconstruction based on a rich corpus of illustrations made by anonymous or little-known artists, such as Fermin Sagistra, of anti-authoritarian art interpreted in the light of the theory, philosophy and criticism of the art of the libertarian movement in Spain.

The author carries out a thematic and stylistic analysis, emphasizing two trends. Firstly, the topic of "enemies of the people", namely, "bourgeois or capitalist, military and priest" ^{[16, p. 62]}, whose ideas correspond to a number of prototypical physiognomies inspired, to a large extent, by the proto-morphopsychological theories of I. K. Lavater and F. J. Gall, on the basis of which one can form an idea about the external appearance as a reflection of the mental and moral decomposition of the subject. Moreover, the enemies of the people acquire an allegorical dimension in the form of "fantastic creatures", which the author, recalling the symbolic function of the medieval gargoyle, interprets as a way to "expel demons" ^{[16, p. 74]} from anarchist society.

Secondly, the theme of the "oppressed", that is, "the poor man, the old man, the child, the woman, the cripple, the sick" ^{[16, pp. 64-65]}, images corresponding to the themes identified by Dardel ^[9] and Herbert ^[13]. One of the novelties in the research of the Spanish author is the identification of one of the strategies of visual propaganda. We are talking about the use of "contrasts" ^{[16, p. 75]}, allowing an effective comparison between the lifestyle of the rich and the poor, the bourgeois and the worker. This strategy is a moral lesson that sheds light on who is good and who is bad, and demonstrates scenes in which orgies, sloppiness, vices, parasitism are presented "on the one hand. On the other – poverty, slavery, hunger, exhausting labor" ^{[16, 74-76]}.

Despite such approaches to classification, we are surprised by the lack of identification of the anarchist image. The anarchist as the theme of illustration of the revolutionary and anti-revolutionary press of the turn of the century opens a wide iconographic panorama. In it, the art historian encounters an eclectic worldview, including references to ancient Greek culture, medieval images, psychiatric theories, as well as cosmic, religious and mystical sources, which is realized and expressed exclusively in the image of an anarchist.

The second type of classification is embodied in the study of Jeanne Godard-Davant. Analyzing the publications of the Argentine periodicals El Perseguido and La Antorcha, the author adds two groups of images. On the one hand, it is a "moral image", which implies a "didactic function" and a "protest function" ^{[11, p. 111]}, and which forms critical thinking in order to resist "hegemonic systems" ^{[11, p. 113]}. On the other hand, it is a "mobilizing image" that performs a "utopian function" and a "propaganda function" ^{[11, p. 111]} for the sake of formulating an idealized future anarchist panorama, as well as an urgent response to the prevailing social situations. Naturally, such functions consist of images discussed in the iconographic constructions of previous authors, which indicates the formation of a classification tradition in which different views are harmoniously intertwined.

The relevance of such images, functions and strategies in the cultural, artistic and socio-political space of our century is ratified at the exhibition Les Villes Ardentes. Art, travail, r ? volte 1870-1914 ("Burning Cities. Art, labor, Insurrection, 1870-1914")^[1] at the Museum of Fine Arts in Caen in 2020. It reveals a panorama of the art of social criticism of the Impressionists, post-Impressionists and naturalists, devoted to various aspects of social and working life from the end of the XIX century to the beginning of the XX century in France. Naturally, graphics occupy an important place in this exhibition, which highlights the works of Jules-Felix Grandjouan, Frantisek Kupka, Signac, Steinlen, Pierre Naudin and Maurice Radiguet for the magazines L'Assiette au beurre and Le Chambard socialiste.

Katie Ferguson's classification grows, to a large extent, on pre-existing soil. The author focused her attention on three illustrations of the anarchist magazine Mother Earth. The first, made by an anonymous author offering a new interpretation of the theme of Adam and Eve, hints at the return and restoration of the lost paradise: the image of "inspiration" consists of naked bodies, broken chains, a bucolic landscape and a hand raised to dawn ^{[10, p. 178]}. The second illustration, made by Grandjuan exclusively for Emma Goldman's magazine, depicts Mother Earth imprisoned by capitalism, aiming the weapons of the "law" at the working class, seeking to save the captive allegory. Here we find ourselves in front of the image of the "uprising" ^{[10, p. 180]}.

Both groups of the K. Ferguson classification are contaminated with the classifications of Dardel, Godard-Davant, Litvak, Herbert. At the same time, the third illustration, considered by Ferguson, introduces us to the "modernist" image ^{[10, p. 184]}. We are talking about the anti-militarist picture of the proto-Cubist trend made by Man Ray. The illustration performed by archaic forms is a game of perspectives and plans in the form of a collage, on the surface of which one can contemplate simultaneously the US flag, two prisoners, a military scene in which a couple of soldiers kill revolutionaries, and the image of Christ on the cross (Fig. 5). Given the artist's further creative innovations within Dadaism and surrealism, the modernist The image is reminiscent of Patricia Leiten's reflections on the role of graphic art in the liberation of painting ^[15]. According to Ferguson, we are facing "an artistic and literary uprising not only in terms of content, but also in terms of form" ^{[10, p. 184]}.

Illustration 5. Meng Rai. War. The cover of the September 1914 issue of Mother Earth magazine. Vol. IX, № 7.

The revolution in form and content will be especially clear a few years later on the example of the Spanish anarchist periodicals Estudios, Orto, Umbral, Tiempos Nuevos, ?Liberaci ? n!, published from 1928 to 1939, which used the avant-garde technique of photomontage by such artists-photographers as Manuel Monleon, Angel Lescarboura, Margaret Michaelis and Katya Orna. The authors of the book Anarchist Graphics write about this. Photography and the Social revolution, dedicated to the analysis of the cultural and artistic context of Barcelona ^[6].

As follows from the above analysis, we see that the invention of new classification systems of anarchist graphics is required in the light of not only another iconographic trend based on the image of an anarchist, but also in the light of stylistic trends of the artistic avant-garde and modernist aesthetics. Moreover, new approaches to systematization should correspond to the nature of the transmission of visual materials in the publications of libertarian periodicals, which was based on the cross-border migration of images outside the official channels of cultural, economic and political exchange.

The graphic art of libertarian newspaper culture should occupy an important place in the history of art. Research in this area sheds light not only on little-studied or forgotten artists, but also on thematic and iconographic trends, as well as on innovations of creative genres that have found fertile ground for their growth on anarchist pages. The low level of development of our subject is based on its limited interpretation as an illustrative and propagandistic language, the aesthetic features of which correspond primarily to the principle of political orientation. Although such an approach is necessary, it limits the scope of interpretations from the point of view of art criticism.

Thus, we can conclude that the study of graphic art can be carried out not only through comparative iconographic analysis used by several of the authors already cited. The cardinal problem is the cross-border state of the visual space of anarchism, that is, not only geographical and temporal limits, but also stylistic and thematic. The above implies a plural flow of aesthetic and political values within the framework of the artistic avant-garde movement. These axes will contribute to the restoration of the historical role of anarchist graphics as an international and autonomous aesthetic phenomenon in the political, cultural and artistic space of the turn of the XIX–XX centuries.

^[1] The exhibition is available at: https://mba.caen .fr/exposition/les-villes-ardentes (accessed: 01/20/2020).