Arts and a Nation : The Role of Visual Arts and Artists in the Making of the Latvian Identity, 1905-1940

Suzanne Pourchier-Plasseraud

ISBN 10: 900430018X / ISBN 13: 9789004300187

Published by Brill Sep 2015, 2015

About this Item

Neuware - Focusing on Latvia, (between 1905 and 1940), Suzanne Pourchier-Plasseraud, has chosen a nation without an ancient state history of its own, to illustrate the evolution of the concept of national identity into a claim for independence, with the help of art and artists.

Seller Inventory # 9789004300187

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Arts and a Nation : The Role of Visual Arts and Artists in the Making of the Latvian Identity, 1905-1940
• Publisher: Brill Sep 2015
• Publication Date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 900430018X
• ISBN 13: 9789004300187
• Binding: Buch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 241W x 160H x 36D millimeters 241 millimeters width by 160 millimeters height by 36 millimeters depth
• Weight: 1021 grams

About this title

Synopsis

Focusing on the role of arts in the construction of national identity, Suzanne Pourchier-Plasseraud has chosen to study the case of a country lacking an ancient state history of its own, Latvia. This book analyses the part played by the visual arts in transmuting the cultural concept of a nation, advocated by a small intelligentsia, into a widespread claim for independence. By the end of the 19th century, fretting under Russian political domination and German economic and cultural supremacy, the Latvians turned back to their own language, culture and folklore, with a special interest for their dainas, their timeless common heritage rooted into a mythical golden age. Latvian artists thus found themselves entrusted with the mission of creating a national iconographic representation and a specifically Latvian art, freed from Russian and German influences. The author shows how the links between the cultural and political spheres evolved between 1905 and 1940, including during the period of authoritarian government preceding WWII. An enlightening contribution to understanding how art and history can be turned into social and political instruments, this book reaches far beyond the Latvian case to a European and even global scope.

About the Author

Suzanne Pourchier-Plasseraud (PhD in History, Université de Paris 1- La Sorbonne) has extensively travelled in the Baltic States since 1988 and is a specialist in visual arts of Lithuania and Latvia. She is one of the co-authors of Capitales baltes (Autrement ,1999 ), Carnets baltes 1980-1999 (Lituanica, 1999), Les Litvaks, héritage universel d’un monde juif disparu (la Découverte, 2008), and the author of Les Arts de la nation, construction nationale et arts visuels en Lettonie 1905-1934 (Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2012).