In Italy picture postcards were disseminated during the Giolitti era and throughout the Great War, thus becoming a concrete medium with a pervasive potential. Postcards influenced mass culture by ...constructing a collective imagination, they promoted the education of adults as well as of young people. As postcards reflected the shape of cultural industry by reproducing large scale images, they stemmed from a complex productive process that became a language of its own, starting from the artistic originality of the image to the printed form, reaching a wider audience both in terms of visual education and as swift communicative tool. In 1909 in Corriere dei Piccoli (1908-1995), the most prominent magazine for children in Italy at the time, Paola Carrara Lombroso (1871-1954) began the project for Bibliotechine per le scuole rurali (Libraries for rural schools), destined to a success until halfway through the Twentieth century. The young readers of the magazine took part with initiative by colouring and selling postcards created by Italian artists. The sum raised was used to donate books to rural schools. This research wishes to analyse a sample of postcards illustrated by well-known artists such as Mussino, Golia, Altara, Bologna and Gugù in order to shed light on the way childhood was represented. Toys, books, expressions and clothes are visual evidence of the multiple perspectives that adults adopted to reach children through entertainment. The artist’s gaze met child readers as they became protagonists and at the same time owning that message by modelling their thought and imagination.
This article will focus on Zita of Bourbon-Parma, last Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary’s visual representation on postcards between 1911 and 1922. It argues that Zita was consistently ...presented in the roles of wife, mother, and Landesmutter (mother of the country). On the face of it, it seems simple that Zita’s self-perception was wrapped up in the roles of wife and mother as coloured by her Catholic faith. However, this article shows that the picture is more complicated. While the roles themselves remained static, the way in which they were imagined and manifested changed as Zita underwent transitions in her life and status. These were influenced not only by her Catholicism, but also by external political forces and needs. Images of Zita and the imperial family were meant to provide the public with images of stability and domesticity in a time of great upheaval. Postcards produced in exile are evidence of a clear initiative on the family’s part and were used to keep the family in the public imagination and therefore maintain or create support for a potential restoration. It is possible to trace a line up to the present day, where Zita’s image continues to be used as a result of her status as Servant of God in the Catholic Church.
Postcards are usually associated with banal holiday pleasantries, but they are made possible by sophisticated industries and institutions, from printers to postal services. When they were invented, ...postcards established what is now taken for granted in modern times: the ability to send and receive messages around the world easily and inexpensively. Fundamentally they are about creating personal connections - links between people, places, and beliefs. Lydia Pyne examines postcards on a global scale, to understand them as artifacts that are at the intersection of history, science, technology, art, and culture. In doing so, she shows how postcards were the first global social network and also, here in the twenty-first century, how postcards are not yet extinct.
Focusing on a private collection of 60 postcards of modern architecture in Mumbai, New Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai and Agra, the contributors to this volume explore the many dimensions of modern ...architecture in India from the 1890s to the 1970s and share their own perspective on these objects. Experts on architectural history and visual studies, as well as postcard collectors provide new insights into a territory and its architectural heritage which is still largely unknown in Europe, and reflect on the postcard as a medium for historical research.
Auf Germanen! Schützet Eure Marken! Rudolf Jaworski
Österreichische Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaften : ÖZG,
12/2021, Letnik:
32, Številka:
2
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
The now abundant literature on Germanic legends and the Germanic cult in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries has so far mainly focused on Germany. Austrian components, in contrast, have only been ...mentioned in passing or neglected altogether, unless they were used for comparison. This study aims at contributing to the iconography of Austrian picture postcards by analysing samples from the last decades of the Habsburg monarchy. The now abundant literature on Germanic legends and the Germanic cult in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries has so far mainly focused on Germany. Austrian components, in contrast, have only been mentioned in passing or neglected altogether, unless they were used for comparison. This study aims at contributing to the iconography of Austrian picture postcards by analysing samples from the last decades of the Habsburg monarchy.
This article proposes another way of looking at how urban Romania was built in socialism, little explored: through official images. The main research question considered the official visual discourse ...of the Romanian state on urban territorial identities reflected in picture postcards, during the socialist period (1948-1989). Thus, the aim of this research is to expose and discuss the political hegemonic discourse as ubiquitous in these visual representations of the Romanian cities. The research objectives focused on identifying elements that supported the idea of a visual discourse that is coherent and resonates with the Romanian Communist Party’s propaganda by analyzing how images in picture postcards of the urban area were constructed. This visual imagery was interpreted through visual analysis in relation to the political discourse of the period. Results showed that the self-legitimation discourse of the Romanian Communist Party set the norm in representations of urban Romania in picture postcards.
The politics of symbolic representation is uncovered by our examining the represented cultural landscape. In this process, semiotics and discourse analysis were the methods complementing each other ...and enabling us to underline how Romanians’ understanding of power relations, of past and present events and ultimately of reality was shaped by signs, symbols, and stories in official visual materials. This research aims to discuss the geography of Romania’s southern border during the socialist period (1948-1989). This geography is made of the Danube and of the Danubian settlements as represented in images within Geography of Romania school textbooks and picture postcards. Thus, the aim of our article is to decode the visual construction of territorial identity of the Danubian settlements in Romania. To reach this aim, we considered the following research questions: Is the Danube the main subject in these representations or a secondary one? How is the Danube represented? What are the key-themes of its representation? How is the past of the settlements on the Danube integrated into the visual discourse during the socialist period? What was the role played by the Danube in the history of these settlements according to these representations (i.e. textbooks and picture postcards)? Results show that the Danube is a liminal space, changing functions depending on historical, political, economic, and social circumstances. The Danube is represented as landscape, defined through its economic (i.e. transport, commerce) or historical functions (i.e. border to the south or communication route with the west). Due to its representations, also the other elements seem truthful and “natural”. The presence of people and activities in the displayed places inform and educate visitors and inhabitants how to use space (contemplative, for entertainment, for relaxation, to learn, etc.). We provide an informed understanding of Romania through visual imagery: representations are singling out its uniqueness and achievements, fitting into the metanarrative of socialist propaganda.
From the Great Depression through the early postwar years, any postcard sent in America was more than likely a “linen" card. Colorized in vivid, often exaggerated hues and printed on card stock ...embossed with a linen-like texture, linen postcards celebrated the American scene with views of majestic landscapes, modern cityscapes, roadside attractions, and other notable features. These colorful images portrayed the United States as shimmering with promise, quite unlike the black-and-white worlds of documentary photography or Life magazine. Linen postcards were enormously popular, with close to a billion printed and sold. Postcard America offers the first comprehensive study of these cards and their cultural significance. Drawing on the production files of Curt Teich & Co. of Chicago, the originator of linen postcards, Jeffrey L. Meikle reveals how photographic views were transformed into colorized postcard images, often by means of manipulation—adding and deleting details or collaging bits and pieces from several photos. He presents two extensive portfolios of postcards—landscapes and cityscapes—that comprise a representative iconography of linen postcard views. For each image, Meikle explains the postcard’s subject, describes aspects of its production, and places it in social and cultural contexts. In the concluding chapter, he shifts from historical interpretation to a contemporary viewpoint, considering nostalgia as a motive for collectors and others who are fascinated today by these striking images.
Picture postcards became immensely popular in the first decade of the twentieth century, in Ireland as elsewhere, and billions of them passed through post offices worldwide. Their imagery was largely ...dictated by market forces, and they penetrated all sectors of society, communicating values and concepts even to those who were unwilling or unable to engage with other media such as books and periodicals. During this period the concept of Irish identity was very fluid, and several nationalist groups had emerged whose aim was to develop a distinct Irish culture worthy of the respect of both Irish and non-Irish people. Picture postcards became seen as a means towards achieving this aim, but also of seriously undermining it. This paper examines reports from Irish newspapers from 1900 to 1910 on the postcard phenomenon, and the social anxieties and fears they reveal.
The built heritage, through the multiple meanings it associates (oldness, architectural, aesthetic, symbolic, authenticity), is characterized by uniqueness and irreversibility, being frequently ...related to the cultural and implicitly tourist image of cities. Due to the seniority of architectural heritage and the special relations established with the place and people, under the direct influence of the socio-cultural and political factors, it ensures the accumulation of symbols that codify the urban space. As a result, heritage buildings are associated with elements of territorial identity. Visual imagery is used as an argument to support the process of selecting significant buildings for local / national culture. These are promoted among the general public. Most of the time, the selection process aim s at identifying representative buildings, a process that registers the influence of socio-cultural and politic factors. This article focuses on the socio-cultural evolution of the Romanian Athenaeum, a symbolic building of the Romanian culture. Based on a rich background of historical illustrations and recent observations, the authors analysed the symbols associated with the Romanian Athenaeum, in various historical periods. The authors used a sample of picture postcards with representations of the Athenaeum and interpreted the information they provided. The key results show the cultural role of the Athenaeum for the capital city, Bucharest, and its relation with the political factor, as this building was selected as the host for important political events with a deep historical charge, most often having the support of national authorities. In the course of time, the Athenaeum was represented constantly in picture postcards, as cultural building symbol and tourist attraction, due to its unique characteristics which emphasize its role as element of urban identity for Bucharest. At the same time, the interpretation of visual imagery allowed the decoding of the symbols and identification of the identity narrative and politics built around the Athenaeum, which, through the interactions generated by the socio-cultural and political plans, confer it the quality of symbolic building for the national and European culture.
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