Re-Animating the Modern Symbol: the Residues of Romantic Materialism in the Picture Language of Isotype

这是一个档案研究项目，涉及奥托·纽拉特、玛丽·雷德迈斯特（后来的玛丽·纽拉特）和艺术家格尔德·阿恩茨在维也纳（1925-1934）、海牙和英国同种型研究所制作的文本、图形和照片。同型系统是当代信息图形的先驱，是一种“国际图像语言”。我打算研究它作为一个实践和理论探索的象征性沟通，展示它如何可以理解通过旧的概念的象征，这比当代符号学。奥托·纽拉特对儿童书籍插图、埃及象形文字、巴洛克风格的浮雕和17世纪的舞台布景感兴趣，这表明了Isotype“图片语言”和更广泛的项目（包括公共展览、摄影和儿童书籍）的复杂而有趣的起源。本研究涉及探索巴洛克和浪漫主义的象征意义理论，它们与浪漫主义对感知作为双向过程的理解的联系，以及二十世纪早期德国和奥地利艺术史和理论中发展的象征和象征主义理论。它特别关注沃尔特·本雅明的早期批评作品，他的“光环”概念植根于浪漫主义理论，是他理解现代性和现代媒体的关键（他以“光环”的丧失为特征）。通过对浪漫主义教育家和结晶学家弗里德里希·福禄贝尔的平行研究，该项目将探索理性化的几何形式如何体现这些象征主义的概念。档案研究（在欧洲和英国的主要档案）和图形/摄影实践的结合，将用于分析技术和过程的同种型。同种型被认为不仅是在它的关系，逻辑实证主义哲学的纽拉特及其直接的历史和社会背景，而且在关系到这些更广泛的想法，符号，这不一定是兼容的纽拉特自己的哲学。该研究方法的目的是把理论和实践的探索象征主义到富有成效的对话，对几何现代主义的唯物主义理解作出贡献，并提供了一个重要的历史背景下，目前转向唯物主义的文化理论（例如，在“东西理论”和“演员网络理论”）。

This is an archival reseach project which deals with texts, graphics and photographs produced by Otto Neurath, Marie Reidemeister (later Marie Neurath), and the artist Gerd Arntz at the Gesellschafts- und Wirtschaftsmuseum in Vienna (1925-1934), in The Hague, and at the Isotype institute in England. The Isotype system is a precursor to contemporary information graphics, an 'international picture language'. I intend to study it as a practical and theoretical exploration of symbolic communication, demonstrating how it may be understood through older conceptions of the symbol, which predate contemporary semiotics. Otto Neurath's interest in children's book illustrations, Egyptian hieroglyphs, Baroque emblems, and seventeenth century tableaux suggests a complex and interesting provenance for the Isotype 'picture language' and the broader project (which included public exhibitions, photography, and children's books). This research involves exploring Baroque and Romantic theories of symbolic meaning, their links to the Romantic understanding of perception as a two way process, and theories of symbols and symbolism developed in German and Austrian art history and theory in early twentieth century. It focusses particularly on the early critical writings of Walter Benjamin, whose concept of 'aura' is rooted in Romantic theory, and is key to his understanding of modernity and modern media (which he characterises in terms of a loss of 'aura'). Through a parallel study of the Romantic educationalist and crystallographer, Friedrich Froebel, the project will explore the ways in which rationalised, geometric forms come to embody these notions of symbolism. A combination of archival study (in key European and British archives) and graphic/photographic practice, will be used to analyse the techniques and processes of Isotype. Isotype is considered not only in its relationship to the logical positivist philosophy of Neurath and its immediate historical and social context, but also in relation to these wider ideas about the symbol, which are not necessarily compatible with Neurath's own philosophy. The research methodology is intended to bring theoretical and practical explorations of symbolism into productive dialogue, to contribute towards a materialist understanding of geometric modernisms and to provide a significant historical context for the current turn to materialism in cultural theory (for example, in 'thing theory' and 'actor network theory').