Jörg Scheller | The Sophistication of Propaganda. New Populist Strategies, Social Media and Post-Photography

Jörg Scheller | The Sophistication of Propaganda. New Populist Strategies, Social Media and Post-Photography

Wykład Otwarty | Open Lecture

18.12, godz. 18.00 | 18.12 (Wednesday), 6.p.m.
Atrium UAP | venue
budynek B | building B

Populism and propaganda are commonly associated with a coarse visual and verbal language. Words like fist blows. Insults. Accusations. Demeaning caricatures, harsh contrasts, poignant motifs, bold typographies. However, the internet and social media have brought along more sophisticated and subtle forms of agitation, brimming with irony and playfulness, feeding on postmodernist aesthetics, laced with innuendo. This lecture explores the sophistication of online propaganda and populism by the examples of Instagram, Tumblr and Facebook posts from new right/alt-right users and activists. It links the hybridization of propaganda with the ongoing hybridization of (post)photographic images and traces it back to the early fascist avant-garde.

Jörg Scheller jest doktorem nauk humanistycznych, historykiem sztuki, dziennikarzem, muzykiem, anglistą, medioznawcą i kuratorem sztuki. W latach 2007–2009 był stypendystą ośrodka DFG Graduate School Bildbüro Medium w Staatliche Hochschule für Gestaltung Karlsruhe. Mieszka w Berlinie, wykłada na Hochschule für Gestaltung Karlsruhe, Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden, Künste Stuttgart, Akademie für Darstellende Kunst Ludwigsburg, Universität Siegen i Universität Zürich.

Jörg Scheller

(born 1979 in Stuttgart) is an art historian, journalist and musician based in various express trains. He studied art history, philosophy, media art and anglistics. From 2007 through 2009 he held a grant from the German Research Foundation for the graduate school Image Body Medium at the University of Arts and Design in Karlsruhe (HfG) where he was awarded his PhD for a thesis on the myth of Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2011. From 2009-2012, he worked as a researcher at the Swiss Institute for Art Research in Zurich and as assistant professor at the University of Siegen (2009, 2011-2013). He became permanent lecturer at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) in 2012. From 2013–2016, he was co-head of photography at the ZHdK, currently he is head of theory of the BA Art & Media. He gave lectures at universities and museums among others in Cyprus, Germany, France, Hong Kong, Italy, Canada, Lithuania, Mexico, Poland, Romania, Switzerland, Taiwan, USA. Besides he had teaching assignments at the HfG, the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste Stuttgart, the Akademie für Darstellende Kunst Ludwigsburg, the Uniwersytet Artystyczny w Poznaniu and the Taipei National University of the Arts. His research is focused on physical culture (emphasis on bodybuilding), exhibition history, popular culture and pop music (emphasis on heavy metal). In 2013, he was curator of the „Salon Suisse” at the 55th Venice Art Biennale, in 2015/16 he curated the exhibition „Building Modern Bodies. The Art of Bodybuilding” for the Kunsthalle Zurich. His essays and reviews appear regularly in, a.o., DIE ZEIT, NZZ, FAZ, Schweizer Monat, Camera Austria, frieze magazine. In 2019 he became Contributing Editor of frieze. Besides, he is the singer and bass player of the trash (without „h”!) metal duo Malmzeit (founded in 2003) who run a heavy metal delivery service. In the early 1990s he started weight training and has been pumping iron ever since.