Signs of Mortality in David Bowie＇s ＂Black Star＂ Video Clip

＂Black Star＂ music video was released two days before Bowie＇s death （January 8, 2016）. It bears various implications of dying and the notion of mortality is both literal and metaphorical. It is highly autobiographical and serves as a theatrical stage for Bowie to act both as a music performer and as a self-conscious human being. In this paper, we discuss the signs of mortality in Bowie＇s ＂Black Star＂ music video-clip. We focus on video＇s cinematic techniques and codes （editing, mise-en-sc6ne）, on its motivic elements and on its narrative in relation with music, lyrics, characters, and gestures. We also discuss the video＇s intertextual references and the broader signification of the black star figure. We adopt a quasi-semiotic approach considering ＂Black Star＂ music video-clip as a text which can be investigated through its signs, codes, and conventions of the musical, visual, and cinematic languages as well. Our interdisciplinary tools derive from visual semiotics and audiovisual analysis models （Barthes 1977; Goodwin 1992; Vernallis 2001, 2004）, without leaving outside Bowie＇s musical-artistic and personal history. As it turns out, Bowie created a video clip that is philosophical in nature and poetic in structure, preserving the role of protagonist. With the visuals creating a psychedelic atmosphere, the lyrics often are heard as a personal confession. They both generate cognitive and emotional responses that influence the way the viewers-listeners may experience, decompose, and interpret Bowie＇s artistic endeavor bridging life and death.

To the Problem of the Deconstruction of Images of Socialist Ideals in Russian Sots Art： Psychoanalytic Aspect

The article is devoted to the psychoanalytic issues of the deconstruction of images of socialist ideals in Russian Sots Art--an ironic title of the artistic trend in which used a mixture signs of visual semiotics of ＂social realism＂ and ＂pop art＂ of the 1990-2000s. By comparing the idealization of the image of Lenin in Soviet art of the 1930-1950s with its grotesque interpretation in Sots Art works of the 1990s, it appears to be interesting to trace the functions of grotesque and caricature in the deconstruction of the canons of socialist realism. Thereupon, special interest is the role of the regression mechanism in the transformation of the ideals of socialist realism into laughable images.

Un système de signaux maritimes:Saussure’s Example of a Visual Code

Saussure regarded nautical flag signalling codes as a prime example of semiological systems.They have something in common with language(e.g.,the principle of arbitrariness)but also some distinctive features(for instance,visual signifiers are unlike auditory ones in being able to deploy different features at the same time,such as shape and colour).The best-known example is the International Code of Signals(ICS).The system as it was during Saussure’s lifetime is explained with reference to his scattered observations,such as that a signal flag is merely“un morceau d’étoffe”until it is brought into use according to the prescriptions of the code shared by its users.Some commentators at the time envisaged this form of visual communication as a“universal language”.However,it is based on a restricted code,lacking the semantic universality of natural language.Each flag represents a letter,and combinations of flags represent predefined wordings in a“code book”.Such visual codes therefore depend on the prior existence of natural languages into and out of which they can be translated.