Summary
Senka Vlahovic Filipov’s book named VIDEO-ILLUSTRATION OF A BOOK: A New View on
the Illustration and Image-Building of a Book in Public is a research
project that deals with the analysis of a new form of building an image of a
book in public and its presentation in public – a video-illustration of a book,
in general and a specific example of a video-illustration of a book, through
theoretical analysis and empirical methods: case study, focus-group interview
and observation.
In the era of new technology, the internet and
mass-communication, a problem of
books is being raised – the number of their readers, the survival of the book
in its classic, printed form and its gradual transformation into electronic
form, the problem of the presence of the book in the media and in the public
and the manner in which it is promoted in, the content of the book, its
(non)competitiveness in relation to the production of spectacle. The modern
man’s perception is accustomed to communicating through images (we move from the
domination of letters and characters into an
image galaxy), but not only static images, but moving images as well, whose
abundance intercepts us at every step, thus oversaturating and weakening our
attention. In such conditions it is difficult to create an interest in a
potential reader in still letters printed
on paper in relation to live moving
images. Consequently, a video-illustration of a book emerges as a form
which illustrates the text of a book with moving
images – visual codes created using cameras and film means of expression,
and thus aims to attract the attention of the reader to the content of the
book.
The goal of this research is to determine the
effect of presenting a book in public in the form of a video-illustration i.e.
obtaining results that will show whether this manner of building an image of a
book and its promotion affects the interest of the target group in the book and
in what way.
At the beginning of this research we have laid
out a theoretical analysis of basic concepts concerning the topic, namely: the
book (its history and its present position), video-illustration (as a new
multimedia form of book presentation) and the image of a book (its creation in
public in relation to culture, publishing and the media).
In the second part, this research deals with a
specific example of a video-illustration of the book “An Evening Nude in the Maiden
Room of Lenka Dundjerski“ by author Radovan Vlahovic, in the form of a
rationale of an artistic project, through theoretical analysis, emphasizing the
process of transforming the content of the book from written into audio-visual
code, and through empirical research of the effects the video-illustration of
this book has on the audience.
The researcher and the author of this book is
also the author of the video-illustration of the book “An Evening Nude in the Maiden
Room of Lenka Dundjerski“ by Radovan Vlahovic, which was created as an artistic
project for this research and which was attached on a DVD to this book.
A video-illustration of a book in the service
of building its image in public, as the basic idea of this research, stands in
defence of the old book with an aim
to attract the attention of the public to the book in new conditions, but, a
video-illustration of a book is also in close communication with a new, future,
multimedia book, combining in itself the moving image, words and sound.
In recent years there has been a growing
interest in illustration among theorists, curators and contemporary artists,
because it represents a more elaborate way of communicating between the textual
and the visual which has survived all changes through the history of art.
Illustration and visual communication in
general have obtained a significant position in a time of globalization,
supported by powerful networked and intense forms of communication which we
have today, precisely because of their ability to overcome language barriers.
The status of illustration was raised to a
higher level from the standpoint of valuing illustration as a form of artistic
expression within the frameworks of fine art, but also within the frameworks of
the graphic industry.
Illustration has, in time, as seen from the
standpoint of theory and the development of the theory of illustration, but
also due to newly created opportunities in recent decades in art and media, not
only stepped outside the scopes of applied art and the conditionality of the
text, but it has also been understood more widely and with more relevance and
weight – that everything is an
illustration – each image in the broadest sense of the word, that
illustration is every visual comment in
the world surrounding us.
In a time in which moving images occupy the
attention and dominate, illustration has found its place surviving, or it hasn’t
even left it by being an image, albeit being moving from the beginning, only
not viewed as such, and one of the forms of its existence in relation to the moving
image, regardless of which of these two standpoints one chooses, is a
video-illustration.
A video-illustration of a book as a drama and
audio-visual piece illustrates the narrative with an upgrade that an
audio-visual piece has compared to the visual. This upgrade is what should win
over the contemporary reader i.e. viewer/listener of the book.
A visual presentation of a certain narrative
has a powerful influence on the observer. This does not diminish the
significance of the narrative itself, the illustrator, even the director as
someone who visualises the scenario through the video-illustration, unavoidably
lean on the text, but the creator of the visual presentation of a given text
imposes his visual experience onto others as well.
Based on research conducted, the visual i.e.
audio-visual presentation of the poetry book “An Evening Nude in the Maiden
Room of Lenka Dundjerski“ by Radovan Vlahovic, in the form of a
video-illustration has a positive influence on the perception of this book by
the audience, which was the base hypothesis of this research. According to the
words of the respondents in the focus-group discussion and the results
obtained, a video-illustration is a livelier,
more tangible, more plastic, deeper and more complete form of book
presentation. Most respondents have concluded that a video-illustration is a positive, useful, beautiful and excellent
form of book promotion, which engages multiple senses and thus makes the
audience enjoy more and encourages the wish of the audience to buy the book. The respondents’
opinions have shown that the video-illustration of a book, in relation to
existing manners of book promotions, is a better way of promoting books because
it is complete, artistic and because it has a very big influence on the reader
which can attract him to read the literary piece.
Most respondents have concluded that the
video-illustration “An Evening Nude in the Maiden Room of Lenka Dundjerski“ by
Radovan Vlahovic awakens emotions in the viewer which concern the viewer himself and in which he is able to find
himself, that it makes the audience feel calm
and relaxed, that it awakens the need
for beauty and art in the viewer,
and that, in the end, it awakens the joy
of being human after all.
Based on these obtained results we conclude:
- that the illustration, being a moving illustration within the
audio-visual form – the video-illustration of a book – has confirmed its
universality and the fact that it is not limited to a two-dimensional image,
but that it extends beyond, to a moving, one could even say film image, which
can be used to illustrate a literary piece,
- that the video-illustration of a book, as a
new medium of appearance and applicability of illustration, in relation to the
classic graphic product – printed book, has confirmed its promotional qualities,
and
- that through video-illustration of a book we
can create a desired image of the book through visualization of the literary
narrative in such a way in which the visual element of the video-illustration
of the book (accompanied by a corresponding auditory element, embedded together
in a dramatic audio-visual structure) primarily adequately corresponds to the
narrative, presenting its values and characteristics, but also pointing out
some of them in a specific way determined by the desired image of the book
which aims to be realized in public, with the audience and the pre-defined
target group.
The
video-illustration of a book testifies to the vitality of illustration and its
potential to survive in the future, not only in the forms in which we know it in
and have seen it in or recognized it in thus far, but also that in new forms
created under the influence of the development of art, media and technology, it
has a potential to become significant as an independent work of art as well and
as an art work serving the purpose of the book.
