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NIETZSCHE’S SELF-IMAGE-FORMING AND ITS REPRESENTATION IN THE POSTMILLENNIAL MEDIA // ΠΡΑΞΗMΑ. Journal of Visual Semiotics. 2021. Issue 4 (30). P. 293-311

The paper is devoted to the consideration of the theoretical problem of the human image and the mechanisms of its formation, a topic which is of considerable relevance in present-day visual semiotics due to the totalizing visualization processes brought about through the increasing power of media and internet technologies. The visual aspects of the functioning of food as a cultural element in the postmillennial communicative environment are analyzed through the interdisciplinary perspective of philosophy and cultural studies. The authors identify Friedrich Nietzsche’s work Ecce Homo as one of the most important sources for understanding the processes of self-image-forming in philosophical and cultural studies, and they show that it is a text which explains cultural and anthropological practices that can be applied in 21st century visual anthropology. In Ecce Homo, the German thinker reintroduces the continuation and development of the traditions of ancient “self-care” (epimeleia), emphasizing the need for the responsible, conscious and individual relationship of a human being to his or her integral image as it emerges in everyday life. Nietzsche demonstrates the key importance of self-image-forming from a primarily medical or even physiological point of view, focusing in detail on the formation of the self through the conscious and authentic use of food practices, living environment, climate, and modes of relaxation. All of these components, especially that of food, are central mechanisms in the formation of the visual image of individuals in contemporary media, focusing not on a critical self-evaluation but instead on an aggressively approved image. The paper argues that it is within Friedrich Nietzsche’s everyday practices of lifestyle that we can identify how food, living environment, climate, and modes of relaxation dominate the 21st century self-image-forming of hypermodern postmillennial individuals in their quest for almost unlimited consumption and hypermediation. The authors also discuss the roles of visual food practices in the presentation of human identity and the representation of cultural realities of the postmillennial era in the functioning of hypermodern media.

Keywords: Nietzsche, self-image-forming, ancient self-care, Foucault, visual semiotics and anthropology, everyday cultural practices, postmillennial media communication, hypermodern individual

A PERSON AS A VISUAL MESSAGE: SEMIOTICS AND AESTHETICS OF THE HUMAH IMAGE // ΠΡΑΞΗMΑ. Journal of Visual Semiotics. 2023. Issue 1 (35). P. 48-77

In modern socio-humanitarian science and everyday reality, the problem of visual semiotics is a key one, given the process of total visualization of the modern world, which requires a serious critical reflection of this phenomenon. The author of this article wants to reveal this problem in the fundamental context of philosophical and visual anthropology, presenting an original project of semiotics and aesthetics of the human image, for which he uses and rethinks the main approaches of modern philosophy in this area. The article is dedicated to the development of the main problems of semiotics in the space of a holistic aesthetic image of a person, presented as a visual message. The author seeks to reveal and substantiate the sovereign, independent and central significance of the visual image of a person in modern semiotic, visual-anthropological, philosophical-anthropological and aesthetic studies. The article explores the mechanisms and levels of perception and understanding of a person, presented as a certain visual message, in everyday life. Critically using and developing the approaches of Roland Barthes in relation to text and image analysis, the author analyses in detail the levels of visual communication encountered in the modern world. He draws special attention to the importance of modern digital technologies in the process of visualizing the everyday existence of a person and their image. Thus, the semiotic and visual-anthropological analysis of modern visual advertising and media, the nature of the use of the image of a person in them and the specifics of modeling its specific meaning are presented in detail. The author considers a person’s image in a more fundamental visual-anthropological and philosophical-anthropological key, and presents it as a spontaneous manifestation of human existence in a phenomenal aesthetic form implemented mainly at the pre-reflexive level. The author of the article uses Barthes’ selection of three levels of meanings (linguistic; having an iconic or denotative code; not having an iconic or connotative code) to study a holistic visual human image, whose formation is somehow influenced by all person’s components (personal name, speech, clothing style, etc.). The author dwells in particular detail on the meaning of language as a manifestation, a way of forming and perceiving a visual human image, the correlations of the denotative and connotative levels in it, and reveals the specific features of visual self-presentation, communication and intersubjectivity in the modern world.

Keywords: semiotics of human image, visual anthropology, aesthetics of image, Roland Barthes, visual message, levels of meanings, language and image