„Пирин пее 2018” и живата песенна традиция на село Брезница

Author(s): Mariana Manoleva / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 2/2019

The article outlines some of the main aspects of safeguarding of the local singing tradition in the village of Breznitsa, Gotse Delchev region. Its present state and the tendencies for change have been outlined on the basis of the analysis of the participation of the groups for folk singing in Pirin pee 2018 sabor. In the focus of attention are Breznichanki folk formation and the woman singing group at the local chitalishte (cultural centre) “P. R. Slaveykov – 1938”. The author analyses mainly the repertoire which shows the attitude to the tradition and the ways of its safeguarding. On this basis two main lines of development have been found – one, which includes strict keeping to the local peculiarities of the traditional singing style and a second one, which includes specifics certifying for influences coming far beyond the local level.

„Полски реквием“ на Пендерецки – work in progress като отговор на историята

Author(s): Petya Tsvetanova / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 9/2018

Emerging in sync with the 20th century political events in Poland, Krzysztof Penderecki’s “Polish Requiem” becomes an œvre devoted to the Polish history that is being “updated” continuously by its author for a period of twenty-five years, by means of adding new parts, related to historic events and personæ. This method of “long-term” composing, characteristic to this author, loosens the framework of opus musicum, and exposes it towards a continuous process of creation; it makes the “Polish Requiem” a work in progress – without a period mark at the end of it, expecting to be updated – eventually…

„Предстоящата единна история на изкуството” на Джеймс Елкинс

Author(s): Ivan Popov / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 1/2019

„Преосмисленият“ Шостакович в музикалните изследвания от 80-те години на XX в. до днес

Author(s): Boryana Mangova / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 9/2018

Soviet Stalinist propaganda elevates Shostakovich’s person and art as being an emblem of flourishing socialist culture. The ambivalence of his behavior and music compositions – a reflexion of complex life circumstances, creates a controversial approach towards the composer in Russia and in the world. Is he a victim, or a devoted servant of Stalin’s regime – this is the question undertaken by the author of the present presentation. Argumentation stems from Shostakovich research in the world from the last decades of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st centuries. A certain process has been noted of liberation from ideological emphasis, and a thorough research of a musical legacy that has a substantial musical and humanist value.

„Проклятые джинсы” и „несчастная колбаса” – к вопросу об отражении социальных эмоций в языке

Author(s): Daria Słupianek-Tajnert / Language(s): Russian / Issue: 9/2019

The article analyses the examples of usage of the nouns jeans and sausage in the book Second hand time by Svetlana Aleksievich. These nouns have the function of contextual emotional and ideological terms. Their usage reflects the emotional dichotomy between the imagination and views of the post-Soviet society concerning the current political situation (resulting mainly from the systemic changes related to perestroika), and social moods conditioned by politics.

„Пространството на диагонала“ – ефект и реализации в клавирните ноктюрни от Димитър Христов

Author(s): Ganka Nedelcheva / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 7/2016

This article’s author introduces the term “space diagonal”. It is interpreted as a real space in music communication, sending out a particular message. The performer observes, awaits, sums up and concludes sound space; its path, modeled by acoustic waves, bringing on genesis, superposition, stratification and degradation. Performer’s reflex is constantly engaged with sound event’s continuous record, with relation to both past and future. This process drafts a thight net of diagonal lines, marking sound’s vertical and horizontal points. Thus, “diagonal space” refers directly to a space with most interpretation activity. Thus, an analogy is sought, between diagonal motion and the real and artistic world, defining diagonal action as the most active one. Dimitar Hristov’s innovative musical language includes non-standard features: obertone (sound particle) pedal, finger pedal, non-measure notation – bringing connections to the new term. It is presented in this study in both theoretical and interpretational aspect, mirroring Nedelcheva’s long involvement with Dimitar Hristov’s music interpretation.

„Размразяването” на сцената на Народния театър. Завръщането на авангардните сценографски практики

Author(s): Albena Tagareva / Language(s): English,Bulgarian / Issue: 3/2018

The paper seeks to offer a look into the processes of challenging the stringent dogmatic constraints imposed by Socialist Realism, that have taken place in the scenography at the National Theatre. In view of the theatrical situation in this country between 1956 and 1968, the National Theatre was no longer the authority that had set the aesthetic directions in the theatre practice. Still, several productions, though few and not that radical as elsewhere across the country, could be highlighted even there, such as Schiller’s Don Carlos, dir. Krustio Mirsky, set design by Ivan Penkov, architect Georgi Trendafilov (1955); Ivan Vazov’s Toward the Abyss, dir. in Stefan Surchadjiev, set design by Asen Popov (1958); Leo Tolstoy’s The Living Corpse, dir. Nikolay Lutskanov, set design by Asen Stoichev (1963), etc., that have broken the mould of the illusionary-likening scenographic solutions. These premieres have established a clear trend in the way the ‘Thaw’ was taking its course, viz. through modernising classic plays and primarily, through their visual expressiveness onstage. Scenography of theatrical productions was the promptest of all the elements of a performance in shaking off the burden of the dogmatic Socialist Realism imposed in Bulgaria in the Stalinist era. It was the artists who have earlier established the scenographic practice and then worked in the period under consideration for the National Theatre with all their authority and mastery to demonstrate their ingenious art that in the late 1950s and the early 1960s became the motor giving an impetus to the change in the conservative design of the theatre’s productions.

„Рилският манастир – история, памет, духовност“

Author(s): Ivanka Gergova / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 3-4/2017

„Рукою грешнаго изуграфа...”. Още веднъж за живописците в късносредновековната и предмодерна епоха

Author(s): Margarita Kujumdjieva / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 1/2018

The present text is an attempt to outline different aspects of several more general problems concerning the process of creating paintings in this historic age with its technological and above all social dimensions. What do we know about the way the painters in the Balkans worked, how did they get their knowledge, and how they have perfected their skills, how well their work has been valued and what was their status in society? We still have few answers to these questions as historians, but they consistently captivate specialists interested in Orthodox art. In this article some of these questions are revisited, and the scarce data from the material preserved in Bulgaria is supplemented with what is known as a result of the study of Orthodox art from 15-17th c. in the Balkans. The study comments on the term „zograf” in Cyrillic written sources, remark on the importance of the painters and the character of their work in the Byzantine era, summarizing data known from the previous publications on the subject. The main part of the article is devoted to the period 15-17 c. The attention is paid to statistics such as the approximate number of known names of masters in the Balkans based on the preserved icons and frescoes signed. These examples are many times more than those in the previous era, yet, the icon-painters of the Balkans continued to show their humility and piousness, adding to their names words like „sinful”, „unworthy”, or „servant of God”. The text examines what is known about the organization of the work process and the training of icon-painters in the late Middle Ages. It is underlined that, unlike the large number of documents in the state archives in Dubrovnik and Venice, as well as the rich written sources from Russia, we have scarce written information on the subject in the Balkans. We acquire data mainly from donors’ inscriptions preserved in frescoes and icons, invocation or other type of inscriptions, and in rare cases from notes in manuscripts, in beadrolls, or from epistolary or travel literature of the period. Some historical and cultural conditions in the Balkans are commented, which resulted in certain specifics, such as people identifying themselves in confessional rather than in ethnic terms, as well as the great mobility of the icon-painters, the work in teams, sometimes ofmixed origin – Greek and Slavonic, and frequent proficiency in several languages. During this period, many of the icon-painters are representatives of the lower levels of the church hierarchy, which suggests that they are distinguished from the illiterate and uneducated population. In rare cases, besides icon-painters, they are also man of letters, and the best masters have been able to make icons and frescoes, and at the same time to transcribe and decorate books. The text remarks on some other specifics of painters’ work: the dependence on seasons and climate conditions, the preservation of the practice to pass the craftsmanship on to a close family circle. In addition, some technical and technological features in the execution of muralsare discussed, as well asthe use of preliminary drawings, models and painters’ manuals and the formation of the painters’ iconographic repertoire. In conclusion, the text draws attention to the state of the material preserved in Bulgaria and in particular to the problem of the attribution of a large number of wall paintings, icons and woodcarved items to St. Pimen of Zograf in previous studies, which is not sustainable due to the lack of facts and serious scientific arguments on the matter.

„Смъртта“ на „живите“ изкуства в дигиталната епоха?

Author(s): Joanna Spassova-Dikova / Language(s): English,Bulgarian / Issue: 2/2017

The proposed text is part of a larger study of the dynamic processes in the performative arts in the era of rapid development of new technologies. The focus is on the performance live arts in the digital era, where liveness (Philip Auslander, 1999) vs. virtual in the age of digimodernism (Alan Kirby, 2009). These processes put a lot of questions about the future of mankind when live people might be replaced by robots, or even become themselves bio-robot hybrids. The latter pertains to the problem of live vs. digital, real vs. virtual, natural vs. artificial. The key word is hybridization, where we can talk about the “death” of the traditional live arts in their fight with the new technologies. Some modern and postmodern ideas about symbolical “deaths” of the Creator in the Creation are discussed.

„Софийски музикални седмици” и Европейската асоциация на музикалните фестивали

Author(s): Diana Danova-Damianova,Diana Danova-Damyanova / Language(s): English,Bulgarian / Issue: 2/2019

The paper deals with several records at the Archives State Agency referring to the 1982 accession of Sofia Music Weeks (the major and most prestigious international music event in Bulgaria’s capital at the time) to the European Festivals Association (EFA; until 1991, Association of European Music Festivals). The real advantages of this accession and the opening up of Bulgarian art through collaboration with other European festivals were presciently foreseen by Bulgarian composer Peter Stupel, the then director of Sofia Music Weeks. In 1988 he joined the managing body of the European Association and made every effort for the earliest Bulgarian music festival, Varna Summer, to join the European festival family, an endeavour which came to fruition in 1987. In that period the Association unfailingly held Sofia Music Weeks in high esteem: the latter was placed among the most intriguing events across Europe in terms of repertoire on a par with festivals enjoying much better funding and organizational capacities. Revealing facts about the rich history of this many-sided Sofia event shed new light on its international representativeness and great renown in the years following the collapse of the Iron Curtain.

„Софийски музикални седмици”. Архивните документи

Author(s): Diana Danova-Damianova / Language(s): English,Bulgarian / Issue: 4/2018

Mounting a music festival necessitates spadework of various types of documents in different formats such as administrative documentation, print materials relating to announcements and reflection (programmes, posters, reviews), photographs, audio and video recordings, etc. Collecting, structuring and keeping all these facilitate research. Research on a large-scale festival supposes sets of documentation as complete as possible to compile a trustworthy calendar of events allowing an objective view of a festival. The extant archival sources are miscellaneous, but taken together with the informational texts and music criticism are instrumental in getting a fuller picture of long-gone events, historically more and more distant. The records of the high-profile Sofia Music Weeks International Festival and its history of five decades are difficult to be found and the bulk of these is presently kept at three institutions: Archives State Agency, Sofia Music Weeks International Festival Foundation and Pancho Vladigerov House Museum, Sofia. The article presents a stage in studying the archival records, suggesting possible lines of research.

„Сърцето на мрака“ – идеи и решения на първата българска постановка

Author(s): Margreta Grigorova,Petya Tsoneva / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 1/2019

Heart of Darkness is a multilayered but coherent work whose universally acclaimed appeal draws on its thematic preoccupation with the problems of initiation and cognition. The rich variety of interpretations and creative reworks of the novella vary from discussions of its importance as a sample of anticolonial fiction to the acknowledgement of its role as a precursor to contemporary fantastic literature. The first Bulgarian dramatisationof Heart of Darkness, screen-written and directed by Valeria Valcheva, is an insightful and successful attempt to do justice to both its contents and the suggestive power of its poetics translated into the language of drama.The performance combines the stylistic features of farce, cabaret, ritual and classical theatre, inserting fragments of Edgar Allan Poe, Vachel Lindsay, Tom Waits, Thomas Eliot and even Pushkin’s poems. Valcheva is particularlyconcerned with reading Conrad’s work as a “European” collective narrative where the African Other is rendered through the poetic features of mask-wearing and the symbolic “curtain” of the jungle. The performance is likewise accompanied by music that includes the “talking drums” of Congo, and its stage design was apparently borrowed from Orson Welles’s cinematic adaptations. One of the outstanding contributions of the Bulgarian performance to the earlier attempts at dramatising Conrad’s work is the use of a marionette to represent Kurtz’s self-glorified condition. The play likewise foregrounds the biographical aspect of Conrad’s work related to Conrad and Marguerite Poradowska’s correspondence.

„Така ли прави всяка жена?“ – метаморфоза в пролог, две картини и епилог по „Слугинята-господарка“. Естетически и жанрови рефлексии

Author(s): Violeta Gorcheva / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 8/2017

The object of this study is “Every Woman Does It This Way?” – a metamorphosis with a prologue, two tableaux and an epilogue. This is an author’s reworking of the opéra comique “La Serva Padrona”, first staged in Bulgaria in 21st and 22nd of May 2015 by the Student Music Theater in the Grand Concert Hall of the National Music Academy. This analysis is presented in the form of a director’s explicaçion, deriving the meaning, intentions, artistic idea, motivations, main objective’s paradigm, and concrete tasks at hand. Esthetic and art parameters are followed and defined, related to the genre transformations and the newly-produced hybrid of music and theater, uniting the quality specifics and building components of opera buffa, operetta, musical, romantic comedy, epic theater. Art provocation is emphasized, as well as the alternative direction and avant-guarde searches and solutions, coming directly from the libretto, rewritten and set at the present time, with the music added, the music theater dramaturgy (conflicts, plot lines), dramatis personæ (some well-known and some new – a total of 23), scenic transcription, and the final audio-visual art product. The final spiritual and musical bridge between the baroque and present time is achieved by means of archetype ideas, actualization, stylization, idealization and universalization.

„Толкова близо, толкова далече“ – глобални номади у дома

Author(s): Nia Tabakova,MIla Stareishinska-Angelova / Language(s): English,Bulgarian / Issue: 2/2016

This paper seeks to introduce authors, whose artistic oeuvres are linked to the concept of global nomads, in the context of the So Close, So Far exhibition. The exhibition has been held on a yearly basis ever since 2012 at the National Palace of Culture, Sofia to display works by contemporary Bulgarian artists living and working abroad. In its essence, So Close, So Far offers a panoramic view of the contemporary trends in the visual arts on a global scale, demonstrated by the artworks of Bulgarian authors. The overview of several artists that have participated in various editions of the exhibition is intended to give concrete examples and thus highlight the works of a specific group of contemporary Bulgarian painters, who have opted for developing their artistic careers beyond the national borders. Their reintroduction on the Bulgarian art scene contributes to the enrichment of the cultural life by drawing parallels between artistic movements globally and locally.

„Тракийски танци” от Петко Стайнов в полето на диалога традиция – съвременност (1926 – 2016)

Author(s): Emilia Kolarova / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 4/2016

„Трафикът“ на образи в списанията на авангарда – участието на български списания от 1920-те години на ХХ век

Author(s): Irina Genova / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 7/2011

Magazines in Bulgaria as elsewhere have been central to the artistic performance of the avant-garde. During the brief spell between the end of WWI and 1925, Vezni (1919–1922) and Plamak (1923–1925), as well as the short-lived Crescendo (1922) joined the widespread exchange network, established between the numerous avant-garde long-lived and short-lived magazines in different European countries. Alongside texts, reproductions of artistic images and photos of equal worth in terms of their significance provide evidence of the close contacts that Bulgarian magazines and their editors with Geo Milev in the first place maintained with international artistic circles. The article specifies particular methods of exchange of images, i.e. through the printed by the European and mostly the German avant-garde post-cards and circulated portfolios of graphic prints. Practical difficulties in pre-printing the images, which had to be transferred onto new plates, are pointed out. Information from letters and other archival materials is adduced in confirmation of particular though just a few cases in view of the limited length of the article.

„Удигруди“ – бразилският ъндърграунд от края на 60-те като радикализация и отхвърляне на Синема ново

Author(s): Boryana Mateeva / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 2/2015

The paper deals with the historical and political origins, the thematic characteristics and stylistic specifics, etc., of Udigrudi or the Brazilian film Underground of the late 1960s in its complex relations with Brazil’s Cinema Novo. Analysing several significant films, their structure, and visual messages and providing some of the keynote statements of major representatives of the movement, the study projects the movement on to the panorama of Brazilian film between the 1960s and the arrival of postmodernity.

„Укротяването на опърничавата” или за женските образи в съвременното българско кино

Author(s): Elitza Gotzeva / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 4/2018

The article displays an overview to the perception of woman in the Bulgarian cinema. Taking as example the famous Shakespearean comedy “The Taming of the Shrew”, the author analyzes the multidimensional representation of woman in art, its meaning and its reflection in the changing perceptions of the contemporary society. Comparing the different interpretations of the Shrew for stage and screen, and several of the best examples of the Bulgarian Totalitarian cinema from the 60s, the author aims to trace how a true female character reveals itself – through visual representation, way of acting, dialogue, subtext and other – evolves and becomes a cult with a strong social influence. In the history of Bulgarian cinema, the 60s are the period where the Bulgarian woman can finally express her own personality against the popular opinion and the power of men in a more or less patriarchal society. The “true dissident” of the communist system is the Bulgarian heroine from the movies of the 60s and 70s which movies payed sometimes the high price of being forbidden to the public. On the contrary, their Post-totalitarian counterparts are mere examples of the marginal stereotypes with flat characterizations, deprived of inner contradictions and arcs of development. The fearless outsiders have been replaced with heroines-marginal. The rebellious women showed in Bulgarian totalitarian cinema, fighting for their right to raise their voices and stand for their feelings, are now opposed to the silent pseudo-rebel heroine of the democracy. To be easier, the recent Bulgarian cinema from 2018 takes even their ability to speak – the Bulgarian heroine is now mute and expressionless

„Уо дъ мън“ – работеща формула за успешна музикалнотеатрална постановка от границата между XX и XXI век

Author(s): Miglena Tzenova-Nusheva / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 7/2011

How in the wake of the so-called ‘cultural revolution’ to get Chinese audiences back to opera houses? How traditional musical dramatic art would convey clear messages outside the Far East? Could a musical theatre performance both command high human values and be commercial? How come a stage performance of 2000 (performed also in Bulgaria in 2010) is a global success, being performed for eleven years now almost every night around the world? Is it possible for a musical theatre work to become a cause, championed globally by both governmental and non-governmental figures and organizations? Is it specific Chinese thinking that has generated such an idea? Does such a phenomenon draw on the national culture alone, or does it come under ‘Western’ influences as well? Is this concept feasible outside China? What makes a musical theatre performance extremely successful? This paper searches to answer these as well as other questions, exploring Wǒ de mèng (My Dream) performance, a work combining elements of Chinese traditional arts and Peking opera. The study uses comparative, historical, theoretical and other methods of research.