Metarealism

Metarealism is a direction in Russian poetry and art that was born in the 1970s to the 1980s and includes such poets as Konstantin Kedrov, Viktor Krivulin, Elena Katsyuba, Elena Shvarts, Ivan Zhdanov, Aleksandr Yeryomenko, Svetlana Kekova, Yuri Arabov, Alexei Parshchikov, Sergei Nadeem. Nikolai Kononov, among others.[1] The term was first used by Mikhail Epshtein, who coined it in 1981 and made it public in the Soviet magazine "Voprosy Literatury" in 1983[2]

M. Epshtein insists that in its philosophic dimension metarealism is "metaphysical realism," while "stylistically" metarealism is "metaphorical" realism.[3] Thus, "meta" means both "through" and "beyond" the reality that we all can see; hence, "metarealism" is the realism of the hyperphysical nature of things. The main expression of its essence is given through a non-visual metaphor or, according to another Epshtein's term, a "metabola" (rather than hyperbole), that means "transfer" or "transition," opening many dimensions.[4] "Metabola" is different from the symbol or a "visual" metaphor, because it assumes the interosculation of realities.[5] Metarealism has little to do with surrealism, since it appeals to the superconscious and not to the subconscious, thus opening up a many-dimensional perception of the world.

Metarealism further gained traction after it became a subject of the House of Artists debate at an exhibition of the hyperrealists, where its utility was discussed as a new method of creation to overcome traditional realism.[6]

  1. ^ Kahn, Andrew; Lipovetsky, Mark; Reyfman, Irina; Sandler, Stephanie (2018). "Metarealism". A History of Russian Literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 639–641. ISBN 9780199663941.
  2. ^ See his "Theses on Metarealism and Conceptualism" from 1983 and the following years [1] Also: Third Wave: The New Russian Poetry. Ed. K. Johnson & S. M. Ashby. Preface by M. Epshtein, A. Wachtel, A. Parshchikov. University of Michigan Press, 1992 ISBN 0-472-06415-0, p. 10, 53, 184 [2], Tom Epstein's essay «Metarealism» in the anthology Crossing Centuries: The New Generations in Russian Poetry. Ed. High, John. NY: Talisman House Pub., 2000 ISBN 1-883689-90-2, ISBN 978-1-883689-90-2, p. 87-89, and Marjorie Perloff "Russian Postmodernism: An Oxymoron?" in Postmodern Culture, Volume 3, # 2, January 1993 [3].
  3. ^ See the most detailed explanation and exposition of this term in Epshtein's articles "Theses on Metarealism and Conceptualism" [4], "A Catalogue of the New Poetries" (Russian version) Archived September 4, 2007, at the Wayback Machine and in its English version [5]
  4. ^ See part 3 in "Михаил Эпштейн". Archived from the original on September 4, 2007. Retrieved October 4, 2007.
  5. ^ See: M.Epshtein. After the Future: the Paradoxes of Postmodernism & Contemporary Russian Culture. University of Massachusetts Press, 1995, 416 p. ISBN 0-87023-973-2, ISBN 0-87023-974-0, pp. 40–50.
  6. ^ Mesaros, Caludiu (2011). Knowledge Communication: Transparency, Democracy, Global Governance. Editura Universității de Vest. p. 47. ISBN 9789731253497.