Andrija Maurović, poster, cca 1946
Translation of ideological discourse: an iconic sign of social realism
Sonja Briski Uzelac
The iconic sign of social realism was created and operated in the function of implementing the ideological program of the first socialist revolution of the early 1930s. After A. I. Zhdanov's speech at the Kharkov Conference (1934), socialist realism was formulated as a normative aesthetic doctrine and stylistic formation based on the visual representation / presentation of the projection of the "new socialist society" and the "new man". As a model of the "new revolutionary art", it is linked to the totality of the political power of the "new state" and the concept of "appropriate to the broad masses"; accordingly, it forms eloquent realistic images-signs that convey the ideal of the construction of a "new reality", both in content and theme, as well as in form. Hence, the iconic sign of social realism is also the visual cultural text of certain contextual situations, historical processes and communicative forms of sociability.
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