Elisabeth Bronfen Livres

A major cultural critic rethinks creativity and the cultural imaginary in a lively exploration of literature, cinema and visual culture.

In the beginning was the night. All light, shapes, language, and subjective consciousness, as well as the world and art depicting them, emerged from this formless chaos. In fantasy, we seek to return to this original darkness. Particularly in literature, visual representations, and film, the night resiliently resurfaces from the margins of the knowable, acting as a stage and state of mind in which exceptional perceptions, discoveries, and decisions play out. Elisabeth Bronfen follows nocturnal spaces in which extraordinary events unfold, enabling the irrational exploration of desire, transformation, ecstasy, transgression, spiritual illumination, and moral choice. She begins with classical myths depicting the creation of the world and moves through nocturnal scenes in Shakespeare and Milton, Gothic figurations, Hegel's romantic philosophy, and Freud's psychoanalysis. In modern times, she shows how literature and film, particularly film noir, transmit that piece of night the modern subject carries within. From Mozart's "Queen of the Night" to Virginia Woolf 's oscillation between day and night, life and death, and chaos and aesthetic form, Bronfen renders something visible, conceivable, and tellable from the dark realms of the unknown.

Addresses the question of how identity is formed as a result of corporeal and cultural positioning, by mapping Dorothy Richardson's early modernist text, Pilgrimage, against our postmodern interest in real and imagined geographies.

Paul McCarthys Kunst ist provokant. Auch in seinen neuen Werkgruppen Pirate und Western, an denen der Künstler mehrere Jahre arbeitete, ist seine künstlerische Sprache erbarmungslos direkt - ohne Rücksicht auf zum Teil verklärende Konventionen. Wie häufig entspringen seine Protagonisten gängigen Klischees und Mythen: Cowboys und Piraten sind Urthemen der amerikanischen Zivilisation und zugleich klassische Sujets des Hollywood-Kinos. Doch ist es die dunkle, bis dahin verborgene Schattenseite seiner Protagonisten, die McCarthy (*1945 in Salt Lake City) in Szene setzt, ironisiert und bis ins Groteske überzeichnet. Doch nicht Provokation und Schock scheinen das Ziel Paul McCarthys, sondern die Katharsis, die den letztlich moralischen Anspruch des Künstlers sichtbar macht. Erstmalig zeigt und beschreibt der Band diese Installationen McCarthys, ergänzt durch Videos, Zeichnungen und Skulpturen der frühen 1960er Jahre bis heute. Sie zeigen die Genese der beiden wichtigen Werkkomplexe und ermöglichen ihre Einordnung in das gesamte Schaffen des amerikanischen Künstlers. Ausstellung: Haus der Kunst, München 12.6.-28.8.2005

Elisabeth Bronfen examines Sylvia Plath's poetry, her novel The Bell Jar, her shorter fiction as well as her autobiographical texts, in the context of the resilient Plath-Legend that has grown since her suicide in 1963.

Matthew Weiner’s series Mad Men is more than a resonant time capsule. Elisabeth Bronfen’s claim is that the show not only thrives on a significant double voicing, reviving the literature, film, music and fashion of the past within and for the cultural concerns of the present. With Don Draper an embodiment of the prototypical con man, his precarious journey from poverty to fame and prosperity can also be seen as a continuation of the moral perfectionism so key to the American tradition. His fall and spiritual recovery is as much an individual story as a comment on the state of the nation. Mad Men reflects on the role television has come to play in this work of the cultural imaginary, both fragile and fruitful. We identify and sympathize with the people in this series not despite but because they are fictional representations, different yet also a mirror of ourselves.

Leading us on a journey through familiar twentieth-century American films, this engaging and provocative book proposes that Hollywood has created an imaginary cinematic geography filled with people and places we recognize and to which we are irresistibly drawn. Each viewing of a film stirs, in a very real and charismatic way, feelings of home. The comfort of returning to films like familiar haunts is at the core of our nostalgic desire. Elisabeth Bronfen examines the different ways home is constructed in the development of cinematic narrative, offering close readings of crucial scenes in classic films.

The book examines Shakespeare's influence on American culture in the early twenty-first century, highlighting how his works are reinterpreted and integrated into modern television series like The Wire, Deadwood, Westworld, House of Cards, and The Americans. It delves into the ways these adaptations reflect contemporary themes and societal issues, showcasing the enduring relevance of Shakespeare's texts in today's media landscape.

Elisabeth Bronfen reexamines hysteria, traditionally seen as a romantic relic, through the lens of medical writings and cultural performance. She challenges the conventional view that links hysteria solely to feminine sexual dissatisfaction, proposing instead that its roots lie in trauma and fear of violation. By interpreting the transformation of psychological pain into physical symptoms, Bronfen highlights how hysteria reflects both personal and societal discontent, revealing its ongoing significance in contemporary discussions of mental health and gender.

Regardless of the clichés associated with Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), Max Beckmann (1884-1950), and Willem de Kooning (1904-1997) in the „public“ private sphere, their exploration of the theme „woman“ go far beyond one-sided definitions. Their portrayals of women are highly nuanced; they have a significance of their own and time and again become sensitive reflections of social and political problems and upheavals. They are not simply surfaces upon which are projected male longings and desires, but catalysts for a confrontation with the artist's own life and history (Picasso), while in Beckmann's work they are completely free, independent counter-images. De Kooning sees them as a separate force within which culminate opportunities for artistic expression. Contributions by art historians, authors, sociologists, and artists approach the theme from a variety of perspectives. (German edition ISBN 978-3-7757-3266-6)Exhibition schedule: Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, March 30-July 15, 2012