RECEPTION OF SERGEI PARADZHANOV’S ARTISTIC SYSTEM IN THE VISUAL CULTURE OF THE LATE 20TH AND EARLY 21 ST CENTURIES

Abstract

This article addresses a highly relevant question: why does Parajanov have such a multitude of followers in
contemporary visual art? The initial phase of this research involves delineating the methodologies and techniques
characteristic of the postmodern era and identifying their manifestations within the master's oeuvre. The isolated cultural
context of the USSR compelled Parajanov to approach artistic creation as a form of internal emigration and a means of
spiritual survival. The study emphasizes that the artist was not a deliberate apologist for postmodernism; rather, he intuitively
synthesized his own idiosyncratic visual language, which we retrospectively identify through the lens of the «postmodern»
paradigm. This analytical vector facilitates the conceptualization of universal features–certain enduring «modules» within
Parajanov's practice – that subsequent generations of artists have utilized to construct contemporary visual lexicons.
Intertextuality (the deployment of citations and allusions), discreteness (fragmentation and collage techniques), theatricality,
irony, and playfulness – the primary modalities and techniques of postmodernism – emerged as inherent characteristics of the
master's art and form the vector for the subsequent section of this study.
To reveal the aesthetic affinities between Parajanov’s visual arts practice and contemporary media, this paper
examines an under-researched area: the analysis of five music videos produced between the mid-1990s and 2020.
Quotational practices, collage methodologies, theatricality, irony, and playfulness act as the universal «fragments» from
which contemporary practitioners assemble their own visual mysteries. Music video directors have discovered within
Parajanov’s aesthetic framework a distilled emotion, intricately codified through symbolism: for Madonna (1995), this
serves as a key to a dreamscape realm, while for the musical group Juno Reactor (1997), it operates as the visual
manifestation of a spiritual trance; the band Kiosk (2009) conveys cultural identity through the static framing
characteristic of Persian miniatures. Seven Sisters of Sleep (2015) broadcast a primal, chthonic energy; whereas Lady
Gaga (2020) explores liminal states of consciousness.
Parajanov fundamentally demonstrated that the cinematic frame can operate with the compositional autonomy of
a painting or the evocative power of poetry. Consequently, contemporary visual art continues to draw profound
inspiration from the immortal tableaux vivants created by this legendary twentieth-century artist.