Intermedial strategies in biographical novels about artists

(based on biographical works about Vincent van Gogh written by V. Domontovych and about Chaim Soutine by Ralph Dutli)

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of peculiarities of intermedial relationships in biographical works about artists. Based on V. Domontovych’s fictionalized biography «A Lonesome Traveller Walking along a Lonesome Road» and Ralph Dutli’s novel «Soutine’s Last Journey» («Soutines letzte Fahrt»), it analyses the inter-artistic interaction of literature and painting, traces how the translation is done from the language of visual art into the language of literary work, and how the artist’s creative heritage and especially the peculiarities of his artistic technique influence the poetics of the biographical novel. Applying the methodology of intermedial analysis, it explores the ways in which art manifests itself on compositional, poetical, linguistic and stylistic levels in the novels about artists.

The interaction of the verbal and fine arts is analysed at the level of thematization, construction of the artist’s image and description of the creative process. The intermediality of biographical novels about Vincent van Gogh and Chaim Soutine is considered through the transfer of features of a work of fine art into verbal art, through the employment of the main means of image creation in painting, such as colour, line, composition, etc. Based on the artistic practices of avant-garde art, the artists under analysis worked within, particular attention is paid to the identification of the poetical principles of artistic trends in the style of a literary work, that is, naturalistic and impressionist elements in Van Gogh’s biography and expressionist and surrealist elements in the novel about Soutine. In addition, the role of a pictorial quotation in the biographical fiction about the artist is worked out. A significant attention in biographical novels about artists is given to artistic detail and ekphrasis.

Novels about artists provide rich material for the research of the dialogue between literature and fine arts not only for literary scholars but also for art critics.