Author
Ovcharenko Sviatoslav
a teaching assistant of the Musical Art Department of Kyiv National University of Culture and Arts (Kyiv, Ukraine).
ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1855-9358
The Musical Underground as an Alternative to the Art Scene
of Totalitarianism and Post-Totalitarianism
Abstract
The musical underground as an underground art testifying what is outside the framework of the Soviet cultural mainstream of the 1980s and 1990s to various extent is considered in the article. It is proved that the concept of underground correlates with the notion of an alternative to the official party art scene of totalitarianism, and is often confused with the related concept of sixties. It is emphasized that the underground is a form of protest art, that is a form of protest in art. It is determined that the musical underground can be, in fact, political, aesthetic, and artistic. It characterizes the artistic surroundings of the underground in which the artist lives. The musical underground has appeared on the territory of Ukraine since the 1980s after all the complex transformations those taking place in academic art (opera and symphony) and after the final legalization of jazz, rock, eco-jazz and other trends those have become permissible and legitimate in the context of the post-Soviet reality of music.
Conclusions. The underground as an underground art expresses its socio-cultural functions in different contexts. Thus, in a totalitarian space underground art becomes a certain locus of elite, selected performers opposing the general oppression of freedom and human rights, and also carrying out the process of creative self-expression, declaration of will in post-totalitarian societies. It is found out that the underground becomes an art symbol aimed at certain vectors of communication and defines itself as a trash culture, or as a niche character and method of culture creation.
Keywords
underground, dissident art, unofficial art, counterculture, music culture, protest art.
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