Icons of Transgression

Bent Sørensen

Aalborg University

Icons of Transgression

All iconic representations of actual persons (living or dead) are caught in a dichotomy between elements of normality/familiarity and elements of transgression.

Manipulation of representations of celebrities or famous persons into hero- or other-images can either constitute adversarial or collaborative icon work.

In adherence with the conference theme of “E Pluribus Unum or E Pluribus Plura” it would be interesting to examine iconic images that are meant to be particularly transgressive and challenge stereotypical images of American wholesomeness.

Icons of Transgression

I propose to look at specific collaborative, yet provocative representations of two 1960s icons of transgression: Charles Manson and Patty Hearst, and to analyze how these particular images simultaneously stylize and sacralize these counterculture (anti)heroes, turning the viewer of the icons from passive consumers into ardent worshippers, consumers or cultural agnostics, all according to our ideas regarding the subjects and symbols in question.

Icons - thesis 1

The commercial icon or pictogram works through simplified representation: It is stylised

The religious icon works through embellished representation and through symbolic detail: It is sacralised

Iconic representation of persons combines these two modes of representation: It presents a stylised and sacralised image of the person.

Icons – thesis 2

A person who achieves icon status has to be recognisable to the majority of a specific group, whether that is a subculture (defined through age, race etc.), a nation, or the global community: Iconicity presupposes familiarity.

A person who achieves icon status has to be extraordinary, whether through his/her achievements, or through image. Iconicity presupposes transgression of normality.

Iconicity is only achieved when the person imaged represents a combination of familiarity (fame) and transgression (cool).

Icons – thesis 3

Iconicity is a form of immortality Iconicity has a history, i.e. not all icons

are permanent. Icons can become dated, and

consequently slip out of their apparent immortal status.

Icons – thesis 4

Icons place us, as viewers and readers, in communi(cati)on with the icon

We are not ourselves icons. Icons thus enforce a passive role on us as

viewers or voyeurs, a role which we may resist but are doomed to re-enact whenever we communicate with an icon. The relation between icon and viewer is thus basically unequal.

Icons – thesis 5

From the religious connotations of iconicity we inherit the position of worshipper.

From the industrial, service and information oriented connotations of iconicity we inherit the position of consumer.

Both these positions are well served by dead icons, and by marketable icons, which offer no resistance to commodification.

Icons – thesis 6

Icons can become overexposed. As a result, people may attempt to actively

resist icons, e.g. by defacing them or tampering with them (slander, rumour-mongering, gossip, satire, co-optation etc. are all possible strategies): The formerly passive worshippers become iconoclasts

All of these activities ultimately serve chiefly to perpetuate the iconic person’s status and longevity.

Icons – thesis 7

Iconicity means a reduction of the person behind the icon (the iconic subject) to image, to object.

Iconicity is a form of martyrdom. Iconicity is a reduction or translation

from individuality to symbol

Icons – thesis 8

The need for icons is an expression of our longing for something beyond our own subject-hood, a desire to idolise

The need for icons is no longer fulfilled in traditional religious ways, but has become transferred onto other manifestations of the extraordinary.

The need for icons has not diminished over the last 50 years, on the contrary there are more icons now than ever, despite the acceleration in cultural change.

Icons – thesis 9

Iconography reveals by concealing and conceals by revealing.

Manson 1

Manson 2

Manson and John Kerry

Manson as George W’s ambassador to the Klingons

Manson's confirmation stalled by politics

President Bush urged the Senate today to "put aside politics" and confirm Charles Manson as ambassador to Qo'noS.

Future ambassador Charles Manson

"Charles Manson is a good man," Bush said. "Questions about his ... management style shouldn't be part of the confirmation process."

The president is dismayed, said White House press secretary Scott McClellan, that scarcely three months after the first Bird-of-Prey entered orbit, Democratic obstructionism has already begun.

Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice has critized the two delays that have already occurred as a result.

"The president deserves to have the person at the Klingon High Council that he thinks best to carry out the job," Rice said.

Manson Icon

Patty Hearst 1

Patty Hearst 2

Patty Hearst Icon – 1

Patty Hearst heard the burst…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhRRWwH3Fro

http://www.guntheranderson.com/v/data/rolandth.htm

Patty Hearst Icon – 2

Resource page

http://www.hum.aau.dk/~i12bent/DoingCulturalStudiesWorkshop1.html

http://www.hum.aau.dk/~i12bent/Future_Lectures/Oslo.html (abstract for this presentation)