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Cultural Production of the Real Through Picturing Difference in the Polish Media: 1940s—1960s The first three parameters are joined by the two next as a consequence of posing a question about the type of medium used and its transparency.° We have to keep in mind that all the visual materials discussed in this chapter belonged to the predigital era, what in practice meant that the photographic image still reflected what stood in front of the lens. All of this together gives shape to the creation of a cultural reality—that is, the creation of representations that correspond to reality. If we assume that the differences between people result from culture—that is, from their manner of perception—then we can also assume that these differences translate into the creation of what we sometimes call “natural” differences. Then the question of what is real and what is the result of creation begins to make sense— whether there is at all a reality that has not been transformed. If everything appears to have been created, then what causes us to interpret certain information as real and other types not? This motif appears in the research on the media and communication. It has numerous other facets and aspects, which will be mentioned later, but in the present approach, perceiving and describing the world via difference has to suffice. Represented difference appears the most visible in times of high polarization—in this case during the Cold War. Moreover, describing reality via difference requires presenting the two sides. Usually it is accompanied by a narrative description, but in my case the image is sufficient—that is, such style of imaging allows one to observe the boundaries between the two sides by way of, for instance, appearance, costume, symbolism, attributes, ascribed roles, behaviours, gestures, place taken up within space, emotions evoked, and so forth. These boundaries also reflect the axis of the dividing line. In such a manner, the Other is created and, to paraphrase Alison Griffiths, representations of difference emerge from a confluence of discursive practices and image-making techniques (2002: xx). The practices of presenting difference served to express attitudes and specific ideas on the subject of differences that spring from those attitudes—in the case of ethnographic material, attitudes and ideas related to cultural or racial differences; in other cases, to differences connected with politics, worldview, or other. The means of presenting difference is similar, and usually becomes filled with newly diverse content following established patterns. In every context of an image, different lines of division appear, resulting from the assumed differentiating criterion. The distance between the two sides becomes visible when we observe the changeability of representing the sides over a prolonged period of time. This changeability is enabled by the fact that the picture remains closely related to the time of its creation and forms a reflection of the relationships prevailing (changing) ° Writing about theatre—more precisely, about the contemporary political theatre—Dorota Sajewska mentions mediological perspective. She understands mediality as a particular way of seeing the world’s existence, perception, and cognition as a specific construct that perpetuates or undermines the type of reality in which we are living (2012: 57). 33
