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Bulgaria Through the Eyes of Foreigners During the 1960s
a fingerprint (Bazin 2005: 15). Even when staged, the situations captured by cam¬
era would acquire the status of absolute truth; they would now have the authority
of evidence and could confirm any textual content, no matter how remote from
reality. “A very faithful drawing may actually tell as more about the model,” Bazin
wrote, “but despite the promptings of our critical intelligence it will never have the
irrational power of the photograph to bear away our faith” (Ibid.: 14). Thanks to
its technical nature, which predetermined the absence of the distinguishable mark
invariably left by the artist’s hand, in socialist society, photography was firmly es¬
tablished as the realist method of depiction. It was assumed that the camera had the
ability to produce a truthful, objective, and unbiased image of the world. Photog¬
raphy became the metaphor for rational knowledge as separated from a subjective
and imperfect sensory perception.
To develop even further the notion of Bulgaria as an exotic destination, the
advertising materials disseminated by the Balkantourist alone would not suffice.
A periodic publication was also needed for the aims of propaganda, a magazine
that would promote in words and pictures the country’s new image. Like neatly ar¬
ranged shop windows, magazines “exhibited” visual evidence of the socialist state’s
prosperity in an attempt to create a more attractive image of socialism for the
public in Bulgaria, the USSR, and the rest of the world. In 1964, the magazine
Resorts in Bulgaria began to be published in Bulgarian, English, German, Russian,
and Esperanto. Richly illustrated, from the very beginning it featured sections like
“As Visitors See Us”, “Books on Bulgaria’, “Foreign Press Comments on Bulgaria”,
“Veni, Vidi, Scripsi”, “Tributes from Our Visitors”, and so on. Articles in these sec¬
tions described a fantastic land of extraordinary nature and a remarkable popula¬
tion. In the advertising photos showing Bulgaria’s resorts, often we can see curious
objects such as palms (which do not grow in the country due to the cold winter),
lush vegetation (which is there but far less exotic than in the illustrations), and an
abundance of fruit—peaches and apricots (traditionally grown) but also coconuts,
bananas, oranges, and pineapples (which do not grow in Bulgaria, nor could be
bought there) (Fig. 4). Elephants were never delivered, but one purposeful detail
in the creation of an exotic image for the resorts were the camels, not only used as
an attraction for tourists but also shown by photography while crossing the natural
dunes of Sunny Beach as if they were on a long and tiresome journey across the
desert (Figs 5 and 6). To all of the above one should also add the tourists’ impres¬
sions from the hospitality and erudition of the socialist citizens (represented as
uncommunicative and cheerless beyond the iron curtain), which were published
abroad and republished in the magazine Resorts in Bulgaria: “Coming into contact
with the Bulgarian people is for every serious-minded Scandinavian a real revela¬
tion, something we cannot experience within the confines of our own borders,”
wrote Heinrich Karlsson, a foreign journalist touring Bulgaria in 1963. “In buses,
on trains and other means of conveyance Bulgarians attempt to converse with me
in German, French, English or Esperanto, and that is how I made many interest¬
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