The authors attempt to build a theoretical model of the understanding of literature from the perspective of philosophical hermeneutics where the language takes a leading role in the process of formation of human culture. From this point of view, the literature receives a specific status of an existential practice in our being-in-the-world. The strategy of perception and interpretation of a literary text, offered by H-G. Gadamer, strongly contrasts with the traditional way of interpretation practiced by the historical school of hermeneutics, but, for this reason, it seems to be the most adequate to the processes happening in the modern literature.

The article analyzes the history of virtual reality images’ emergence and development in popular culture. The images of the virtual reality are considered in the context of the influence exerted upon them by philosophy of technology as well as by the conceptions of technological optimism and technological pessimism. Ideological roots of the virtual reality images can be traced in the field of utopian literature and futurology. Popular books and movies about virtual reality have served as the main source material for this analysis.

The article analyzes such a complex phenomenon of the modern culture as “handmade”. The authors not only examine some specific features of the phenomenon, but also use it as an example to show main principles of the modern culture’s functioning and of a person’s self-realization in the sphere of everyday life. Key words: handmade, leisure project, cluster, recipe, the Self, everyday life, the Thing, culture industry

The article offers a way of solution of such a culturological problem as the Russian provinces’ musical culture systematization. Several research areas are marked out: a practical area - the Russian provinces’ musical life, a textological one - musical heritage of the Russian provinces, a symbolical area - the provinces’ musical mythopoetics, and a problem of the provinces’ semantization in the minds of Russian composers.

The article considers some topical issues of interaction between the civil society, government and business on implementation of the Bases and Strategy of state cultural policy. Author pays special attention to the analysis of experts and specialists’ speeches at the Second Cultural Forum of Russian Regions, that took place in Moscow and Yakutsk on September 25, 2015 with the participation of the Council of Civic Chambers of Subjects of the Russian Federation, the Ministry for Development of the Far East of the Russian Federation, the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation, the Federal Agency on Affairs of Nationalities, the Government, the Civic Chamber of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), leading cultural experts, leaders of education, youth, national, information policy, specialists in social entrepreneurship, representatives of higher education institutions, etc.

This article is dedicated to common problems connected with a modern decorative program of Christian mural painting for a chapel or other compact liturgical architectural space. The article considers some neoclassical models, unrelated to the canonical language of an icon, and offers several practical recommendations for artists involved in the monumental church painting.

The article deals with the figure of flying horse appearing in the jiamas, Chinese folk prints of Yunnan province. The author examines the ceremonial function of these prints and the significance of the magic horse for the culture of the people of Bai. The article offers a hypothesis of origin of the Pegasus image in the folk prints of Yunnan.

The article gives a comparative analysis of historical and ethnographic materials of the late 19th - early 20th century to define the anthropological characteristics of theatricality in the context of Mordovian dance plasticity. For the first time ever, the basis is provided to the artistic and esthetic levels of existence of the syncretic behavioural activities of ancient composition of the “bezaktersky” theater of the “folklore period”.

The article is devoted to the points of view of archimandrite Photios and the scientist-archeologist G. D. Filimonov on the creative work of Sapozhnikov brothers, Moscow guild icon-painters of the early 19th century. While Photios would see in the mural and iconic works by the Sapozhnikovs the evidence of firmness of the ancient icon-painting school, Filimonov conversely perceived them as a proof of development opportunities for the authentic Russian folk art. The reason for such a sharp difference between their opinions was a distorted understanding of the ecclesiastical painting’s nature in the Modern Age as well as of the origin of its stylistic and iconographic dissimilarity.

The article considers the concept of solipsism as a vital and philosophical impasse and analyzes Wittgenstein’s approach to this question in those paragraphs of the Philosophical Investigations that refer to “the private language argument”. The author shows that Wittgenstein’s solution to this problem leads to rejection of any philosophical and psychological thesis (of behaviorism, primarily), which could be compared to Gorgias’ negative ontology.

The article considers the ideas of the first wave of Russian symbolism in 1890s-1900s in the context of P. Sorokin’s historical-cultural typology. The analysis of the first symbolism manifests by D. S. Merezhkovsky, V. Y. Bryusov, K. D. Balmont witnesses to the growing crisis tendencies in art and culture between the two centuries; this fact is considered by P. Sorokin as a consequence of the major changes within the framework of transformation of the sensitive historical-cultural type. The author shows the tendency of the Russian symbolism, as a form of modernist style, to overcome the crisis situation through actualization of the values of idealistic culture with its typical synthesis of sensitivity and supersensitivity.

The artistic methods of K. Malevich are discussed in the article in the light of the theory of fractals. It is claimed that the main creative ideas of the artist can be described using the notions of visual, semiotic and dynamical fractals. The author demonstrates that the fractal analysis allows us to designate the artistic works of K. Malevich as visual, semiotic and dynamical fractals, and the image fractalization provides us with some specific perception effects. The article investigates the fractality of the “Black Square” and the multidimensional fractality of architectons.

A borderline state of the culture is reflected today in human social practices, revealing some new meanings. They are connected not only with the external reality but also with the spiritual state of society; they go into a special sphere of otherness in relation to the previous stages of human development. The transition beyond the bounds of actual existence into the space of consciousness objects creates a new type of otherworldly (average) man. The otherwordliness is, first of all, a classical characteristic, often forgotten and unclaimed by the young generation of Russians. When we say classics, we mean not only the art but also the manners, perceptions and, especially, ethics. The otherscopeness is a goal of the innovational development; it is reflected in the new ideal transmitted and created by the modern education, whose specifics the article is devoted to.

The concept of cultural code, increasingly used in the meaning of essence, core, basis of a specific cultural system, is required to be specified as a category of humanitarian discourse. The genesis of the concept of cultural code is associated with borrowing by the humanities from the exact sciences’ scientific-conceptual nomenclature of the term “code” which can be treated as a system of symbols, signals that transmit information. The definition of cultural code appears to be essential, disclosing the phenomenon’s nature, considered as a set of basic concepts, attitudes, values and norms that serve to read cultural texts. Detailed typologisation of cultural codes seems possible using main cultural categories, as the originality of any cultural system is determined by the general conceptions and attitudes that people base on when they perceive and comprehend everything they meet in their lives.

The Great Mirror became a source of themes and subjects for the East Slavic literature. The article researches its angelic theme, the exploration of which allows us to understand how deeply the West European ideas had penetrated into the Orthodox consciousness. The range of problems concerned with spirits contains the most important philosophical aspects, which underwent a significant evolution in the 17th century during the process of the book’s adaptation in a new culture and its russification. The author analyzes the images of lightful angels represented in the book, reveals some features of their nature and appearance, compares the models of celestial hierarchy presented in this book and in some works of ecclesiastical writers, describes anthropological characteristics and “physicality” of the angels, recognizes the types of their service, and finds parallels between the angels appearance’s details shown in the collected novels and the types of iconic images of the spirits, established by the second half of the 15th century, the time when the source for the Great Mirror was made up. Key words: “The Great Mirror”, angels, archangels Michael and Gabriel, the celestial hierarchy, angel’s “body”, service, iconography Pages: 86-94

The article is dedicated to the dominant structural-semantic element of the autobiographical prose of the 19th-20th centuries. The communion with God in the prose about childhood is considered as a source of formation of the author’s style and moral position. The motive of the communion with God not only gains in a plot the typological universality of general line, but also vividly defines the specificity of each author’s individual style. The motive of the communion with God is considered via genre apposition of documental and artistic points.

The article considers ethnocutural features of the motivation for reading as a core concept of library science, by the example of the needs of readers of the Tuva Republic. The author shows the correlation between the readers’ motives and the political, social and cultural situation in the region. She presents the results of her investigation of the people’s motives for reading and the motives’ dependence on current values and norms of the Tuvinian society. It is defined that reading in an ethnic environment is a mandatory component of a national ethnic culture.

The article examines the early stage of development of the classic Greek theater and its tragic basis in close correlation with the ancient culture’s specific features and the ancient Greeks’ worldview. The two best-known interpretations of antiquity elaborated by F. Nietzsche and O. Spengler are emphasized here particularly. While analyzing the roots of tragedy, the author pays special attention to its close relation with rituals and sacrifices. In the context of the subjectness problem, the article raises the question of a specific status of the Greek theater’s spectator, who can be reasonably called an active participant of the spectacle, representing a subject.

The article focuses on the role of the concepts “Nature” and “Dialogue with the Bible” in the organization of artistic space of the Russian vocal music. The purpose of the article is to consider these concepts as a projection of key ideas of the Russian culture, whose interaction reveals a mental feature of the Russian people - perception of the world as a Divine Providence. Practical and scientific importance of the work is connected with exploration of the problem of mental origins of the Russian romance, its national identity. The search of mental characteristics of the Russian romance required application to multidisciplinary methods enabling to integrate knowledge from different fields of science in order to address the specific (musical) problem. The article asserts that the correlation of the concepts “Nature” and “Dialogue with the Bible” forms a semantic space which reveals spiritual facets of the unity between man and nature in the Russian romance. The study of the problem of national identity of the Russian vocal music is getting a special priority in the current conditions of cultural globalization. Disclosure of the problem’s new aspects is important for both the musicians and the musical experts.

The article considers some aspects of the printed lists of subscribers as historical sources, methods of using them in researches on reader’s history and culturology. The author demonstrates the experience of creation of a multilevel integral dynamic reflective-measuring parametric model of the reader of Russian civil type books of the last third of the 18th century. Such a sociocultural model includes social, geographical, gender, personal characteristics and reflects the thematic-typological structure of different population groups’ reading circle.