In principle, the work of art has always been reproducible. Objects made by humans could
always be copied by humans. Replicas were made by pupils in practicing for their craft, by
masters in disseminating their works, and, ﬁnally, by third parties in pursuit of proﬁt. But
the technological reproduction of artworks is something new. Having appeared intermittently in history, at widely spaced intervals, it is now being adopted with ever-increasing
intensity. Graphic art was ﬁrst made technologically reproducible by the woodcut, long
before written language became reproducible by movable type. The enormous changes
brought about in literature by movable type, the technological reproduction of writing, are
well known. But they are only a special case, though an important one, of the phenomenon
considered here from the perspective of world history. In the course of the Middle Ages the
woodcut was supplemented by engraving and etching, and at the beginning of the nineteenth
century by lithography.

The work of art in the age of its technological reproducibility: second version: Walter Benjamin

The Turkish Cinema in the Early Republican Years: US Diplomatic Documents on Turkey II

This article explores the relationship between spy films, political censorship and Norwegian foreign policy during the period from 1914 to 1940. Espionage was a popular topic in Norway during this era, both in the news media and as a theme in fictional dramas. Based on a survey of the vetting of 57 spy films, both silent and sound, by the state censorship board, the article focuses on the Norwegian government’s hidden role in political film censorship throughout the period. While Norway’s Constitution and film censorship statutes provided no legal foundation for political censorship, there is nonetheless ample evidence that it took place. The article concludes with an in-depth analysis of the process of banning the US film Confessions of a Nazi Spy in July 1939, the German involvement in that process, and the subsequent effort to change the censorship law to reflect what was happening in practice.

German pressure: Spy films and political censorship in Norway, 1914–40

Although there are several general accounts of the history of cinema in Turkey, little is known on the use of film as a means of communication by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and his followers in building...

Enis Dinç

Papers

Performing Modernity: The Film of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk on his Forest Farm