Analýza etnografické fotografie v kontextu díla Václava Marka

Anotace: The article represents the content analysis of the work of the Czech ethnographer Václav Marek from two points of view. The first one is the textual analysis of the thematic topics of his ethnographic work. The other is the image analysis, namely the examination of his self-made photographs taken during the fieldwork. The aim of this comparative study is to confront the research topics of Marek’s ethnographies with the topics of his photographic work. Marek’s most important themes include the pre-Christian Sami religion, the origin and evolution of the traditional Sami livelihood with reindeer breeding in the first place, the historical development of family and social life, with highlighting the degenerative evolution of the Sami women’s status in the society, or the position of the Sami minority in national states. However, these research topics are just rarely visible in Marek’s photographic work. The exception is his interest in Sami reindeer breeding, which is one of the distinctive attributes of Sami culture. In contrast to his own ethnographic studies, Marek tried to capture in the photographs an idealized and romantically glamorized view of Sami culture, avoiding some controversial topics.