PT Journal
AU Anger, J
   Papezova, M
TI Who's Looking Back at the Sunflower? The Nostalgic Construction of Inka Zemankova's Star Image
SO Iluminace
PY 2023
BP 25
EP 68
VL 34
IS 3
DI 10.58193/ilu.1738
WP https://iluminace.cz/en/artkey/ilu-202203-0002.php
DE Inka Zemankova; Slunecnice; star studies; nostalgia; swing; popular culture; Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; television; gender
SN 0862397X
AB Inka Zemankova (1915-2000) is known as a pioneering Czech female swing singer, a symbol of burgeoning Czech popular music under the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Due to personal, cultural, and political circumstances, her professional career, spanning over sixty years, did not ever reach nearly the same level of fame and success as in the early 1940s. Since the 1960s, however, there were many waves of nostalgia for the singer (and the golden days of swing) driven by radio and especially television that strove to bring her back to the spotlight. Our study argues for the significant role of nostalgia and recycling in (re)defining Zemankova's star image, which cemented not only her status as the first Czech swing star but also many ongoing myths about her life as well as gender stereotypes. Analysis of written and audiovisual archival sources, focused particularly on television shows that involved Zemankova's iconic song Slunecnice (Sunflower) from the film Hotel Modra hvezda (Hotel Blue Star, 1941), uncovers the ways in which nostalgic framing filtered the singer's star image through the gaze of prominent male figures of the Czech showbiz. It also demonstrates that the role of Inka Zemankova herself was far from passive: she exploited the nostalgic male gaze to revive her fame and support the myth of not fulfilling her star potential due to ideological persecution. The nuances of Inka Zemankova's stardom examined throughout the article are further demonstrated in the accompanying audiovisual essay Slunecnice ocima gentlemanu (Sunflower Through the Eyes of Gentlemen).
ER