“Proud of the Past, Aiming for the Future”: Analysis of Multimodal Narratives of the Russia Exhibition at VDNKh

The article, using the example of the Russia International Exhibition and Forum at VDNKh, examines the features of multimedia exhibitions as an instrument of the political communication. It presents an original methodology of studying information content of such exhibitions that adapts the principles of multimodal analysis. According to the authors, assessing characteristics of the communicative resources and their available usage scenarios allows us to make reasonable assumptions about communicative opportunities and limitations that are mediated by these resources. This approach has been used to analyze exhibitions that had a chronological structure, organized according to the principle of “was — became — will be” i.e., a narrative format. The data were collected via observation method during 11 visits to the Russia International Exhibition and Forum. The authors studied displays of the Russian regions, presented in pavilion 75, and the pavilions of 7 federal executive bodies and 10 companies and corporations. During the data coding process, in addition to thematic categories, the authors documented methods of presenting information. Their systematization, taking into account the modes of expression of the meanings involved, made it possible to model communicative interactions based on them. The article presents case studies of the exhibitions of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation and VEB.RF, demonstrating different ways of representing temporal connections, analyzes the main approaches to constructing multimodal narratives in the displays of the regions of the Russian Federation, and identifies unique features of representing the future in the studied exhibitions. The article demonstrates the opportunities of expressive resources aimed at different ways of sensory perception, to construct brief or expanded narratives. It shows that the narrative approach is most efficient within the secluded space, where visitors spend a sufficient amount of time, consistently building up discursive content, which forms limitations for its use in the competitive environment of large exhibitions.