Per una critica hauntologica del fumetto: spettri, precarietà e futuri perduti nel fumetto italiano contemporaneo

The present research aims to propose a systematic study of a corpus of contemporary Italian comics under the aesthetic lens of spectrality and hauntology, to investigate the aesthetic-representational modes through which the texts elaborate and conceptualize an inherently contemporary absence such as that of the future. It will be shown, in fact, how the cultural imaginary of our era has seen a progressive removal of futuribles horizons, in response to endemic phenomena of precariousness (laboral, economic, relational and existential). This absence leaves a deep mark on the contemporary imaginary, which seeks tools to represent and elaborate it: the spectre, as a metaphorical figure, indeed conceptualizes the return of a future that was considered lost, and thus stands as a key ontological presence to narrate and interpret the contemporary. Building on Jacques Derrida's early theorizations of hauntology, later reworked by Mark Fisher, the present research proposes an actualization of the theoretical framework related to the “ontology of the spectral” and its application to the comics medium. The latter proves to be particularly suited to be analyzed in the light of spectral aesthetics, both because of its porosity towards the contemporary imaginary and because of its medial specificities, its multimodal semiotic functions and the sense-making dynamics. These involve, at various levels, a continuous dialectic between presence and absence. This work will thus build an original methodology of analysis that focuses on the dialogue between comics, the imaginary and the most significant instances of our present, resulting in an investigation of the possibilities of negotiation that the comics medium can propose of the spaces and times of the contemporary through its aesthetics. ​