Showing papers in "Journal of Visual Culture in 2003"
TL;DR: The double question whether visual culture studies is a discipline or an interdisciplinary movement, and which methods are most suited to practice in this field, can only be addressed by way of the object as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: The double question whether visual culture studies is a discipline or an interdisciplinary movement, and which methods are most suited to practice in this field, can only be addressed by way of the object. This article probes the difficulty of defining or delimiting the object of study without the reassuring and widespread visual essentialism that, in the end, can only be tautological.
185 citations
TL;DR: By exploring a number of contemporary new media artworks that focus on the digitized image of the face, this work proposes the encounter with the `digital-facial-image' (DFI) as a new paradigm for the human interface with digital data.
Abstract: By exploring a number of contemporary new media artworks that focus on the digitized image of the face, I propose the encounter with the `digital-facial-image' (DFI) as a new paradigm for the human...
36 citations
TL;DR: Phelan is now the Ann O'Day Maples Chair in the Arts at Stanford University as mentioned in this paper, having worked in the Department of Performance Studies, Tisch School of the Arts, New York University from 1985 to 2002.
Abstract: Having worked in the Department of Performance Studies, Tisch School of the Arts, New York University, from 1985 to 2002, Peggy Phelan is now the Ann O’Day Maples Chair in the Arts at Stanford Univ
34 citations
TL;DR: The authors examine the role of the image in defining the place of New York in cultural memory, particularly the iconography of the Twin Towers and the representations of their implosion, and argue that "dust" became the dominant visual and textual trope, casting a cloud (both actual and symbolic) over the narration of the traumatic moment.
Abstract: This, in some senses, is a departure from my other writings, though retains a concerns with the rhetoric of representation. The piece results from the events of September 11th, 2001 and their immediate aftermath, and how to critically reflect upon lived experience in the context of a ‘world event'. Starting from the visual and textual documentation of that day and the competing media interpretations of its meaning and significance, I examine the role of the image in defining the place of New York in cultural memory, particularly the iconography of the Twin Towers and the representations of their implosion. In this I argue that ‘dust' became the dominant visual and textual trope, casting a cloud (both actual and symbolic) over the narration of the traumatic moment. The article concludes with a consideration of the memorialization of 9/11 as an architectural aporia.
12 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a travelogue of the city of Havana is described, with a focus on the curatorial design of its museums, and on the fashioning of cultural memory.
Abstract: This article engages the ‘fashioning’ of cultural memory. It is a travelogue through the city of Havana, and looks in particular at the curatorial design of its museums. In this Cuban city where time is frozen in architecture, and peels off buildings, where all that is solid rots and melts in the air, memory is ‘suited’ to ruinous fabrics. In the Museum of the Revolution, torn shirts and worn-out skirts speak of the country’s struggle. A model modernist apartment makes room for novel times. Similarly, the Museum of Decorative Arts displays objects of material culture to give space to a history that includes private life. In its (with) drawing room, historic conjunctions are tailored to the making of female space. In Havana, memory is not erected as monument but fashioned as material document. In a city of fantastic 20th-century architecture, and moving urban culture, history is written as interior design.
12 citations
TL;DR: Bal's argument seems to me so thoughtful and capacious, concerning the question of the possible future(s) of visual culture as an area of inquiry, that my own reading of it has led me, in fact, to a slight change of direction.
Abstract: When a new area of investigation emerges in the humanities, a chief priority must be to reflect on what might further, and what might hinder, its development – a task which Mieke Bal’s essay carries out, I think, with exceptional precision and finesse. Bal’s argument seems to me so thoughtful and capacious, concerning the question of the possible future(s) of ‘visual culture’ as an area of inquiry – if not a field or a discipline – that my own reading of it has led me, in fact, to a slight change of direction: from the question of where the study of ‘visual culture’ might go in the future, to issues of the present and the past. If shifts in the intellectual schemes and frameworks that operate in the humanities do not occur in a vacuum, but are embedded in an array of actual social experiences, when a new area of knowledge emerges it makes sense to ask the question: to what changes in the social sphere might this emergence be a response?
11 citations
TL;DR: The authors investigates how an external cause of the image takes on the role of a figure in Quattrocento painting and sculpture, and becomes foundational for Warburg's understanding of the Pathosformel and of Nachleben.
Abstract: Aby Warburg placed the wind, or air, at the centre of his investigation of the art of the Italian Renaissance. This article investigates how an ‘external cause of the image’ takes on the role of a figure in Quattrocento painting and sculpture, and becomes foundational for Warburg’s understanding of the Pathosformel and of Nachleben.
10 citations
7 citations
TL;DR: In this article, Fedida considers the function of the relic in the work of mourning in terms of the psychic mechanism of disavowal (Verleugnung) which underlies the capacity for living a paradoxal state: acceptance of something no longer possible, no longer present, precisely because it is neither possible nor present.
Abstract: Following chapter 2 of Freud’s Totem and Taboo, Fedida considers the function of the relic - and remnant - in the work of mourning in terms of the psychic mechanism of disavowal (Verleugnung) which underlies the capacity for living a paradoxal state: acceptance of something no longer possible, no longer present, precisely because it is neither possible nor present. Above all, Fedida is concerned with the autonomy of the relic in the psychic life of mourning, the function of which is to prevent the representation of one’s own death to oneself and thereby to permit continuance in time. Underwriting the relic in the work of mourning is the relation knowledge-belief and the meaning of separation, since the freezing of the process of separation can lead to a greater role of unanalyzable, potentially psychotic elements, hence the relic can enter into an economy of the psychoses.
7 citations
TL;DR: The Swiss curator Hans-Ulrich Obrist is best known for the exhibitions he has organized in Europe, North America, Japan, and elsewhere, including ''Cities on the Move', ''Laboratorium', and ''Do-it'' as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: Fascinated by questions of curating, interdisciplinary and experimental art exhibitions, the function of the museum and the gallery, globalization, cultural memory, the visual and the non-visual, and the process of collaboration itself, the Swiss curator Hans-Ulrich Obrist is best known for the exhibitions he has organized in Europe, North America, Japan, and elsewhere, including `Cities on the Move', `Laboratorium', and `Do-it'. As well as curating, organizing and facilitating exhibitions in more traditional venues, Obrist has also coordinated many other events that have taken place in unorthodox spaces such as in houses, monasteries, libraries, an aeroplane and a hotel. Here Obrist speaks with Vivian Rehberg about these and other things. Towards the end of their conversation, they are joined by the Italian urban planner and architect Stefano Boeri who, along with Rem Koolhaas and Sanford Kwinter, co-curated `Mutations' with Hans-Ulrich Obrist.
6 citations
TL;DR: The New York Times reproduced five Norman Rockwell paintings, which had been digitally manipulated to evoke ‘September 11’ and its aftermath, between 2 November and 1 December 2001 as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: Between 2 November and 1 December 2001, The New York Times reproduced five Norman Rockwell paintings, which had been digitally manipulated to evoke ‘September 11’ and its aftermath. These full-page adverts for the newspaper were signifiers of revisionist cultural values, selective sentiment, familial security, and particular visions of the nation-state. This article explores the images as: expressions of mourning, trauma and the new patriotism; an ideological narrative within media manufacture of consent; contributions to dominant versions of collective memory and politicized memorials of the present.
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TL;DR: The authors argues that it is better to lose ourselves in our involuntary histories than to master them by methodological virtuosity and that we should wait for an enlightenment that will never come rather than engage ourselves in tactical teleologies, all the while writing into the now that waiting is.
Abstract: This article argues for a Visual Culture of the endless elision of the object and the discourse in their own and each other’s anachronism as historical, on the one hand, and projections of the contemporary subject, on the other. It suggests that we are better to lose ourselves in our involuntary histories than to master them by methodological virtuosity and that we should wait for an enlightenment that will never come rather than engage ourselves in tactical teleologies, all the while writing into the now that waiting is. It criticizes the narrowly canonical basis of Visual Culture, of what wishes to be a discipline at the point of philosophical transformation.
TL;DR: In this article, the convergence of a variety of concerns from his broader oeuvre (in particular, his criticism of the systematizing tendencies of disciplines such as Architecture, and his interest in the underground, Archaeology and Expanded Cinema) and the emergence of what Matta-Clark termed experience-optics is examined.
Abstract: This article examines some aspects of Gordon Matta-Clark's late filmic works. It notes there the convergence of a variety of concerns from his broader oeuvre (in particular, his criticism of the systematizing tendencies of disciplines such as Architecture, and his interest in the underground, Archaeology and Expanded Cinema) and the emergence of what Matta-Clark termed experience-optics. It goes on to explore experience-optics in terms of the relationships encountered between cinematic image and the broader dimensions of Archaeology, gravity and vertigo, relationships through which the artist sought to encourage an active spectatorship that promised to open out human experience to an `expanded being'.
TL;DR: This article explored the relationship between modern sound and modern architecture in British suburbs during the interwar period, with particular emphasis on the aural dimensions of this, and brought differences between theoretical accounts of aural and architectural modernity into relation with aspects of the lived sociability of the suburban architectures that have been subject to such narratives.
Abstract: This article arose from work on the constellation of social space in British suburbs during the interwar period, with particular emphasis on the aural dimensions of this. The aim was to bring differences between theoretical accounts of aural and architectural modernity into relation with aspects of the lived sociability of the suburban architectures that have been subject to such narratives. The exploitation of concrete historical moments in the uncertainty of aural and spatial perception is intended to allegorise the perceived, undecided condition of suburban culture at the time.
This is an early piece in my more extensive work on relationships between modern sound and modern architecture. A revised version of the essay appears as a chapter in my book Auditions: Architecture and Aurality, (MIT Press). This is currently in production and will be published early in 2008.
TL;DR: In the olden days of visual studies, matters were not as serious as Mieke Bal's essay would suggest they now are as discussed by the authors, and conversations were constant and fun, the quarrels with the university administration fierce and energizing.
Abstract: In the olden days of visual studies – the late 1980s – matters weren’t as serious as Mieke Bal’s essay would suggest they now are. When she and I sat drinking champagne late one evening in order to fortify ourselves for the task ahead, we giggled as much as we plotted. Our dean at the University of Rochester had encouraged us to submit a typed proposal the next day for a new graduate program in ‘comparative arts’, one that would profit from an alliance between her department, comparative literature, and mine, art history. For months afterward, Mieke and I traded our original ‘floppy’ back and forth, adding and subtracting from the scheme as the vicissitudes of university and regents (the state board of education) politics demanded. As the program evolved remarkably fast into the first doctoral degree in ‘Visual and Cultural Studies’, it drew energy from many new recruits: Norman Bryson, Craig Owens, Kaja Silverman, Constance Penley, Lisa Cartwright, David Rodowick, Janet Wolff and Douglas Crimp. A constellation of stars – nearly all of whom have since gone elsewhere – the likes of which hasn’t been seen again in the annals of visual studies. The conversations were constant and fun, the quarrels with the university administration fierce and energizing. No one had a certain idea what this new ‘interdiscipline’ would accomplish, but we knew that it was destined for greater things. And Mieke was our prophet.
TL;DR: The work of psychoanalyst Pierre Fedida on the work of mourning, separation and depression was examined in relation to works by Freud, Lagache, Mannoni and Laplanche as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: This article introduces the work of psychoanalyst Pierre Fedida on the work of mourning, separation and depression. Fedida’s work is first examined in relation to works by Freud, Lagache, Mannoni and Laplanche. After explaining the importance of anthropology in the conceptualization of mourning, attention is then directed to clinical interpretation illustrated by Georges Rodenbach (Bruges-la-morte) and Chantal Akerman (Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles). Attention is drawn to the role of substitutive formations, leading to an understanding of the mobility of psychic life such that the presence of unanalyzable psychotic kernels suggests not only limits to analytic experience but a corresponding presence in culture, too. From this, certain suggestions on temporality and depression - living the impossible death - lead, to a question relating to the renovation of cultural histories and studies. What should be the issue - visual culture, or a philosophical anthropology of culture and visualit...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a history of Polish national cinema, which they call Polish National Cinema (PNC), focusing on world-scale efforts in Polish filmmaking instead of claiming Polish cinema's uniqueness.
Abstract: If proving exceptionality is the expected impetus of an author’s decision to write a history of national cinema, cultural historian Marek Haltof’s opening line in his book Polish National Cinema may baffle the expectant reader. As if to prove the ordinariness of Polish cinema, he writes, ‘Polish cinema has a history essentially as long as cinemas elsewhere’ (p. 1). He compensates throughout the book for Poland’s formerly ephemeral, forever understated, presence on the globe by demanding that Polish cinema measures up against the cinema of other countries. He gives examples from Polish film history that match other world models in cinema and concentrates on world-scale efforts in Polish filmmaking instead of claiming Polish cinema’s uniqueness. Still, Haltof’s loyalty to Polish cinema shows through his obvious frustrations. His tender care for his unduly embattled subject percolates through every page and produces a proper history of a developed national cinema that is anything but ordinary.
TL;DR: K, the hapless hero of Kafka's The Castle, enters the novel as an expert in reading signs and mapping out natural topographies, and his trade is to chart the real, define reliable points of reference, and to help people navigate the world around them as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: K., the hapless hero of Franz Kafka’s The Castle, enters the novel as an expert in reading signs and mapping out natural topographies. A surveyor by profession, his trade is to chart the real, define reliable points of reference, and to help people navigate the world around them. Seeing, for surveyors such as K., is knowing. His eyes are trained to register objects in their spatial surroundings and thus render them meaningful. Their task is to empty the world of its specters so as to eliminate the breeding grounds of the uncanny.
TL;DR: From Antz to Titanic as discussed by the authors presents an extensive, pull-no-punches critique of cinema scholars who freely help themselves to questionable concepts such as "identification" and "interpellation" and who make unsubstantiated claims concerning the deleterious effects of particular films on supposedly passive and homogeneous spectators.
Abstract: In this ambitious and timely state-of-the-field address-cum-manifesto, one that makes no attempt at skirting its subtitled aim of ‘reinventing film analysis’, Martin Barker presents an extensive, pull-no-punches critique of cinema scholars who freely help themselves to questionable concepts such as ‘identification’ and ‘interpellation’, and who make unsubstantiated claims concerning the deleterious effects of particular films on supposedly passive and homogeneous spectators. At once a work of meta-criticism and first-order investigation, From Antz to Titanic strives to identify just where (and how, and why) academic film studies has gone off the rails, and to illustrate through numerous case studies what a responsible, fruitful, empirically oriented film analysis might look like.