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Douglas Edric Stanley
The monster's image
Three years ago, during a previous conference on cine-film and interactivity at the ÉESI, I put forward the outline for a “hydraulic” approach to image in motion: a dynamic approach hinged on the fluctuating image ,which, notably, could factorise the fluidising import that algorithmic engines have brought to the image. It was an interesting hypothesis, which was just not bold enough to go all the way. The bane of the problem being insistence on maintaining our nostalgic affinity with the photographic trace within the image, at the hands of the horizontality of the new storing configurations, like those involving data bases, which tend to scramble the figures present.
Since then my assessment has been turned around. I no longer view the object as just a game of constant re-juxtaposition; it has become play on mutation, with image-growth sprouting from just about any appendage of the “Thing”. It is just possible that old traces still linger in that image, now however, they play a completely different role and feed the beast with different fodder. In this novel image, from now on, I can see a form of “monstrousness” germinating within the image, and getting right down to the entrails of the GPU itself, coming up to the pixelized surface of the screen for only a brief moment of display.
By accepting the monster in the image our approach to it becomes transformed, thus transforming that which we understand as figure, mimesis and finally narration. It also changes fields of inquiry which sanction and capture phenomena more securely and which I consider as being the most relevant for these transformations, starting with video games.
Recent publications:
1 « Antagonisme et imbrication : beyond the concept of interactivity », text of the conference delivered at the University of Provence, Marseille, France, May 5th 2008; http://www.abstractmachine.net/blog/conference-3
2 « Le mythe de la mite : toward IT mothology », radio texts in the « Mythologies 2008 series: Ma foi! Beliefs, religions, identities », Radio Grenouille 88.8, Marseilles, France, April 7th 2008; http://www.abstractmachine.net/blog/le-mythe-de-la-mite
3« Purpose machines », in Switch Journal, no.24, University of San Jose, 2007; http://switch.sjsu.edu/v24
4« Algorithmic Writing Systems », text of the conference delivered at the Colloque Programmation Orientée-Art, La Sorbonne, October 2007; http://www.abstractmachine.net/blog/algorithmic-writing-systems
5« /*RUN*/ », in Nouveaux médias, nouveaux langages, nouvelles écritures, collective work, under the supervision of Colette Tron, Entretemps, 2005.
6« This is Fun! », in Jouable, collective work, Les presses du réel, 2004.
7« Lexique de l'interactivité », 1997; http://www.abstractmachine.net/lexique