Eleventh International Conference on The Image

Abstract

This paper focusses on an alternative photographic aesthetic based on the human eye which may have evolved given a different set of historic technical developments. In broad terms, this aesthetic is dependent on the recording medium being far more sophisticated than the lens, the opposite of how photography actually evolved. The paper references an art practice based on single element lenses which materially reduce phenomena to what may be experienced preconsciously inside the human eye. The paper then aligns the practical outcomes with aspects of phenomenology (Merleau-Ponty, 1945) and the optical unconscious (Benjamin, 1936). In phenomenological terms, the aesthetic produced privileges the biology of the human eye over the processing power of the visual cortex; a preconscious ocular aesthetic over conscious perception. The paper contends that when viewing images that approach a fundamental, yet unknown, visual experience the viewer partially has access to preconscious visual phenomenon. The results highlight how photography has always strived to produce a uniform, sharp plane of focus which in turn falsely maintains humans experience the world in a similar manner. The paper also extends aspects of Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s (1945) “perceptual absence” and Walter Benjamin’s (1936) “optical unconscious” whilst bringing the two together. The paper also realises how an arts practice can incorporate the agency of materials (Carter, 2004) to approach traditionally intellectual enquiry in novel ways.