Eleventh International Conference on The Image

Abstract

Language and its propositional structure is considered as the foundation of an epistemic process in the humanities. Follow the bias of Western thought, images as stimuli of the visual sense, are rather understood as a means of deception than as a medium with the ability to understand a phenomenon of our experienced world. A number of authors in the history of sciences, cognitive psychology, art history and “Bildwissenschaft” are pointing at the hidden potential of using the visual sense as an epistemological means. In his quest for a visual epistemology for example, Rudolf Arnheim’s writings on visual thinking can provide a possible starting point to enter the discourse on visual argumentation. From his point of view, “cognitive operations called thinking are not the privilege of mental processes above and beyond perception, but the essential ingredients of perception itself.” (Arnheim 1997 (1969): 13) Gottfried Boehm observes, that we can be immersed in an image and take part in it. Or we can analytically evaluate an image, keeping our distance to it while taking it apart. (See: Boehm 2019: 25) In contrast to the above mentioned sources in the medium of language, this contribution addresses with experimental image series the question how images are capable of providing evidence and can contribute to an epistemic process. The project is using the methodology of practice-led iconic research. The experimental creation of image variations, resulting in image series, is used as a foundation for a hermeneutic interpretation of these visual stimuli.