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'We must know what kinds of expression fit what kinds of knowledge and become skilled at presenting our information in the medium that our audience will find easiest to understand'. (R. Lanham, 1995). |
Finds its heritage in print, graphic design, typography, photography, and other '2 dimensional' forms of representation. As a generally visual culture we can easily adapt our understanding of one 2 dimensional form from to another, moving fairly comfortably from the cartoon to Renaissance perspective, from the photograph to a Cubist painting. However, it is important to recognise the evolution of aesthetic forms is based on a merging of technological and cultural determinants; painting provided an aesthetic for photography, whilst print making (etching) inspired the process; illuminated texts provided type with its style and the mechanical press provided the structure; theatres impact on cinema and cinemas impact on T.V., and T.V.'s impact on video...
Roland Barthes discusses the structures of THE PHOTOGRAPHIC IMAGE: (Image, Music, Text. Roland Barthes.1977). The meaning embedded in the image, the Photographic Message
An obsession with clip art and cartoons threatens to undermine the emergence of a new aesthetic and new meanings.
Can be seen to evolve through theatre, cinema, T.V, and video. Eisenstien had several theories of montage (edit/assembly) which remain extremely relevant to the production of multimedia...
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These theories were established long before the hypertext link and morphing. Should we be satisfied with 'page turning' and fast pixel dissolves when we have the rich history of cinematic language to draw on?
As yet we have no obvious Interactive heritage, apart from the short history of data navigation. However, we can look to theatre for inspiration, we can look to architecture for spatial models, psychology for theoretical underpinning [Ventriloquism effect - 'The phenomenon of intersensory bias, where, for example, vision can influence judgments about movement and hearing'. (Stein et al 1993)] , in fact we can see models and metaphors in everyday human interaction and the structures contain them.
It is the convergence of these design practices that should be / is forcing a paradigm shift to a holistic media experience rather than a fragmented mish-mash of muddled aesthetics.
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'Our fine arts were developed, their types and uses were established, in times very different from the present, by men whose power of action upon things was insignificant in comparison with ours. But the amazing growth of our techniques, the adaptability and precision they have attained, the ideas and habits they are creating, make it a certainty that profound changes are impending in the ancient craft of the Beautiful. In all the arts there is a physical component which can no longer be considered or treated as it used to be, which cannot remain unaffected by our modern knowledge and power. For the last twenty years neither matter nor space nor time has been what it was from time immemorial. We must expect great innovations to transform the entire technique of the arts, thereby affecting artistic invention itself and perhaps even bring about an amazing change in our very notion of art.' Paul Valéry, Aesthetics, 'The Conquest of Ubiquity,' (translated by Ralph Manheim, p. 225. Pantheon Books, Bollingen Series, New York, 1964.) |
