Visual perception: digital imagination and sensitive experience of the social world

Abstract

With every historical epoch comes a different way of thinking, a different way of seeing, capable of identifying the fundamental elements of a change of paradigm. Any discussion of ‘paradigm’ in relation to the contemporary world must include the development of the digital realm and its technological apparatus, which transform vision and influence how we perceive the world. Central to this development has been the emergence of myriad new forms of communication and a culture of sharing life, which characterize the process of seeing.Technology opens up new horizons in terms of how we expose our presence in the world: via digital photography and video, in every instant of everyday life we are in a position to expose our social world, the fragments of our existence. This cultural effect is not merely a consequence of ways of structuring existence, but also constitutes a change in the way we think about our relationship with the world. Every cultural and technical change brings together a variation of thought and perception, and this represents a basis on which to understand and interrogate the continual mutation of our social imaginary and the process of building, producing and transforming the Real.