Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

In New Philosophy for New Media Mark Hansen defines the image in digital art in terms that go beyond the merely visual. Arguing that the digital image encompasses the entire process by which information is made perceivable, he places the body in a privileged position - as the agent that filters information in order to create images. By doing so, he counters prevailing notions of technological transcendence and argues for the indispensability of the human in the digital era. Hansen examines new media art and theory in light of Henri Bergson's argument that affection and memory render perception impure - that we select only those images precisely relevant to our singular form of embodiment. Hansen updates this argument for the digital age, arguing that we filter the information we receive to create images rather than simply receiving images as pre-existing technical forms. This framing function yields what Hansen calls the digital image. He argues that this new embodied status of the frame corresponds directly to the digital revolution: a digitised image is not a fixed representation of reality, but is defined by its complete flexibility and accessibility. It is not just that

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• List of Figures (p. vii)
• Acknowledgments (p. xi)
• Foreword (p. xiii)
• Introduction (p. 1)
• Part I From Image to Body
• 1 Between Body and Image: On the "Newness" of New Media Art (p. 21)
• 2 Framing the Digital Image: Jeffrey Shaw and the Embodied Aesthetics of New Media (p. 47)
• 3 The Automation of Sight and the Bodily Basis of Vision (p. 93)
• Part II The Affect-Body
• 4 Affect as Interface: Confronting the "Digital Facial Image" (p. 127)
• 5 What's Virtual about VR? "Reality" as Body-Brain Achievement (p. 161)
• 6 The Affective Topology of New Media Art (p. 197)
• Part III Time, Space, and Body
• 7 Body Times (p. 235)
• Conclusion (p. 269)
• Notes (p. 273)
• Index (p. 321)

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

"New media" here refers to digital art forms that both act upon the perceiver's physical constraints and provoke the audience to reconstruct aesthetic assumptions. Hansen (English, Princeton Univ.) moves the reader through a grounding history of Henri-Louis Bergson's theory of perception before plunging into a tightly constructed theory of postmodern aesthetics, in which the human body, rather than the human eye, dominates perception. Illustrating his discussions with particular examples of digital art productions-for instance, the presentation rendered by a focused lens that offers both created image and reflection of actual objects-the author underpins each step of his presentation with an impressively Hegelian structure in which traditional aesthetics, contemporary digital experimentation, and the effects of the human on perceiving the new media art are treated. Like the art it treats, this aesthetic theory addresses the concrete as well as the intellectual and metaphoric. This is rich reading for those already grounded in the traditions of Henri Bergson and Suzanne Langer while of concern to artists working on the cutting edges of the digital field as well.-Francisca Goldsmith, Berkeley P.L., CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

CHOICE Review

Hansen's study is an ambitious attempt to address philosophically new and emergent media as well as contemporary new media art. Drawing on the work of Henri Bergson and recent developments in neuroscience, Hansen (English, Princeton) contests the idea that the new media are dismantling the very notions of medium and the subject. He argues that the perception of digitized images, for instance, is an embodied experience, one in which the body filters, or forges, the digital image. Thus, rather than considering the image or the work of art as a stable object, Hansen is interested in all the instantiations of perception that constitute the plural, constantly reconstituted digitized object of perception. Hansen complements his argument with analyses of contemporary new media artists. This study is an important contribution to its field, yet, given its highly specialized nature, it is perhaps best suited for libraries that support active programs in media studies or theory. ^BSumming Up: Recommended. Upper-level undergraduates through researchers/faculty. S. Barnett Central Connecticut State University