Eucharistia
Published March 14, 2021
Starting
with television up until today’s internet-as-scroll, it appears as if
electronic images have revitalized allegedly surpassed attitudes towards them. Mythical
fetishistic rituals of idolatry, in which images are presented against the
backdrop of music and repetition —as something to be felt or even touched— are
once again the cornerstone implicitly structuring all other social relations. There’s
no longer a clear distinction between image and spectator since, following John
of Damascus’ ancient advice, these divine images are not only meant to be
embraced with the eyes but also with the lips and the heart. These are images
that call for the entire body and not only the mind. Like the eucharistic ritual, they become the bridge
mediating between internal life and objective reality, individual and society. In
the acoustic space, or as music composer Raymond Murray Schafer called it, ‘the
soundscape’, spectators no longer own or capture images through their eyes, instead
they move about this artificial scenery. In this context, imagination ceases to
be described as an inventive subjective ability, ideally practiced in solitary contemplation,
and starts being conceived as movements performing sense within a landscape
composed of accumulated images and sounds.
Feautured sounds:
Like a Prayer - Madonna
Featured spaces: Basilica of Santa María del Mar
Other related media: The Immortal Bodies by Boris Groys
Further reading: Mitchell, W. J. T. (1996). “What Do Pictures Really Want?”. October, Vol. 77 (Summer 1996), MIT Press, 71-82.
Schafer, R. M. (1994). The Soundscape: Our Sonic Environment and the Tuning of the World. Rochester, Vermont: Destiny Books.
Simondon, G. (2008, 2013). Imaginación e Invención.(P. Ires, Trans.) Buenos Aires: Cactus.
Featured spaces: Basilica of Santa María del Mar
Other related media: The Immortal Bodies by Boris Groys
Further reading: Mitchell, W. J. T. (1996). “What Do Pictures Really Want?”. October, Vol. 77 (Summer 1996), MIT Press, 71-82.
Schafer, R. M. (1994). The Soundscape: Our Sonic Environment and the Tuning of the World. Rochester, Vermont: Destiny Books.
Simondon, G. (2008, 2013). Imaginación e Invención.(P. Ires, Trans.) Buenos Aires: Cactus.