Historical Evolution Of The Image (03.06.2002)
Albert Borgmann, in his Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life, devises the “device paradigm” as an illustration of the pattern into which the stuff that defines technological existence falls. Even though Borgmann writes his book in 1984, it is of value to examine the paradigm in context of current developments of technological society. It becomes a question of whether the device paradigm is still applicable to the current technological setting, or if it is truer now than even before. It is thus taken into consideration in light of the specific instance of the thing, as Borgmann uses it, that is a painting prior to the modern period. The specific thing of a painting is contrasted to the technological device of a digital image. The progression of the medium change between the painting to the digital image will be examined as well as the skill it takes to produce them. Availability of these is observed, along with the consequence of such a metamorphosis in the essence of the thing and device.
First, however, Borgmann states the thing as a pretechnological object in the Heideggerian sense. The thing gathers the fourfold, being earth, sky, mortals, and divinity. Thus it is something which reveals the world in all its aspects. In this case, a painting of the medieval times is one which is created by a master. The master has undergone a lifetime of training under another master, and the business of the arts is under the guild system. A single painting would take many weeks to complete, and all instruments in its creation are known instinctively to the master. The pigments are hand ground and prepared, as are the brushes and the canvas. All these materials are obtained either by gathering them in the wild, or from others in the community. This activity requires a social engagement with those in the community. But it also requires social engagement in that all works are commissioned by the community, which are almost exclusively for the church. Thus, a single painting brings about engagement with the community and with the materials it is made of. Moreover, the fact that the painting itself is of religious nature requires the master to understand the character of the times, and his choice of composition and subject matter are reflective of this. But more importantly, such a work requires a devotion to the divine itself, and it is fueled by a desire to please the divine—aside from the community—as if it were an offering. And so the painting is a thing, in that it reflects earth in the pigment, twigs, and animal hair that are taken from the earth. The painting reflects the sky as it is seen in the light of the heavens, and inevitably using light in the composition. It also reflects mortals and divinity by, not only depicting people or divinity or both, but also in its involvement with the people of the community and the inspiration taken from the faith in the divine by the artist. So the painting itself is a thing in its revelation of the world that it is created in.
The changes which occur in the creation of painted images, as far as medium, skill, and availability, are first apparent with the advent of printing techniques. As discussed, paintings in medieval times are composed of ground pigment. These were in the form of oil paint, tempera, or water based. The skill with which these were applied required many years of training, and even then only a handful of particularly proficient painters make it into the history books. The availability of paintings is restricted to the wealthy, primarily churches, and the availability of producing them is reserved to those who are taken in by masters as apprentices, which are few as well. The development of block printing changes the medium little in the case of paint, but the technique is certainly different. Block prints are simplified to icons, and crude in comparison to paintings. The images are carved from wood, which limits the amount of detail that can be used. However, the significance of block printing is that it can be replicated and quantified in its production. The block print is the first instance of the move from a thing to a device. Once a block has been carved, it can be used to print again and again. This falls into Borgmann’s theory in that it conforms to the notion of a device in splitting means and ends. The block is the machinery and the print itself the commodity. As the process becomes easier, faster, and mass produced, the end is commodified.
The modern period also brought with it the camera. Use of the camera, in monochrome initially, eliminates the usefulness of painting in its endeavor of depiction of persons and events. Since the monochrome image, though not completely superior to the painted image for lack of color, is more accurate in its portrayal, it is therefore deemed better. The photograph is more realistic, the camera more complex in its mechanism, and the results faster attained. This change increases the split between the thing and the device in that the machinery of the camera is more unfamiliar, and the photographs more familiar in its lifelike illustration. The change in the medium is greater here from the painted or printed image, as new and modern chemicals are used in the exposure of the film. As with the block print, the photograph is cheaper and thus more attainable. Furthermore, the use of a camera requires less technical knowledge of the process, as all that is needed is the setup of the camera and the activation of the trigger. The use of the machinery becomes easier, though it remains concealed, whereas the photograph is constantly refined.
A further advancement in photographic technology allowed for color, as it becomes known that certain chemicals can be used to apply coloration to the photograph, aside from just black and white. The machinery of the photo camera has shrunk as well, from the bulky large cameras that stood on tripods as tall as a man, to the more compact and lightweight cameras that are carried in hand. The photographic mechanism is further concealed and variable in its specific attributes. Also, the use of 35mm film puts the availability of the photograph in the general consumer’s hands. Anyone is able to buy a simple compact camera at the local “grocery.” The process of film development is streamlined to where photographs are ready within the hour. The operation of the camera takes little more than the insertion of Kodak Advantix™ film and the push of a button. Operation of film development machines is equally simple, as the machinery performs all actual development. Once again, the means are further mechanized, concealed, shrinking, and are variable. The ends, in turn, are commodious, fixed, and refined. This shift, in its consideration of application, is the definitive word on the outdated existence of such a thing as painting in portrayal of persons and events, surely. After all, a color photograph is virtually real in comparison to the crude and unrefined stokes of a brush in a painting.
The postmodern time, or whatever the time may be in which persons find themselves currently, brings renewed hope with the advent of digital imagery. The digital camera can be purchased easily on the appropriate website. It is not even necessary to leave the comfort of the home to purchase the camera. Shipping options for next day air are available, too. The camera arrives, and it is ready to take pictures of all the wonderful devices in the technological home. The image itself is completely unfamiliar and abstracted in its reduction to the presence or absence of electrical impulse in a media card. The media card itself is an abstraction in that it is inconceivable how an actual image, let alone hundreds, can be in such a miniscule, shrunken piece of plastic and metal. Now more than ever, the digital camera requires the minimum amount of skill to operate. The camera is fully digital in all its functions from taking the image, adjusting color, to applying the flash when low light is automatically detected. It is no point of consideration how all these things occur. The images themselves no longer require development, eliminating the necessity of making the effort to venture to a film processing business. In fact, the images can be printed on photo paper with a photo printer right in the safety of the home, and rest assured that no one else will see them. Though the cost of the camera and printer may be initially higher, the fact that hundreds of pictures can be taken at no cost of viewing them on the monitor screen certainly more than makes up the difference. One can only speculate how much more the micro circuitry of the camera can shrink, how many different ways the camera can truly achieve the same end, how much less skill it can take to use it. Yet the photograph continues to be as familiar as it has ever been, if not more so, and it is fixed and still clearer and more brilliant.
The bifurcation of means and ends, unfamiliarity and familiarity, variability and a fixed state, and the expanding gap between them are certainly without consequence. The fact that this phenomenon is a reality is not without ramifications if it is allowed to continue in that way. Borgmann suggests that, since devices are initially intended toward the disburdenment of true encumbrance, they do achieve that goal. But when does disburdenment become disburdenment of trivial discomforts and annoyances? At some point devices change into a commodity of affluence, and that is what produces disengagement. Affluent commodities disengage in their diversion from focal things, which result in detachment from reality and detachment from the world. As the world is revealed through technological devices, it is no longer a world of humanity, but a world of technology and its devices. Such an existence deteriorates into loneliness and depression, both of which are detrimental to the being of humanity. In truth, it can be said, by line of the preceding argument, that technological existence may well bring about the extinction of the human race, unless it is counteracted. This counteraction, may, as Borgmann claims, lie in a counterbalance of focal things and practices.
Works Cited
Borgmann, Albert. Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1984.
