An Essay in the Computer Art User Theme as a Role Beyond the Audience in Dominic McIver Lopes’s Approach

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Assistant Professor, Department of Visual Arts, School of Visual Arts, College of Fine Arts, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

2 Associate Professor, Department of Visual Arts, School of Visual Arts, College of Fine Arts, niversity of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

3 Professor, Department of Advanced Studies in Art, School of Visual Arts, College of Fine Arts, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

This essay is based upon the analysis and interpretation of Dominic McIver Lopes’s approach to pictures and new art forms, and also underlines the underpinning of his view of philosophy of art and aesthetics. It would also both show that how the human agent could be studied as the audience and user, and how the user have some roots in the audience and simultaneously goes beyond. Section I focuses on the audience role that would be parted to classic audience and extra-classic audience, the latter being based upon the former and also beyond it. Section II would prove that user is also is based upon these two roles and surpasses them. The user encounter is with a non-traditional interactive work and includes some orders of appreciation which make the user perform such different roles as audience, discoverer, player, and performer. As long as the theme of audience is concerned, the picture and the process of pictorial recognition is central, and as long as the notion of user is at stake, the appreciation through interaction with a work of possible interchangeable displays would be at the center. The non-traditional encounter includes the traditional as well because the user appreciation is in some way through the basic conceptual and perceptual abilities of the audience. During the non-traditional interactive encounter the user interacts with a work which predetermines the way of producing the displays and the work being appreciated through this interaction. The user has different objects of appreciation which include the possible displays, the work itself and its expressions, meaning, and significance, the  user’s ego and her character, the computer art works as a whole and also as an appreciative art kind, and finally the computational interactivity as the medium of this new art. The user appreciation would be an accumulation of the simultaneous appreciation of aforementioned objects and would be definable in such a space. The nature and essence of non-traditional works relatively depend on the possible displays, the materials used in the creation, the artist’s intentions and operations, and the theorizations around the work. Generally speaking, the non-traditional interactive works have a kind of nature some part of which is visible in material form, the other part relatively invisible with roots in the computational interactivity. The user may encounter this kind of works as an audience, and she also may encounter as an user who produces the desired or undesired possible displays, reaches to an appreciation which in turn may be deepen by way of her distancing from the work and thinking about it during the interaction of after, and finally grasps the messages of the work. She also may play as a player with the work as a game and reach the appreciation through playing. Also she may be a performer as a veteran user who knows what the resulted displays would look like and interacts to produce them. Lopes’s long term position implies that the audience has a pictorial static nature and the user an extra-pictorial dynamic one.

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

لوپس، دومینیک مک‌آیور (1400). فلسفه‌ی هنر کامپیوتری (حامد زمانی گندمانی، مترجم)، انتشارات چشمه- گیلگمش. (چاپ اثر اصلی 2009)
Allen, R. (1993). Representation, illusion, and the cinema. Cinema Journal, 32(2), 21-48. https://doi.org/10.2307/1225603 Atencia Linares, P. (2012). Fiction, nonfiction, and deceptive photographic representation. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 70(1), 19-30. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/263370053_Fiction_Nonfiction_and_Deceptive_Photographic_Representation Benovsky, J. (2011). Three kinds of realism about photographs. The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, 25(4), 375-395. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236785154_Three_Kinds_of_Realism_About_Photographs
Bergeron, V., & Lopes, D. M. (2012). Aesthetic theory and aesthetic science: Prospects for integration. In A. Shimamura & S. Palmer (Eds.), Aesthetic science: Connecting minds, brains, and experience (pp. 63-79). Oxford University Press. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/288726033_Aesthetic_Theory_and_Aesthetic_Science_Prospects_for_integration Casey, E. S. (1971). Imagination: imagining and the image. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 31(4), 475-490. http://escasey.com/Article/Imagination_Imagining_and_the_Image.pdf
Dilworth, J. (2002). Varieties of visual representation. Canadian journal of philosophy, 32(2), 183-205. https://doi.org/10.2307/40232147
Gabriel, F. G. (2010). Realism and realistic representation in the digital age. Journal of Film and Video, 62(3),3-16. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236780178_Realism_and_Realistic_Representation_in_the_Digital_Age
Goldberg, K. (1995-2004). Telegarden [Artwork]. https://hikmahemma.wordpress.com/2016/08/26/week-4-ken-goldberg-telegarden-1995/#jp-carousel-294 Hansen, M. B. N. (2004). New Philosophy for New Media. MIT press.
Hayles, N. K. (2008). Electronic Literature: New Horizons for the Literary. University of Notre Dame Press.
Hopkins, R. (2008). What do we see in film? The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 66(2), 149-159. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1540-6245.2008.00295.x
Kenney, K. (2004). Representation theory. In K. Smith, S. Moriarty, G. Barbatsis, & K. Kenney (Eds.), Handbook of Visual Communication (pp. 121-138). Routledge. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781410611581-14/representation-theory-keith-kenney
Lopes, D. (1997). Project x [Artwork]. https://projectx.damianlopes.com/project_x.html
Lopes, D. M. (1996). Understanding Pictures. Clarendon Press.
Lopes, D. M. (1997). Art media and the sense modalities: tactile pictures. The Philosophical Quarterly, 47(189), 425-440. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9213.00069.
Lopes, D. M. (1998). Imagination, illusion and experience in film. Philosophical Studies, 89(2-3), 343-353. https://philpapers.org/rec/LOPIIA
Lopes, D. M. (1999). Pictorial color: Aesthetics and cognitive science. Philosophical Psychology, 12(4), 415-428. https://doi.org/10.1080/095150899105666
Lopes, D. M. (2000a). From languages of art to art in mind. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 58(3), 227-231. http://www.jstor.org/stable/432104
Lopes, D. M. (2000b). What is it like to see with your ears? The Representational Theory of Mind. Philosophical and Phenomenological Research, 60(2), 439-453. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2653494
Lopes, D. M. (2002). Vision, touch, and the value of pictures. The British Journal of Aesthetics, 42(2), 191-201. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjaesthetics/42.2.191
Lopes, D. M. (2003a). Pictures and the representational mind, . The Monist, 86(4), 632-652. https://doi.org/10.2307/27903847
Lopes, D. M. (2004). Directive pictures. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 62(2), 189-196. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-594X.2003. 0151.x
Lopes, D. M. (2005a). Sight and Sensibility: Evaluating Pictures. Clarendon Press.
Lopes, D. M. (2005b). The domain of depiction. In M. Kieran (Ed.), Contemporary Debates in Aesthetics and Philosophy of Art (pp. 160-175). Blackwell. https://philpapers.org/rec/LOPTDO
Lopes, D. M. (2009). A philosophy of computer art [Falsafeye honare computeri] (Hamed Zamani Gandomani, Trans.) Cheshmeh-Gilgamesh. (Original work published 2009) (In Persian)
Lopes, D. M. (2010). Picture this: Image-based demonstratives. In C. Abell & K. Bantinaki (Eds.), Philosophical Perspectives on Depiction (pp. 52-80). Oxford University Press. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/281787600_Picture_this_Image-based_Demonstratives
Lopes, D. M. (2011). An empathic eye. In A. Coplan & P. Goldie (Eds.), Empathy. Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives (pp. 118-133). Oxford Univerity Press. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/295086482_An_Empathic_Eye
Lopes, D. M. (2014). Beyond Art. Oxford University Press.
Lopes, D. M. (2016b). In the eye of the beholder. In J. Dodd (Ed.), Art, Mind, and Narrative: Themes from the Work of Peter Goldie (pp. 223-240). Oxford University Press. https://philpapers.org/rec/LOPITE-2
Lopes, D. M. (2018b). Being for Beauty: Aesthetic Agency and Value. Oxford University Press.
Lopes, D. M. (2024). Aesthetic Injustice. Oxford University Press.
Manovich, L. (2002). The Language of New Media. University of Toronto Press.
Nanay, B. (2010). Perception and imagination: Amodal perception as mental imagery. Philosophical Studies, 150(2), 239-254. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-009-9407-5
Novitz, D. (1975). Picturing. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 34(2), 145-155. https://doi.org/10.2307/430071 Rozin, D. (1999). Wooden mirror [Artwork]. https://www.smoothware.com/danny/woodenmirrormuseum.jpg
Ryan, M. L. (2001). Narrative as Virtual Reality: Immersion and Interactivity in Literature and Electronic Media. The Johns Hopkins UP.
Savedoff, B. E. (1992). Transforming images: Photographs of representations. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 50(2), 93-106. https://academic.oup.com/jaac/article/50/2/93/6341396
Schellenberg, S. (2013). Belief and desire in imagination and immersion. The Journal of Philosophy, 110(9), 497-517. https://doi.org/10.5840/jphil2013110914
Shaw, J. (1995). Golden calf [Artwork]. /https://www.jeffreyshawcompendium.com/portfolio/golden-calf Snibbe, S. (1998). Boundary functions [Aertwork]. https://www.snibbe.com/art/boundaryfunctions?itemId=epqaydm4l29xczcb2ismnf47o2r2tm Utterback, C. and Archituv, R. (1999). Text rain [Artwork]. http://camilleutterback.com/wp2022/wp-content/gallery/text-rain/text_rain1_edit.jpg
Walton, K. (2002). Depiction, Perception, and Imagination: Responses to Richard Wollheim. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 60(1), 27-35.
Yamakawa, H. (2007). Kodama [Aerwork]. https://www.ycam.jp/en/archive/works/kodama/
Journal of Fine Arts: Visual Arts
Volume 31, Issue 2
June 2026
Pages 7-18

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics