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The Location of Image: From Painting to Virtual Reality

From the Cave Paintings to virtual reality, the location of image varies. The space of the image has been subject to the ontological condition of the medium that contains the image. This sheerly visual space is also a product of our cognitive structure under the influence of the social and cultural context of the time. If the perspectival grids defined our vision of the world under the mathematical rules, the new visual environments such as video and virtual reality are rapidly changing our perception in an unprecedented way. This paper explores the locations of image as visual paradigms and traces the changing notions of vision in the social and cultural contexts. As Ren□ Descartes aptly acknowledged, out vision is not only a product of human eyes, but that of the cognitive system ruled by a mind. From the Renaissance paintings that employed the perspectival grids to the Baroque ceilings, the images of the two-dimensional space offered an illusion of a ‘real’ space that transformed the physical support to a virtual space. In the 19th century, image’s primary function as a representation of the world was challenged by its strongest rival, photography. As many art historians have been acknowledged, the invention of photography changed the directions of painting from the representation of a natural world to its ‘art-for-art’s-sake’ aesthetic formalism. However, the function of representation has been always at the core of the images. With the rapid development of new media, images found more effective way of representation with the unprecedented quantity of reproductivity and the speed of distribution. The virtual reality is one of the latest media showing the images free from the natural laws of our physical world. It opens up a new regime of vision, which I would call the ‘incorporated vision.’ Different from the traditional media in the visual art, the new media employ other sensory organs to maximize the effects of the artwork. The virtual reality allows us a fantasy world that one can fully immerse oneself. The loss of a critical distance is often discussed as the problem of this new media. Nevertheless, with the unbounded metamorphosis of its shape and medium, the image enjoys its renewal in more potential forms.