Elephant & Castle

Sensibilità ecomediatica / Ecomediatic Sensitivty / Sensibilité éco-médiatique

Adriano D'Aloia — 2022-12-15

Viviamo ormai nel Mediacene, un’era geologica caratterizzata all’impatto cruciale delle tecnologie di percezione, informazione e trasporto sul contesto storico e ambientale in cui viviamo. Divenuti veri e propri ambienti vitali, i media contemporanei sono regolatori di una sensibilità multimodale da cui dipende la nostra consapevolezza delle sfide e delle insidie della crisi ecologica ormai conclamata. Questo numero offre alcuni spunti di riflessione sullo stato attuale del discorso sull’ecologia mediale, alla ricerca di un nuovo paradigma ecosistemico di descrizione del rapporto tra gli esseri viventi e il pianeta.

We now live in the Mediacene, a geological era characterized by the crucial impact of technologies of perception, information and transport on the historical and environmental context in which we live. Having become real living environments, the contemporary media are regulators of a multimodal sensitivity on which our awareness of the challenges and pitfalls of the now full-blown ecological crisis depends. This issue offers some food for thought on the current state of the discourse on media ecology, in search of a new ecosystemic paradigm for describing the relationship between living beings and the planet.

Nous vivons actuellement dans le Médiacène, une ère géologique caractérisée par l’impact crucial des technologies de la perception, de l’information et des transports sur le contexte historique et environnemental dans lequel nous vivons. Devenus de véritables milieux de vie, les médias contemporains sont les modulateurs d’une sensibilité multimodale dont dépend notre prise de conscience des enjeux et des pièges de la crise écologique désormais manifeste. Ce dossier offre un aperçu de l’état actuel du discours sur l’écologie des médias, à la recherche d’un nouveau paradigme écosystémique pour décrire la relation entre les êtres vivants et la planète.

Images for a World to Come. Visual Practices of Ecological Activism

Giuseppe Previtali — 2022-12-15

Between the more interesting political phenomena of the last few decades, collective uprisings are still partially overlooked. This global spread of rebellions, regardless of their specific political motivations, seems to be characterized by a recurring set of visual practices, thus urging a reflection on the political roles of the images in contemporary politics. Following the theoretical framework recently proposed by Didi-Huberman, the essay will try to sketch some preliminary thoughts on this regard, analyzing the forms of visual agency that emerge from the collective occupation of public (and political) spaces, also trying to consider the progressive emergence of a specific emotional dynamics. After this theoretical introduction, the essay will focus on ecological and environmental activism, and specifically on the Fridays for Future’s phenomenon, discussing some of the political functions that images assume in this context.

On the Aesthetics of Environmental Data. The Work of Forensic Architecture between Forms of Reporting and Artistic Practice

Laura Cesaro — 2022-12-15

In the framework of theoretical analyses proposed by studies of the "geographies of the Anthropocene", attention is focused on the representation of territories in the convergences between media, technologies and digital cartography. This aesthetic approach finds favourable ground in protest movements which remain as yet unexamined in any depth. Among these, Forensic Architecture – the University of London's whistleblower research centre at Goldsmiths, founded in 2010 – stands out. Composed mainly of scientists, architects, journalists and filmmakers, the team carries out rigorous mapping of environmental data which focuses on imaging as a diagnostic practice, analysing the environmental situation, transforming the way in which data is visualised in civic practice through artistic and performative initiatives, and expanding the canonical boundaries of the fruition of forensic art. This paper aims to focus attention on the practices of Forensic Architecture, whose work is regularly shown in international art or architecture exhibitions, and its reuse of images which find form in denunciation and collective awareness. The article will also examine the audiovisual products documenting a decade of research in the territories of Palestine: "Counter-forensics in Palestine" (2012-2022).

Prosthetic Sensorium

Jan Christian Schulz — 2022-12-15

This proposal investigates the transition of the individual body sensorium into a collective global techno-sensorium extending the perception and mediating the ecological sensitivity of the human. Examples of extended body protheses (satellites, sensor technologies…) and their functioning are used to explain the inter-relationships of a proliferating techno-sensorium that activates environmental protheses such as “biorocks”, glacier blankets or anti-forestation listening technologies.

Visualiser des données météorologiques: représentations des phénomènes atmosphériques

Chiara Rubessi — 2022-12-15

Data visualisation technology has made many databases visible and intelligible, and the issue of accessing, analysing, using and visualising data is one of the problems of the digital society. In this perspective, the representation of weather phenomena raises a series of questions about the visualisation modalities adopted. How are the data of meteorological phenomena represented? From this question, the contribution aims to analyze some 2D representations of meteorology through the tool of data visualization in order to observe the way atmospheric phenomena are rooted in the mediation technology.

Ice Core Verticality. The Eloquence of Ice and the Visual Construction of Deep Time

Valeria Burgio — 2022-12-15

Ice cores are fundamental techno-scientific components of the visual culture of the Anthropocene. Through the eloquence of ice, the Anthropocene sets the tone for its own narration, one made of impending apocalypse, planetary boundaries, and irreversible tipping points, while, at the same time, attesting for the “lively materiality” of ice, and of its past and present states. This essay analyzes and determines the narrative agency and the semiotic complexity of ice cores within the contested terrain of the Anthropocene thesis and presents two recent art-science collaborative projects exploring the aesthetic dimension of ice cores: Susan Schuppli’s Ice Cores (2019) and Giulia Bruni and Armin Linke’s Earth Indices (2022).

Le design de la “fusion”. Une anthropologie des corps excitables

Jérémy Damian — 2022-12-15

The crisis experienced by the mountain tourism sector is perceived by a number of actors as an economic opportunity. The crisis has always represented a field of opportunity for the consolidation and extension of marketing knowledge and practices. In this case, the crisis in mountain tourism has seen a strengthening of the links between “tourism”, “marketing” and experiences of connexions to nature. Our relationship to the world(s) increasingly functions like the relationship to casinos and slot machines described by anthropologist Natasha D. Schüll in Addiction by design (2014): mediated by the engineering and management of attention, ecstasy and self-forgetfulness. Fusion is both a promise and a mean to hook consumers. This article aims to critically present the historical emergence of a form of design for the experience of fusion with nature.

Les ruines comme médias virtuels. Visualiser et contre-visualiser l’anthropocène

Anna Caterina Dalmasso — 2022-12-15

In the visual culture of recent decades, a deep nostalgia for the obsolete has taken hold of the human image. It is inhabited by a singular fascination with ruin that counterbalances the obsession with the new. While the media have repeatedly allowed us to witness the destruction of entire archaeological heritage sites – from the emblematic Buddhas of Bamiyan, victims of Taliban iconoclasm, to the occupation of Palmyra by the forces of Daech – the urban decay in the post-industrial zones of the world inspires a photographic tourism on the theme of ruin porn. The essay proposes to analyse ruins as media, i.e. as a device capable of putting us in contact with a temporal dimension which, in the current environmental crisis, seems radically denied: the future.

Topologie dal network planetario: Note sulle "mostre di pensiero" di Peter Weibel e Bruno Latour

Paolo Berti — 2022-12-15

Quattro mostre, nell’arco di un ventennio, presso lo ZKM - Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie di Karlsruhe hanno segnato la storia di una suggestiva collaborazione tra il curatore e teorico dei media Peter Weibel e il sociologo Bruno Latour, per quelle che sono state definite le loro Gedankenausstellungen (“mostre di pensiero”): Iconoclash (2002), Making Things Public (2005), Reset Modernity! (2016) e Critical Zones (2020). La scelta delle opere costituisce strumento di analisi, partecipando – nell’ottica dei curatori – a quel contesto ontologico di convivenza antigerarchica di entità di natura completamente differente, che siano esseri umani, animali, enti inanimati, elementi chimici, geologici, costrutti sociali o, appunto, esposizioni; ma anche a un più largo ordine di pensiero che in anni recenti ha tentato di descrivere la complessità delle “nuove politiche terrestri” trovando volentieri fianco nella rappresentazione artistica.

Intensificare il non-umano: pratiche inclusive nel lavoro di Anicka Yi, Tomás Saraceno e Philippe Parreno

Vincenzo Di Rosa — 2022-12-15

Negli ultimi due decenni, diversi artisti hanno iniziato a esplorare il rapporto tra tecnologie mediali, soggettività ed ecosistemi viventi. Seguendo metodi e obiettivi spesso differenti, hanno messo in luce un intreccio radicale tra i linguaggi dell’arte e le problematiche connesse alla crisi ambientale. Questi artisti si sono mossi in direzione di un’estetica “inclusiva”, così come l’ha recentemente definita Nicolas Bourriaud, poiché hanno proposto uno sguardo decentrato capace di problematizzare le principali opposizioni che caratterizzano l’habitus dell’antropocentrismo. Il saggio mira ad analizzare tre installazioni artistiche in cui l’intensificazione dell’agency non-umana ha contribuito a creare dei veri e propri ambienti mediali in cui gli spettatori sono stati invitati a riconsiderare il proprio rapporto con l’alterità. I progetti presi in esame sono Biologizing the Machine (terra incognita) (2019) di Anicka Yi; Sounding The Air (2018) e Webs of At-tent(s)ion (2018) di Tomás Saraceno e la mostra ANYWHEN (2016) di Philippe Parreno allestita alla Tate Modern di Londra. La tesi che si intende sostenere in questo saggio è che una delle principali strategie adottate da questi artisti sia stata quella di intensificare, e quindi rendere pienamente visibile, l’agency delle entità non-umane – come quella degli elementi vegetali e dei microorganismi – mediante la coazione con le tecnologie dell’automazione e dell’intelligenza artificiale.

Complex Identities in Contemporary Animated Cinema between Posthumanism and Ecocriticism

Matteo Quinto — 2022-12-15

This paper shows how animation emerged as a suitable medium for depicting hybrid identities between human and non-human beings. It also shows how animation was an important resource for developing an ecocritical imaginary and ethics that rejected oppositional dualisms and the paradigm of the exceptional human. The first section outlines the rigid and ʻproprietaryʼ conception of identity and shows how this has contributed to the consolidation of human supremacy over the environment and the non-human. The second paragraph analyses examples of flexible identities based on relationships, hybridisation and change and shows how this kind of identity has contributed to the development of new ecologies. The third section outlines the characteristics of identity in the contemporary posthumanist and ecocritical framework based on sympoietic and interspecies constructions of networks of biological data, personal decisions, conscious and unconscious desires, relations and hybridisations. The final paragraph attributes to the poietic and metamorphic power of animation its effectiveness in representing these posthumanist identities, in showing the agency of non-human beings and in soliciting a fully ecocritical ecological sensitivity, in that it rejects clear-cut oppositions and human exceptionalism by aiming for a radically new way of conceiving human beings, nature, technology and their relationships.

Environmental Misinformation and Audiovisual Serial Narratives. An Automatic Analysis of the Twitter Social Discursiveness on "Seaspiracy"

Marta Rocchi — 2022-12-15

The ongoing pervasive presence of green media content may increase audience environmental consciousness. Indeed, several authors have highlighted the central role played by visual digital media in bringing environmental issues to public and political attention. Within this context the proliferation of streaming services and audience’s everyday use of green media content may facilitate public connections, enhance environmental sensibility, and facilitate behavioural change. This paper explores the insights film and media scholars may get from audience’s ongoing debates related to environmental issues when boosted by audiovisual narratives. We investigate the production and circulation of knowledge and environmental misinformation associated with Seaspiracy (2021), a Netflix documentary about the impact of commercial fishing. This product was criticized for misrepresentation: NGOs, sustainability labels and experts quoted in the documentary have charged the filmmakers with making ‘misleading claims’ and using out-of-context interviews and erroneous statistics. The main aim of this study is to explore the role of digital communication – interpersonal and through the media – in the public definition, elaboration and contestation of environmental issues. We focus on tweets related to the documentary Seaspiracy to understand how misinformation may spread through audiovisual narratives. We use automatic text analysis tools including sentiment analysis and topic detection to understand how audience responses enable or inhibit the discourse in a shared cultural debate on environmental issues.

Lista dei revisori 2022

Elephant & Castle — 2022-12-15

Lista revisori 2022

Alberto Baracco
Alessandra Vaccari
Alessandro Del Puppo
Alice Lenay
Alice Rosenthal
Andrea Gelardi
Barbara Grespi
Carla Subrizi
Caterina Toschi
Chiara Portesine
Claudio Zambianchi
Cristina Baldacci
Cristina Casero
Damien Delorme
David Zerbib
Davide Colombo
Delphine Hyvrier
Denis Viva
Elisabetta Modena
Emiliano Trere
Fabrice Sabatier
Fabrizio Li Vigni
Franca Bruera
Francesca Gallo
Francesco Casetti
Francesco Guzzetti
Francesco Maria Spampinato
Gaëlle Théval
Giorgia Gastaldon
Giorgio Zanchetti
Guido Bartorelli
Ilaria Mariani
Jonathan Tichit
Juan Albarrán
Livio Belloi
Marco Bellano
Marco Benoît Carbone
Marie Rebecchi
Marion Duquerroy
Martin Givors
Michela Sacchetto
Miren Gutiérrez
Neil Alperstein
Nicola Agliardi
Nicola Manghi
Pierre-Olivier Dittmar
Raffaele Bedarida
Raffaella Perna
Riccardo Venturi
Roberta Valtorta
Ruggero Eugeni
Sara Catenacci
Valentina Valentini

Vent'anni di laboratorio dell'immaginario

Franca Franchi — 2022-12-15

Dal numero 28 di dicembre 2022 Elephant & Castle. Laboratorio dell'immaginario assume una nuova fisionomia attraverso la migrazione sulla piattaforma OJS e una rinnovata veste grafica. Ma lo spirito che anima il lavoro della rivista è rimasto quello delle origini e del suo fondatore Alberto Castoldi...