My closest friend, Kelsi Cooke, created this piece of hybrid art as an assignment for her Digital Media class. I chose to close read first, because it evoked an emotional response in me in a three part “past, present, and future” sense as well as a nostalgia for older and now outdated forms of communication. I also feel that the merging of text, images, and use of color is extremely stimulating and interesting to study. For this essay, I will first study each image individually, and then discuss the effect of all three images collectively.
The first image portrays a turquoise background with cursive text, and in the foreground, a stamp claims the upper left hand corner, while the bottom an open envelope occupies right hand corner with a letter tucked inside. Along the left side of the image, the word “news” scrolls across the box in cursive. Beginning with the background, the color turquoise is associated with feminine appeal and a retro kind of nostalgia for the past (specifically 1950s). The text in the background, which is not entirely legible, suggests the finite life of the written word in letters; this being that because they are physical and destructible, they are not the ideal of recorded communication because they can be lost forever. The stamp and letter in the foreground represent the first kind of news that was spread: by people communicating to other people. For example, letters usually contained news of entirely families, or whole towns and were typically read aloud to groups of people. Letters, therefore, served as extremely important communicative tools for spreading news, which relates to the scrolling word down the side of the image. The image of the stamp and letter also reflects the slow process of traveling news, in that letters could be delayed for weeks or months depending on several factors such as weather or lost mail. The placement of the objects in the foreground, within the image is also interesting because they might suggest the importance or relevance of each. It is interesting that the stamp is placed in the upper left hand corner of the picture because stamps are supposed to be placed in the upper right hand corner when addressing an envelope. This mirror reflection and placement reversal might suggest potential discrepancies when news is relayed from person to person through hearsay, with no accountability for false or exaggerated information. Thus, it is likely that information can go askew when relayed or translated through people. The open envelope, with the letter appearing to be coming out of the envelope suggests that writing is a dynamic and ongoing process of communication. If the envelope was closed with the letter tucked inside for example, this would suggest that mail is a thing that exists, but the observer of the image would not get a feel for the act of writing that is experienced with the open envelope.
The second image gives a much different impression of the written word with the image of the printing press, which suggests the emergence of mass production of the written word and the birth of the newspaper. The color purple, which is used as the background for this image, is frequently associated with royalty and wealth. This combination suggests that during the emergence of mass news, it was only accessible t the middle and upper classes that needed to be literate and able to afford the newspaper and books. The notepad in the bottom left hand corner marks the first step in the writing/journalistic process, as it serves as a quick reference to jot down facts and quotes from interviews and news stories. Thus, it appears smaller in size than the printing press. However, proportionally it is quite large in contrast to the press, which might suggest its greater importance as the first place the words appear and the original text. The printing press obviously served as a key component in the revolution of journalism because of the ability to mass-produce news and literature. It is important to note that this is the end of the physical, written word.
With the death of the physical word comes new life manifested in the digital word and news imaging. The third image in this sequence marks the age of technology, highlighting video cameras, smart phones, and computers. The background color for this image then is extremely appropriate, as yellow represents enlightenment and the future. It is also associated with creativity and energy, which are serve as foundations in the age of technology. It is appropriate, than that it should provide the background for the digital media age with a keyboard as the yellow background image, and modern pieces of technology in the foreground. This image marks the beginning of the digital age, when the old journalism of the physical, written word is dead (along with the School of Journalism at CU). But fear not, for Journalism will be reborn in the digital media age with fast paced news updates 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. Now, society relies on and believes in news stories more than ever.
While each image marks a different transition in the life of the written word and mediums of information, one cannot deny the different pathos affect each image provokes in the observer. As the images progress, the distance between people and text grows. The first image, marking the age of letter writing and news traveling from person-to-person, creates a nostalgic longing for the long-forgotten intimacy between people. The scrolling script on the side of the image is formed in a cursive font that represents handwriting. Cursive handwriting is rarely used now. The colors, script, and images in this first piece of art evoke happiness, intimacy, and familiarity with the written word and its ability to connect people. The second image is the first image containing a machine, and thus seems to create a distance between the observer and the text and the writer and the text. The word “news” that scrolls along the side is now in a “Times New Roman” font, which removes a piece of character from the writer by confining the text to a standardized, universal style of text. The writer loses control of how the words appear to the reader. The third image marks an even greater distance between the author/presenter and the observer/reader/viewer. The cold metal and plastic machines are not human, and connote the ideas of cyborgs and hybrid bodies. Once again, the word “news” appears, scrolled on the side of the image in a more computerized style that suggests a non-human, computer generated message. While at first glance, the images appear to be suggesting the increasingly non-human gap growing between people and news, one must remember that writing was one of the first types of hybridity that humans took part in. As letters, words, and numbers are constructed forms of meaning, the pen, pencil, press, camera, and phone are all simply tools humans use to communicate. Therefore, humans are not necessarily distancing themselves from people and using machines more now, because they have been doing this since the first person wrote. News and media is moving in different directions, but not necessarily forwards or backwards.
No comments:
Post a Comment