La construction de l'image comme matrice de l'histoire
Year: 2001
Type: article
Abstract: The Construction of the Image as a Matrix of History, Éric Michaud. As of the 19h century, the image was no longer considered a document or witness of the past but an actor of history. While Christianism had put forward a future preformed by the image of the past, the "new Christianism " of the Saint Simonians put its faith in artists, "men with imagination", that it placed in the avant garde of the society to shape its future : It was the artists' job to interest society for its future well-being and to "transport the terrestrial paradise of the past towards the future". The last third of the century, under the sign of science, through concepts of "psycho-motor induction " and "suggestion " developed an image whose essential virtue was to affect bodies, to produce what the St. Simonians called "an obligation to act" and tofound a new social order. Gustave Le Bon, Nietzsche, Bergson or Georges Sorel theorized this effective power of the image that propaganda and advertising developed in the 20h century to hasten the masses' path towards future happiness.
Author: Eric Michaud
Language: English
Subfield: Visual Arts and Performing Arts
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2031196673