Vol. 1(1). 2018. Сергей Анатольевич Дзикевич

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СКАЧАТЬ and consolidated by the rhythms and rites of life. Like plants with extended roots, particular and universal human images are fixed in the imagination and gain effect from the connection with already existing ideas and images (Hüppauf, and Wulf 2009).

      3) As images of the imagination and the imaginary, human images become part of the body (Wulf 2018; Pragrana 2016). They are inherent and therefore can be difficult to change. Often they consist not only of individual images, but of picture sequences, even of picture networks, with which heterogeneous, sometimes even paradoxical images are «captured». As a result, existing human images are repeatedly confirmed and their importance is reinforced (Wulf 2014).

      THE WORLD BECOMES AN IMAGE

      A characteristic of modernity is the fact that the world is opposite to man and is perceived as an object and an image. In ancient times, people, animals and the environment were part of living nature, the Physis. They were generally perceived as similar to each other. They were stimulated by the power, the dynamis of nature, the Physis. This relationship of people to the world was retained in the Middle Ages. Animals, people and world are created by God and have a common creatureliness. In the modern era this relationship of the (Western) human being to the world, to other people and to themselves changes. Nature is no longer experienced as animated. It becomes the object. The people are no longer part of nature or the world created by God, but are opposite it; they measure it and register it as «object». In this process the world becomes an image. With the development of new media this trend increases. Not only the world and the other people are perceived as images, we ourselves are also increasingly perceiving ourselves in the mode of images. The widespread use of digital photography in everyday life and especially the sefies are proof of this (Kontopodis, Varvantakis, and Wulf 2017). Using electronic photos or films we create all important events, and ultimately create an image of ourselves (Wulf 2013a, 2013b).

      Human images show the central role images play, and with them the imagination and the imaginary world, for the constitution of the person and his education. They also make it clear how strongly the images are defined by their respective historical and cultural character and how important their research is within the framework of anthropology. Human images are images which the person creates of himself, and whose significance must be understood for his perception of the world, his memories and his future projections. They are generated by social and cultural practices of everyday life and by the arts. Human images become part of the collective and individual social and cultural imaginary world and thus play a part in shaping human activities. The creation of images is a feature, which we share as human beings, whose form, however, is very different in history and in different cultures. As the images and the imaginary world visualise something, which would otherwise remain invisible, their research is an important area of anthropology.

      What we describe as an «image» is different, meaning that the spectrum of the term is broad and requires a range of further clarification. Sometimes we mean the result of visual perception processes. Under the influence of neuroscience and its visualisation strategies, the results of the perception with other senses are often even described as «images». We then speak about mental or «inner» images, which bring to mind something which is not actually present. These include, for example, souvenir pictures, which differ to the perceptions due to their vagueness. The same applies to sketches or drafts of future situations, to dreams, hallucinations or visions. Many aesthetic products also take the form of images. They are products of a process aimed at the creation of an image. As metaphors, they are ultimately a constitutive element of language. Creating images, recognising images as images, dealing with images using one’s imagination, is a universal capability of humans (Wulf 2014, 2018). However, it varies depending on the historical period and culture. Because which images we see and how we see images is determined by complex historical and cultural processes. How we perceive images and deal with them is also influenced by the unique nature of our life history and subjectivity.

      Like all images, human images are the result of energetic processes. They transform the world of objects, actions and other people into images. Using the imagination they are imagined and become part of the collective and individual imaginary world. Many of these processes are mimetic and result in an assimilation to other people, environments, ideas and images. In mimetic processes the outer world becomes the «inner world», which is a world of images (Gebauer and Wulf 2018. 1998). This world of imaginary images plays a part in shaping the outer world. As these images are performative, they contribute to the emergence of actions and to the production and performance of our relationship to other people and to our surrounding world. The imaginary world is the place of the images as such, the destination of the imagination process generating the images. At the same time, it is the starting point of the mimetic and performative energies of the images.

      IMAGE AND IMAGINATION

      No less than the language is the imagination, a conditio humana, a human condition, whose foundations lie in the constitution of the human body (Adorno 1984; Belting 2001; Hüppauf, and Wulf 2009; Wulf 2013b, Wulf 2018). The performativity, i.e. the orchestrated character of human action, is a consequence of the principle openness and role which the imagination plays in the form of this openness. With its help the past, present and future are interwoven. The imagination creates the world of the person, the social and cultural, the symbolic and the imaginary. It creates human images. It makes possible history and culture and thus historic and cultural diversity. It creates the world of images and the imaginary and is involved in the creation of the practices with the body. Not only is an awareness of these practices required for their production and performance. In reality, they must be incorporated and be part of a practical, body-based, implicit knowledge, whose dynamic character makes possible social and cultural changes and designs. Here mimetic processes based on the imagination are of central importance. Cultural learning takes place in these processes, which creates a social and cultural identity that is a central prerequisite for well-being and happiness.

      The imagination plays a central role for all forms of social and cultural action and its concentration in human and world images. Using images, diagrams, models, etc., it controls the human behaviour and action. Images are defining moments of the action, whose significance is constantly increasing. This leads to the question what makes an image and what types of images can be distinguished. For example, mental images can be distinguished from manually and technically generated images, as well as moving and non-moving images.

      The imagination is of fundamental importance not only in global art. It plays an important role in the genesis of the Homo sapiens sapiens and its cultures. References to the aesthetic design of bone scrapers can be traced back several hundred thousand years (Wulf 2014). People’s access to the world and the world’s access to the «inner» person takes place using the imagination in the form of images.

      A distinction can be made between magical images, representative images and simulated images. The magical images have no reference connection; they are what they portray. The statue of the «Golden Calf» is the holy thing; with a relic the body part of the holy thing is the holy thing. The situation is different for representative images which are often based on mimetic processes. They refer to something which they portray themselves or are not. Photos are included here which show situations which are the past and not the present. Simulated images are images which have become possible with the new processes of electronic media and are playing an increasing role in the lives of people. The difference between the perceived and the mental images is important. Each presentation is an expression of the fact that an object is missing. This is obvious for souvenir pictures and future projections. The perceived images based on existing objects have an influence on both.

      Pathological images, visions and dreams also differ to perceived and souvenir pictures. In all cases the imagination is involved in the creation of the images. СКАЧАТЬ