University of Sussex
Browse

Digital aesthetics: the discrete and the continuous

Download (201.08 kB)
journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-09, 12:26 authored by M. Beatrice FaziM. Beatrice Fazi
Aesthetic investigations of computation are stuck in an impasse, caused by the difficulty of accounting for the ontological discrepancy between the continuity of sensation and the discreteness of digital technology. This article proposes a theoretical position intended to overcome that deadlock. It highlights how an ontological focus on continuity has entered media studies via readings of Deleuze, which attempt to build a ‘digital aisthesis’ (that is, a theory of digital sensation) by ascribing a ‘virtuality’ to computation. This underpins, in part, the affective turn in digital theory. In contrast to such positions, this article argues for a reconceptualization of formal abstraction in computation, in order to find, within the discreteness of computational formalisms (and not via the coupling of the latter with virtual sensation), an indeterminacy that would make computing aesthetic qua inherently generative. This indeterminacy, it is argued here, can be found by reconsidering, philosophically, Turing’s notion of ‘incomputability’.

History

Publication status

  • Published

File Version

  • Published version

Journal

Theory, Culture & Society

ISSN

0263-2764

Publisher

SAGE

Issue

1

Volume

36

Page range

3-26

Department affiliated with

  • Media and Film Publications

Research groups affiliated with

  • Sussex Humanities Lab Publications

Full text available

  • Yes

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2018-03-22

First Open Access (FOA) Date

2018-03-22

First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date

2018-03-22

Usage metrics

    University of Sussex (Publications)

    Categories

    No categories selected

    Licence

    Exports

    RefWorks
    BibTeX
    Ref. manager
    Endnote
    DataCite
    NLM
    DC