CommentStreams:9de792c8713424d02a8e2a66037c1d01

Hi Daria, I felt very much inspired by your text to revisit the construction of affect through investigating the algorithmic manipulation of distance and proximity. The commodification of desire and affect are often discussed in the filed of film and pornography studies as well. With the word "Haptic Visuality" for example (see Touch: Sensuous Theory and Multisensory Media (2002)), film critique Laura Marks introduces various film works that generates corporial bodies as something unobjectifiable, thorough filming them with extreme close-up or unstable camera works.

"A haptic pornography would invite a very different way of engaging with the image. The haptic image indicates figures and then backs away from representing them fully—or, often, moves so close to them that for that reason they are no longer visible. Rather than making the object fully available to view, haptic cinema puts the object into question, calling on the viewer to engage in its imaginative construction. Haptic images pull the viewer close, too close to see properly, and this itself is erotic." from Touch: Sensuous Theory and Multisensory Media (2002) e-book P.16

I believe your critique on the affect also deals with the proximity and eroticism that camera gaze can strategiclly produce or deconstruct. What do you think? See you soon in Berlin.