Vision and its link to the Philosophy and Beliefs of its Time

The sense of sight is arguably the most prominent and valued one in our society. I read a very interesting essay by Martin Jay called Scopic Regimes of Modernity from his book Vision and Visuality which explores this notion by breaking down of visual experience into three key types of visual subcultures (scopic regimes) which have emerged since the Renaissance. He argues that although Cartesian perspectivalism dominates, it is more accurate to hold all three in mind to understand vision. “the scopic regime of modernity may best be understood as a contested terrain, rather than a harmoniously integrated complex of visual theories and practices” (p.4).


What I personally find most interesting about this essay is that in each instance, the context of the historical timeframe that each theory arises from seems inextricably linked to it. This throws up an interesting question - does the nature of vision change depending on when we live and experience culture? Also, if our vision is changed - thus the space we perceive too is altered, laying out the final question, what is our contemporary space? Can I use the critical techniques of the essay or ones like it to decifer a notion of vision for 2009 and what is the space it perceives?


This question brings me back to my interest in the ideas explored and developed by neuroscience. Because of the brain's plasticity, the individual's experience shapes their perception of space and reality. The individuals experience is among others shaped by the era they are part of.


But back to Jay. The Baptism of Christ by Leonardo da Vinci (1472 - 1475)


1. Cartesian perspectivalism:

Otherwise known as one point perspective which came from southern European Renaissance ideas, it exemplified the Renaissance endeavor to incorporate science into all aspects of life. Although the word Cartesian stems from its association to René Descartes, Jay sees Cartesian perspectivalism as being contrary to Descartes philosophy . Jay quotes Richard Rorty from his 'Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature" (1979) "In the Cartesian model the intellect inspects entities modeled on retinal images...In Descartes' conception - the one that became the basis for 'modern' epistemology - it is representations which are in the mind."

Jay finds fault in a number of areas with this method of vision, which assumes a fixed and singular eye / viewing point. Jay argues that that both viewer and painter are disembodied, writing that "the bodies of the painter and the viewer were forgotten in the name of an allegedly disincarnated, absolute eye." It is unnatural, not accounting for normal binocular vision or the dynamic, saccadic motion of the human eye. He writes

"In Norman Bryson's terms, it followed the logic of the Gaze rather than the Glance, thus producing a visual take that was eternalised, reduced to one"point of view" and disembodied."(p.7)

He also notes that this de-eroticises the art: "The moment of erotic projection in vision - what St Augustine had anxiously condemned as "occular desire" - was lost as the bodies of the painter and viewer were forgotten in the name of an allegedly disincarnated, absolute eye." (p.8)
The Music Lesson by Johannes Vermeer (1632-75)
2. Baconian perspectivalism

As a sub group of Cartesian perspectivalism occuring in Northern Europe, in exemplified by the Dutch 17th century painters like Vermeer, in which the eye of the observer ceases , the frame is removed and the work is based around the objects existing independently of a viewer.
"The projection is, one might say, viewed from nowhere. Nor is it to be looked through. It assumes a flat working surface." (p.15)
The emphasis is on the fragmentary nature of reality, "attention to many small things versus a few large ones; light reflected off objects versus objects modelled by light and shadow; the surface of objects; their colours and textures, dealt with rather than their placement in a legible space..." (p.13 - quoting Svetlana Alpers. The Art of Describing: Dutch Art in the Seventeenth century p.44) Modern day photography and film are described as being the descendants of these method of vision.The Hermitage Winter Palace, St Petersburg by Rastrelli
3. Baroque Vision:

Jay is most interested and excited by this model of vision which he desribes as "more radical alternative". Although introduces 'the baroque' by its conventionally understood context in the 17th century and its links to the Catholic counter Reformation, he goes on to state that "it may also be possible to see it as a permanent, if often repressed, visual possibility throughout the entire modern era."

Using the writing of the French philosopher Christine Buci-Glucksmann, La Raison Baroque of 1984 and La folie du voir of 1986, he sets up this third model as the one most relevant and appropriate to the reality of vision in the modern age. There are many comparisions to be made in the way in which he describes this vision with the writings of the deconstructivists such as Derrida. He writes, "the baroque self-consciously revels in the contradictions between surface and depth, disparaging as a result any attempt to reduce the multiplicity of visual spaces into any one coherant essence."

He himself compares it to other philosophical systems: "Leibniz's pluralism of monadic viewpoints, Pascal's meditations on paradox, and the Counter Reformation mystic's submission to vertiginous experiences of rapture might all be seen as related to baroque vision."