빌렘 플루서의 ‘無 의미’를 통해 본 디지털사진의 푼크툼 연구

Abstract

Flusser regards human history as the historical change in codes of images, texts, and technical images. He says, “decoding the meanings of technical image is jumping into the empty universe and will never been decipherable.” This study is intended to find the clues that he left in hope of their being decoded and consider how the meaning of empty universe is decoded through photography, the first technical image. First, photography is a device based on gaps. The nature of thinking in text that has a desire for “personal narrative” is inherent in technical image. Taking Wolfgang Iser, an aesthetician of reception, as an example, it can be said that a work is reified by filling up the gaps and indeterminate elements through “personal narrative” of the recipient. Second, the symbol used for classifying the history of codes by Flusser is divided into ‘a sign agreed upon’ and ‘a sign to be agreed upon’ according to the consideration on Peirce, a semiotician. Decoding ‘a sign agreed upon’ is available through unilateral acceptance while decoding ‘a sign to be agreed upon’ is available through “metonymy by recipients.” Third, following the texts by Flusser, the character of empty universe is defined as “to have infinite potential, possibility and inevitability, no unchanging truth or objective meaning.” Here Flusser himself says: “The value of truth in photography is meaningless. Probability calculation and indeterminacy are dominant.” Based on Flusser’s theory, classical photography and digital one have the same position in ontology. It was observed that their principles and processes of decoding are identical, and therefore, digital photography also owns studium and punctum. Conclusionally, it can be seen that decoding technical image, especially photography, derives from the recipient-oriented interpretation and the recognition of potentials of its infinite meaning.