I hate to reflect. I’m neither a mirror nor a reflector. More than that, I just plug in. I am not a sword. Is it not possible to simply state, to question, to raise? I can certainly see the debates of our time, the possible consequences of Photoshop, AI, AI, AI. To say no more, the abolition of royalties: download it and fuck you!
These consequences are unforeseeable and inescapable. The loss of credibility of the image traditionally considered authentic, the loss, or even the abolition, to say the least, of what we call, after Walter Benjamin, the aura… Which loss, of course, is creative, an activity. And here the snake bites its own tail. It becomes actual to create new gods. The woke-culture warriors will necessarily organise in hordes, iconoclasts will be clashed with the mee toos, who will form a coalition with the aggressive environmentalists… The 14th Dalai Lama explained that “anger and rage clouds our vision, and aggression produces even worse reactions”. Perhaps you should discuss this with the tomato soup bombers! I don’t mind the yellow peas, I really like them with fried onion rings. You can take the soup. I don’t want to follow Marx when he tries to turn Hegel’s thinking on its head, but think of the words of the Dalai Lama, Gyaco Tendzin.
I am, for the moment, only interested in whether I can create a valid view with the most traditional means, which deceptively resembles a generated visual surface, perhaps to indicate that the idea is still the decisive factor in the creation, and that the concrete view can be produced with more or less trouble and expense. Cost, because the analogue process has become very expensive. Digital is not cheap either, but it just flows, it flows, it’s the flesi.
To quote from my favourite poem: ‘There can be a martyr for the abandoned altar’ – to quote Imre Madách’s Eva.
Tamás Féner