New Philosophy for New Media

In New Philosophy for New Media Mark Hansen defines the image in digital art in terms that go beyond the merely visual. Arguing that the digital image encompasses the entire process by which information is made perceivable, he places the body in a privileged position - as the agent that filters information in order to create images. By doing so, he counters prevailing notions of technological transcendence and argues for the indispensability of the human in the digital era. Hansen examines new media art and theory in light of Henri Bergson's argument that affection and memory render perception impure - that we select only those images precisely relevant to our singular form of embodiment. Hansen updates this argument for the digital age, arguing that we filter the information we receive to create images rather than simply receiving images as pre-existing technical forms. This framing function yields what Hansen calls the digital image. He argues that this new embodied status of the frame corresponds directly to the digital revolution: a digitised image is not a fixed representation of reality, but is defined by its complete flexibility and accessibility. It is not just that