Chroma Key Dreams: Algorithmic Visibility, Fleshy Images and Scenes of Recognition

TY - JOUR

T1 - Chroma Key Dreams

T2 - Algorithmic Visibility, Fleshy Images and Scenes of Recognition

AU - Agostinho, Daniela

PY - 2018

Y1 - 2018

N2 - The increasing pervasiveness of datafication across social life is significantly challenging the scope and meanings of visibility. How do new modes of data capture compel us to rethink the notion of visibility, no longer understood as an ocular-based perceptual field, but as a multifaceted site of power? Focusing in particular on technologies of algorithmic recognition, the article argues that in order to understand the broad stakes of visibility under algorithmic life, the intersection between algorithmic recognition and the notion of social recognizability needs to be further theorized. In dialogue with the work of Sondra Perry, and drawing on contributions from feminist and critical race theories, the article revisits theoretical debates on racialized visibility within photography and film to show how racializing processes are inscribed in digital and algorithmictechnologies. In reading through these debates, the article suggests that visibility, as a racial formation, is always already subjected to an algorithmic logic. Through the analysis of Sondra Perry’s work, the article sketches out a political ontology of the image premised on the intersection between computation and the markings of the flesh as a possible way to think through the stakes of visibility under algorithmic life.

AB - The increasing pervasiveness of datafication across social life is significantly challenging the scope and meanings of visibility. How do new modes of data capture compel us to rethink the notion of visibility, no longer understood as an ocular-based perceptual field, but as a multifaceted site of power? Focusing in particular on technologies of algorithmic recognition, the article argues that in order to understand the broad stakes of visibility under algorithmic life, the intersection between algorithmic recognition and the notion of social recognizability needs to be further theorized. In dialogue with the work of Sondra Perry, and drawing on contributions from feminist and critical race theories, the article revisits theoretical debates on racialized visibility within photography and film to show how racializing processes are inscribed in digital and algorithmictechnologies. In reading through these debates, the article suggests that visibility, as a racial formation, is always already subjected to an algorithmic logic. Through the analysis of Sondra Perry’s work, the article sketches out a political ontology of the image premised on the intersection between computation and the markings of the flesh as a possible way to think through the stakes of visibility under algorithmic life.

KW - Faculty of Humanities

KW - Sondra Perry

KW - algorithms

KW - blackness

KW - flesh

KW - opacity

KW - race

KW - recognition

KW - visibility

U2 - 10.1386/pop.9.2.131_1

DO - 10.1386/pop.9.2.131_1

M3 - Journal article

SN - 2040-3682

VL - 9

SP - 131

EP - 155

JO - Philosophy of Photography

JF - Philosophy of Photography

IS - 2

ER -