Artificial, natural, historical

Julian Rohrhuber

pp. 60-70

in: Randy Adams, Steve Gibson, Stefan Müller Arisona (eds), Transdisciplinary digital art. sound, vision and the new screen, Berlin, Springer, 2008

Abstract

This article discusses the role of sound for the formation of authenticity and historicity in film. In the light of the documentary All That We Have, it argues that the delimitation between "natural" and "artificial" constitutes a key element for the construction of the authentic. Algorithmic sound synthesis is shown to be a possible intervention within this construction. Informed by a generally epistemological orientation, this analysis inquires how form, method and content may together contribute to a critique of a naturalization of history.