Thursday, December 4, 2008

A Performative Image


To my mind a performative image has the potential to change the world, to inspire thought and action in the viewer and to, in some way, affect the world. Bolt writes about the importance of the relationship between images and reality and to my mind this image captures this relationship very well. By presenting very clearly and in an almost 'violent' way the effects that smoking can have on your body, this image (taken from an ad campaign) has the potential to influence the actions of the viewer, therefore making it truly performative. Whether or not the image is able to inspire change is up to the viewer themselves, whether they choose to learn from what has been show to them and use this to in some way change the way that they live. The fact that the image has the potential to inspire this sort of change is what makes it performative and therefore very powerful, illustrating to us Artaud's emphasis on reality within performance. It is the reality within the image that gives it the ability to have such an impact.

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