The term afterimage describes when an image persists in one’s vision, even after exposure to the original image has ceased.
Matters of ownership and authorial privilege are now greatly problematized by the volume and fluid interchange of information on the Internet. Artists are reflecting this cultural shift with a more deliberate presence—literal or technical—in their work, and, especially, interjected into that of another. Unusual juxtapositions invest mundane or familiar objects with new vitality and forge new histories. Simple cut-and-paste (by hand or digitally) becomes a revelatory and critical act. Referencing and borrowing are now commonplace, and are no longer exclusive to new media work.
Ultimately, these practices exploit the rift between history and the formation of memory—how do we reconcile an image or object’s original intent, meaning, and context with new exposures? If an image has a past and a present, who determines its future and how? The artists selected for AFTER IMAGE take this moment as an invitation to intervene, and to further diffuse the concept of artist as sole maker of meaning.
