生成屏幕:视觉媒介终端的未来考古学

Becoming Screen:Future Archaeology of Visual Display Terminal

屏幕无处不在,通常被默认为是一种技术化的光学设备和视觉媒介终端。但光亮所照之处,屏幕背后的发展史却晦暗不明。本文沿着媒介考古学、媒介系谱学和媒介古生物学的理论路径,在历史和未来中寻找挑战性的屏幕形态。中国历史上的屏风是重要的绘画媒材,它体现了空间隔断和象征再现的合二为一;作为光学设备的当代屏幕则在类型学和形态学上呈现出复杂性;初露端倪的虚拟现实促使屏幕隐没,但它的附在与透出揭示了它的本体——构成环境。屏幕是人抵达所存在世界的中介物,它的生成即是这一世界的生成。

Screens are ubiquitous and are often tacitly assumed to be technologically enabled optical devices and visual display terminals.However,the history of screen development is obscure.This paper follows the theoretical paths of media archaeology,media genealogy and media paleontology to find uncommon screen forms in history and the future.The Chinese traditional screen“pingfeng”is an important medium for painting,embodying the merging of spatial partition and symbolic representation;the contemporary screen as an optical device is typologically and morphologically complex;the virtual reality drives the screen into invisibility,but its“on”and“through”reveals its very being,the constitutive environment.The screen is the mediator between us and the world we exist,and its becoming is the becoming of that world.