Nature as violent and violated : Five essays on the visual culture of the Anthropocene

• Main Author: Vik, Synnøve Marie
• Format: Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: The University of Bergen 2021
• Subjects: Arctic; Johannessen
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/11250/2725510

This dissertation aims to explore the configuration of the relationship between nature and technology in a selection of significant works from contemporary visual culture, that have not previously been subject to a similar ecocritical analysis. I engage with central concepts to the field of visual culture, focusing primarily on the Anthropocene, violence, technology, and visuality. Through deploying and developing this theoretical framework on a heterogenous image material from 1959 to 2015, I find that nature is depicted as violent and violated, a paradoxical condition which also presents itself in the depiction of humanity and its extensions. The dissertation demonstrates the relevance of visual culture analyses to the critical study of the Anthropocene and the academic field of environmental humanities. I approach the main research question through five independent articles. Inspired by Jacques Rancière’s concept of mediality, the first article asks how a media ecological analysis may contribute to a discussion on media’s material, physical consequences on the environment today, in a study of the auto-destructive and auto-creative art of Gustav Metzger. The second article describes how Olafur Eliasson’s art installations and photography engage with nature and technology, demonstrating how his projects both epitomize and challenge Jussi Parikka’s notion of a topological media ecology. Exploring the visual construction of authority over the Arctic, the third article explores PR photography accompanying resource extraction by way of tar sand and shale gas installations, carried out by the oil company Statoil (now Equinor). Further exploring the perspectives of visuality and media ecology, the fourth article examines an art installation by Toril Johannessen that researches objects used to uncover the laws of light and vision, displaying the geological foundation of modernity. Finally, in an analysis of the TV series Treme (2010) and the motion picture Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012), I identify the visuality ...