COPYRIGHT AND USE OF THIS THESIS This thesis must be used in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1968. Reproduction of material protected by copyright may be an infringement of copyright and copyright owners may be entitled to take legal action against persons who infringe their copyright. Section 51 (2) of the Copyright Act permits an authorized officer of a university library or archives to provide a copy (by communication or otherwise) of an unpublished thesis kept in the library or archives, to a person who satisfies the authorized officer that he or she requires the reproduction for the purposes of research or study. The Copyright Act grants the creator of a work a number of moral rights, specifically the right of attribution, the right against false attribution and the right of integrity. You may infringe the author’s moral rights if you: - fail to acknowledge the author of this thesis if you quote sections from the work - attribute this thesis to another author - subject this thesis to derogatory treatment which may prejudice the author’s reputation For further information contact the University’s Director of Copyright Services sydney.edu.au/copyright The Cinematic Aesthetics of Digital Virtualism Heon Jeong A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Art History and Film Studies Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences The University of Sydney 2014 Statement of Originality This is to certify that to the best of my knowledge, the content of this thesis is my own work. This thesis has not been submitted for any degree or other purposes. I certify that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work and that all the assistance received in preparing this thesis and sources have been acknowledged. ……………………………….. Heon Jeong April 2014 ii Acknowledgement This thesis is a product of my life, love, and tears. I hope that this dissertation is dedicated to people’s lives and happiness. I also wish that this thesis becomes a little compass for the future of cinema and cinephiles. I would like to express my gratitude to all those who gave me the possibility to complete this thesis. I especially want to thank my supervisor, Dr. Richard Smith for his guidance during my PhD research at The University of Sydney. His perpetual favour and concern had motivated all my research. He encouraged me to go ahead with my thesis. I deeply appreciate his help and support for me. Furthermore, I want to thank Dr. Alan Cholodenko, Dr. Laleen Jayamanne, Dr. Bruce Isaacs, Dr. Mary Roberts, Dr. Keith Broadfoot and School administration manager Ms. Elizabeth Conner for all their help, support, interest and valuable advices at Department of Art History and Film Studies in The University of Sydney. My deepest gratitude goes to my family for their heartfelt love and support throughout my life; this dissertation is simply impossible without them. I am indebted to my parents and siblings during my whole life. Especially, I would like to give my special thanks to my wife Sung Ah Lee whose patient love enabled me to complete this work. I always love you. I also thank my two sons, Henry Yeonsu Jeong and Harry Yeonchan Jeong. You have made my life more fertile and bountiful. I would like to thank all people who have helped and inspired me for my life. God bless you! iii Abstract This dissertation explores the cinematic ontology of digital virtualism in the context of the current trend to digitalisation. I define digital virtualism as the aesthetics of assemblage and configuration in the age of digital images. This definition implies that digital technology strengthens the complex tension between physical reality and imaginary illusion. Based on computer simulation and synthesis, the digital image intensifies the contradiction between cinematic materiality and immateriality. Digital virtualism is the aesthetics of historical hybridity and aesthetic complexity between the actual and the virtual, the indexical and the symbolic, the material and the immaterial, the real and the imaginary. In this context, this thesis examines the aesthetical relationship of filmic virtuality and the digital image. In particular, I assert that the digital image is the new form and expansion of filmic virtuality. While film is always the art of the virtual, that is, the aesthetic imbrication of actual indexicality and imaginary illusion, the digital image intensifies the contradiction of filmic virtuality between reality and illusion. On one hand, computer simulation reinforces the indexicality of film by the principle of perceptual realism. On the other hand, it attenuates the causality between the object and the image by digital manipulation. I argue that digital technology simultaneously intensifies both filmic reality and the manipulation of the imaginary. Thus, the digital image expands the expressive force and aesthetic potential of cinema. After examining the cinematic aesthetics of realism, modernism, postmodernism, and digital aesthetics after postmodernism, this dissertation investigates the aesthetical implications of Deleuzian virtuality in the age of the digital image. Deleuze presents the cinematic aesthetics of virtual conjunction in the monism of simulacra, which implies the indiscernible and inextricable imbrication of the actual and the virtual, original and copy, reality and image, and cinematic movement and time. Following the discussion of the aesthetical ontology of Deleuzian virtuality, this dissertation theorises the assemblage aesthetics of digital virtualism. Consequently, this dissertation proposes the subjective and practical task of digital ethics. Digital technology intensifies the spectacular attraction of images and the interactive participation of iv spectators in the cinematic process. In contrast, the digital image reveals technological fetishism and aesthetic commercialisation. Based on the ontological contradiction of the digital image, this dissertation articulates the configurative aesthetics and the subjective ethics of digital virtualism. v Table of Contents Introduction 1 1. The Definition of Digital Virtuality 14 1-1. The Concept of Virtuality 16 1-2. The Virtuality of the Image: History and Aesthetics 23 1-3. The Virtuality of Film 33 1-4. Digital Virtuality: Concept and Historicity 44 2. The Aesthetics of Digital Virtualism 76 2-1. The Aesthetics of Hybridity 78 2-2. The Aesthetics of Synthesis 87 2-3. The Aesthetics of Materiality 100 2-4. The Aesthetics of Information 116 3. Film Aesthetics and Digital Virtualism 131 3-1. Realism: Bazin and Indexicality 133 vi 3-2. Modernism: Metz and the Imaginary 145 3-3. Postmodernism: Baudrillard and Hyperreality 159 3-4. After Postmodernism: Digital Aesthetics beyond Postmodernism 176 4. Gilles Deleuze and Digital Virtualism 193 4-1. The Ontology of Simulacra: From Representation To Virtual Conjunction 197 4-2. Cinematic Movement: Materiality and Sensation 212 4-3. Digital Time: Crystal-Image and Digital Virtualism 227 Conclusion 251 Bibliography 263 Filmography 279 vii Introduction 1 This thesis explores the aesthetics of digital virtualism as a new ontology of cinematic digitalisation. Digital virtualism is the hybrid aesthetics of physical reality and imaginary illusion. This definition implies the imbrication and bridging of the real and the unreal, the actual and the potential, and the material and the immaterial. Digital virtualism is the cinematic aesthetics of assemblage and configuration, which takes place in the virtual simulation of the computer. Since the rapid computerisation of film technology in the 1990s, the aesthetics of digital virtuality has proliferated in the world of cinema. This is because data algorithms and numerical manipulation have intensified the virtual simulation of film images. Hence, digital virtualism strengthens filmic virtuality. The virtuality of digital cinema expands and reinforces the contradictory complexity between the reality and the imagination of cinema. Digital cinema is a successor to and new form of filmic virtuality. This thesis is based on the balanced view of continuity and discontinuity between film and digital image. I assert that digital technology has transformed the virtuality of cinema from the photochemical to the digital, which raises two related questions concerning the aesthetics of film. First, what is the relation between filmic reality and digital cinema? Does computer synthesis herald the end of filmic indexicality? Indeed, the aesthetics of digital virtualism evokes the issue of filmic indexicality. In this thesis, I will argue that computer-simulated images retain filmic indexicality. As Philip Rosen observes, ‘digital mimicry’ also works on the ground of indexicality and historicity.1 Although filmic indexicality is transformed by digital manipulation, cinema still exists in relationship to physical reality. However, the aesthetics of digital virtualism implies a new, different, and heightened reality of cinema. My next question concerns how the imaginary nature of film has changed with the spread of digital technology. How does digital technology transform the nature of cinematic illusion? Digital cinema has provoked a theoretical debate about the nature of the filmic imagination, including cinematic affection, thought, dream, fantasy, and illusion. The 1 Philip Rosen, Change Mummified, Minneapolis, London: University of Minnesota Press, 2001, pp.307- 309. 2 Tom Gunning, Moving Away From the Index: Cinema and the Impression of Reality, A Journal of 2