The conference The Image-Thing will analyse the function of the image as an operator endowed with reality. By way of acknowledgement of its ontological dimensions, the conference will explore the key role that it plays between object and subject, as well as between the intelligible and sensible world.

Theories, practices and films will be presented that address today the different regimes of presence of images as well as their relative independence and exteriority, and develop directly or indirectly a reflection about imagination offering an alternative to the idea of an imaging consciousness distancing us from reality. Rather than being understood as an ineffectual figment of imagination, the image will be regarded as central to the understanding of life itself, thus becoming a vehicle for the comprehension of modes of existence that would otherwise escape our grasp. As written by Gilbert Simondon, the image-thing is a “sample of life”, a quasi-organism presenting itself according to its own forces, capable of inhabiting our consciousness like an intruder resisting the free will of the subject. Conceived of as exerting such a decisive role, the image will reveal itself as a vital function of the living.

Curated by Chiara Vecchiarelli
Scientific Committee: Martin Bethenod, Andrea Cavalletti, Benoît Tadié, Chiara Vecchiarelli, Angela Vettese, Frédéric Worms

Lectures by Andrea Cavalletti, Emanuele Coccia, Elie During, Bertrand Prévost, Chiara Vecchiarelli, Frédéric Worms, Dork Zabunyan
Screenings of works by Pierre Huyghe, Mark Lewis, Jonas Mekas, Peter Snowdon

Image: Pierre Huyghe, Cambrian Explosion, 2016, live marine ecosystem
Photo: Stefan Altenburger Photography Zürich

In collaboration with Università Iuav di Venezia, École normale supérieure de Paris, Institut français Italia.

Free entry

Program
Thursday, October 27

Morning

11am Welcome remarks

Screening
Outtakes From the Life of a Happy Man (excerpt, 4′) by Jonas Mekas

11.15-11.55am
Frédéric Worms How Images Live, and Relive

12.05-12.45pm
Bertrand Prévost Neither Objective nor Subjective, but Expressive: the Image

Afternoon

3-3.40pm
Elie During Volume-Image, Floating Time

Screening
Galeria do Rock (2′) and Brass Rail (3’50”) by Mark Lewis
Side/Walk/Shuttle (excerpt, 8’40”) by Ernie Gehr

3.50-4.30pm
Andrea Cavalletti Vertigo Effect

4.40-5.20pm
Dork Zabunyan Vernacular Images and Imagination of the Arab Uprisings: Revolution in Real Time 

5.30pm

Screening
The Uprising (1h19′) by Peter Snowdon

Friday, October 28

Morning

10.30-11.10am
Emanuele Coccia Seed Theory or the Living Images

11.20am-12.10pm
Chiara Vecchiarelli The image as a Function of Reality

12.20pm
Closing panel discussion, with Andrea Cavalletti, Emanuele Coccia, Elie During, Bertrand Prévost, Chiara Vecchiarelli, Frédéric Worms, Dork Zabunyan

Afternoon

Screening
3pm
L’Ellipse (13′) by Pierre Huyghe

3:15pm
Outtakes From the Life of a Happy Man (1h8′)  by Jonas Mekas

4:30pm
A Way in Untitled (14′)  by Pierre Huyghe

break

5pm

introduction by Elie During
Invention (1h27”)  by Mark Lewis