BETWEEN IMAGE AND GESTURE: GROUPE μ VISUAL RHETORIC WITHIN THE METAMODERN HORIZON
Abstract
This article explores the evolution of Groupe μ visual rhetoric within the context of metamodern aesthetics. The foundational tenets of their work, Traité du signe visuel (1992), are analyzed as the theoretical basis for an affective semiotics of the image. The paper clarifies the notion of post-figurativity as a metamodern gesture that enables a sensuous-affective interaction between the image and the viewer. It is demonstrated that post-figurative thinking shapes a new rhetoric of co-being, where the image functions not as a representation, but as an event of shared affect.
The phenomenon of the post-figurative image is analyzed within the context of metamodernism's aesthetics. The authors consider post-figurativity as a form of visual gesture that embodies doubt, affect, and an invitation to co-being. Through examples of contemporary visual images, it is shown how the post-figurative emerges not as a representation, but as an affective event open to mutual interpretation.
Furthermore, the authors analyze the phenomenon of screenality (or écranité) in metamodern culture and explain the methodological significance of Groupe μ contribution for understanding this feature of contemporary life. Screenality is interpreted as a condition of shared presence, where affect becomes a new type of communicative action, and the screen functions as a space of co-presence. Metamodern culture is defined not merely as a culture of images, but as a screen culture in which screenality transforms into a new ontology of vision, forming an interface of empathy where the spectator becomes a co-participant in the visual.
The conclusion asserts that Groupe μ conception of visual rhetoric established the groundwork for understanding the image as a structural system of signs where form possesses cognitive status. This concept resonates with the logic of metamodern culture, engaging it in communication and creating not an image as a message, but an image as an echo of co-being.
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