AUGMENTED REALITY ART IN CONTEMPORARY VISUAL CULTURE

doi:10.26565/2306-6687-2024-69-01

Dmitry Petrenko DSc. In Philosophy, Head of the of the Department of Theory of Culture and Philosophy of Science, V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6771-2916
Lydia Starodubtseva DSc. In Philosophy, Acting Head of the of the Department of Media Communications, V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8259-4775

DOI: https://doi.org/10.26565/2306-6687-2024-69-01

Keywords: augmented reality art, digital culture, immersion, metamodernism, power, postmodernism, space, spatial turn, virtual reality, visual culture

Abstract

The article considers the artistic strategies of augmented reality (AR) art in the context of the «spatial turn». It is proposed to consider augmented reality art separately from the theories of culture that have developed around the phenomenon of virtual reality. The thesis is substantiated that the art of virtual reality was reflected within the framework of postmodernist theories that proceeded from the understanding of culture through the theory of the simulacrum. Instead, the art of augmented reality must be understood through the latest theories of culture that rely on post-discursive factors of culture and the material presence of cultural objects. It is proposed to consider the art of augmented reality through the phenomenon of spatial presence, which is the main feature of AR technologies – localization and binding of AR projects to specific spatial positions. AR-art is analyzed in the context of the spatial turn in modern humanitarian and social studies, which bring the problem of space to the forefront.

An appeal to the texts of AR-artists, creative manifestos and program articles allows us to conclude that AR-artists understand their work through the categories of a kind of return of art to reality and oppose the postmodernist understanding of art as a pure simulation. For AR-art, the combination of digital image and material presence in space is important. The article studies AR-projects of artists T. Thiel, G. A. Rhodes, J. K. Freeman, V. Pappenheimer and highlights the main artistic strategies inherent in AR-art. In particular, three main strategies are distinguished: invasion - the unexpected appearance of digital objects in public space, immersion - immersion in an augmented urban space, representation - a critical understanding of space in the context of historical, ecological or political narratives. It is determined that AR-art carries an emancipatory potential and can embody countercultural strategies of opposition to official discourses of power, which inscribe space into narratives of legitimization of existing power relations. AR-art embodies the latest strategies of metamodernist cultural practices of the 21st century and seeks new ways to understand man, society and the world.

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