Lecture Lital Henig (Ben Gurion): Visual compositing
Visual compositing: Engagement, interpretation, and visualization of archival imagery in Holocaust memory in digital culture.
Archival images of the Holocaust have been and continue to be an essential component of Holocaust memory and representation. In recent years, Holocaust memory projects have begun using these images in fragmented forms, copied, cut, and pasted into new configurations. This lecture will explore this visual trend and examine it through the concept of visual compositing: layering images to create a new understanding of their collective symbolism. Through visual analysis of four recent digital and non-digital Holocaust memory works, I analyze the practice of visual compositing and its influence on recent Holocaust memory. By exploring recent works through diachronic and synchronic axes, I argue that visual compositing influences both the visual representation of Holocaust memory and the memory work involved in this kind of representation. While engaging in visual compositing, creators generate or invite others to create new representations of the Holocaust. This act offers opportunities to explore the past from new perspectives, but also risks diminishing the singularity and specificity of the represented experiences. The lecture concludes by showing how visual compositing calls for adopting a new visual literacy for Holocaust representation and memory, working in and evolving with digital culture.