BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Sabre//Sabre VObject 4.6.0//EN CALSCALE:GREGORIAN BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/Zurich X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/Zurich TZURL:http://tzurl.org/zoneinfo/Europe/Zurich BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0200 TZNAME:CEST DTSTART:19810329T020000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=3;BYDAY=-1SU END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:+0200 TZOFFSETTO:+0100 TZNAME:CET DTSTART:19961027T030000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=10;BYDAY=-1SU END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT UID:news351@eikones.philhist.unibas.ch DTSTAMP;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20260818T174718 DTSTART;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20260915T181500 SUMMARY:Fragile Images: Naturalism and Camouflage DESCRIPTION:Many Greco-Roman anecdotes about interactions between images an d their viewers raise the issue of naturalism and its deceptive powers. Pe rhaps most famously in Pliny's anecdote about grapes painted by Parrhasius \, the birds mistake the image for what it represents and start pecking at the painting (Natural History xxxv.65). Here we have a typical case of on tological oscillation: in the perception of the viewer the image dissolves into\, or is elided with what it represents. Much commentary has focused on the painter’s virtuosity in creating a lifelike illusion\, yet one as pect remains underexplored: the behaviour of the birds themselves. The sto ry is not simply about artistic triumph\; it also presupposes that animals possess the perceptual and semiotic abilities needed to be deceived by an image.  \\r\\nNow animals are not only deceived by images: in camouflag e they are also deceivers. Both Parrhasius' painting and the octopus who b ecomes the image of its surroundings present themselves as something they are not. The painting deceives the birds\, just as the octopus deceives it s predators into taking it for something it is not. In Antiquity this abil ity of animals to create deceptive images was often noted\, both in zoolog ical writing\, but also represented in vase painting and mosaics. Even tho ugh Pliny's anecdote is not about camouflage as such\, it is a major state ment about similarities between animal and human image-making and -viewing . \\r\\nTaking into consideration visual deception by animals shows that naturalism does not always result in an awareness of the pictorial illusio n (as in trompe l'oeil paintings). Instead\, visual deception modelled on animal deceptive behaviour\, and sometimes using animal shapes to deceive\ , leads to an unstable relation in which the viewer remains captivated in visual ambiguity. At the same time\, such forms of deception should not be understood merely as representational phenomena. As is already evident in animal camouflage\, they function as forms of adaptive and social behavio ur\, embedded in interactions between agents and observers\, and aimed at survival. In this sense\, naturalism operates not only at the level of ima ges\, but within behavioural strategies. \\r\\nIn other words\, my aim is to consider human and animal image-making as part of a spectrum of mimeti c behaviour\, perceptual and cognitive abilities shared by human and anima ls. Where Philippe Descola has recently given an anthropological framework to naturalist painting of the early modern period\, I here propose to giv e an ethological foundation to naturalism in the arts.  X-ALT-DESC:

Many Greco-Roman anecdotes about interactions between images and their viewers raise the issue of naturalism and its deceptive powers. Perhaps most famously in Pliny's anecdote about grapes painted by Parrhasi us\, the birds mistake the image for what it represents and start pecking at the painting (Natural History xxxv.65). Here we have a typical case of ontological oscillation: in the perception of the viewer the image dissolv es into\, or is elided with what it represents. Much commentary has focuse d on the painter’s virtuosity in creating a lifelike illusion\, yet one aspect remains underexplored: the behaviour of the birds themselves. The s tory is not simply about artistic triumph\; it also presupposes that anima ls possess the perceptual and semiotic abilities needed to be deceived by an image. \; \;

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Now animals are not only deceived by image s: in camouflage they are also deceivers. Both Parrhasius' painting and th e octopus who becomes the image of its surroundings present themselves as something they are not. The painting deceives the birds\, just as the octo pus deceives its predators into taking it for something it is not. In Anti quity this ability of animals to create deceptive images was often noted\, both in zoological writing\, but also represented in vase painting and mo saics. Even though Pliny's anecdote is not about camouflage as such\, it i s a major statement about similarities between animal and human image-maki ng and -viewing. \;

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Taking into consideration visual deception by animals shows that naturalism does not always result in an awareness o f the pictorial illusion (as in trompe l'oeil paintings). Instead\, visual deception modelled on animal deceptive behaviour\, and sometimes using an imal shapes to deceive\, leads to an unstable relation in which the viewer remains captivated in visual ambiguity. At the same time\, such forms of deception should not be understood merely as representational phenomena. A s is already evident in animal camouflage\, they function as forms of adap tive and social behaviour\, embedded in interactions between agents and ob servers\, and aimed at survival. In this sense\, naturalism operates not o nly at the level of images\, but within behavioural strategies. \;

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In other words\, my aim is to consider human and animal image-making as part of a spectrum of mimetic behaviour\, perceptual and cognitive abil ities shared by human and animals. Where Philippe Descola has recently giv en an anthropological framework to naturalist painting of the early modern period\, I here propose to give an ethological foundation to naturalism i n the arts. \;

DTEND;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20260915T193000 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR