A Critical re-appraisal and re-alignment of the viewing screen by means of an experimental body of fine art practice

The typical rectangular viewing screen is a ubiquitous tool in the everyday, a formal presence in the workplace, at home, and in public spaces. The result of such ubiquity is the viewer’s desensitisation towards the screens increasingly invisible objecthood. Instead, a hierarchy of viewership is formed – focus on images preceding focus on the screen structures that deliver them.

This research employs an experimental body of fine art practice to critically re-align and re-centre the viewing screen in this embedded viewing hierarchy of image first, structure second. Initially centered around the hybridised practice-based methodology driving this enquiry, subsequent chapters in this thesis map the range of the practice’s investigation. These chapters include ‘Objecthood of the screen’, ‘Screen and mobility, ‘The Problematic Image’, and ‘The Phenomenological Screen’ and ‘Moving Image Precedents’, each providing a basis for interrogative practical outcomes through relevant theoretical literary sources and fine art-centric contextual references.

This research contributes a key finding and new knowledge to the field of the visual arts in this unique critical appraisal, and subsequent realignment of the viewing screen engendered by the various thematic aspects and unique conceptual frameworks presented in and alongside its experimental body of fine art practice. Provoking a reevaluation of viewer engagement with the screen may encourage a change in viewership of screen-based image in a society increasingly dependent on digital imagery.