Since its beginnings in the 1990s, artistic research has become established as a new format in the areas of educational and institutional policy, aesthetics, and art theory. It has now diffused into almost all artistic fields, from installation to experimental formats to contemporary music, literature, dance, or performance art. But from its beginnings--under labels like "art and science" or "scienceart" or "artscience" that mention both disciplines in one breath--it has been in competition with academic research, without its own concept of research having been adequately clarified. This manifesto attempts to resolve the problem and to defend the term. Further, this manifesto defends the radical potential of artistic research against those who toy all too carefully with university formats, wishing to ally their work with scientific principles. Its aim is to emphasize the autonomy and particular intellectuality of artistic research, without seeking to justify its legitimacy or adopt alien standards.

Emmanuel Levinas's interview with Francoise Armengaud in 1988 is one of the only statements we have from the philosopher, who became influential in various disciplines through his ethics that focuses on the fine arts specifically. Presented in English for the first time here, this interview brings us Levinas's understanding of "obliteration" as an uncanny, disruptive, and even "unavailable" concept. Discussing the work of the French sculptor Sacha Sosno, Levinas parses the complex relationship between ethics and aesthetics, examining how they play out in artistic operations and practices. In doing so, he turns away from the "ease and lighthearted casualness of the beautiful" to shed light instead on the processes of material wear and tear and the traces of repair that go into the creation and maintenance of works of art, and which ultimately give them a profound uniqueness of presence. This evocative interview uncovers a hidden thread of aesthetic thinking in Levinas's work and introduces a new way of looking at artistic practices in general.

Theodor Adorno's famous aesthetic theory was not merely a theory of the aesthetic; it also made a wider claim about the aesthetic implications of all theory. At the same time we have to deal with aesthetic objects and events in which an aesthetic theory is inherent, which show themselves as art. From both sides--theory and aesthetics--a link can be made to the etymological meaning of theoria, which understands the theoretical as a seeing or perspective. Featuring lucid essays by major thinkers, the book examines this link, focusing equally on the aesthetic implications of theory and the theoretical implications of aesthetic events.

Schmerzen, korperliche Erschopfung, Erosionen oder Spuren zeitlichen Verfalls und ahnliches verweisen auf Erfahrungen, die sich diskursiver Einholung nicht ohne weiteres fugen. Mit dem Formlosen, der blossen Materialitat oder dem Chaos assoziiert, widersetzen sie sich den generellen Begriffen des Textes und des Verstehens. Zudem verweigern sie sich ihrer Entschlusselung als Konstruktion im Sinne ihrer begrifflichen Bezeichnung und Unterscheidung wie auch ihrer Inszenierung als einer asthetischen Praxis, weil sie in allen ihren Hervorbringungen als eine nicht aufgehende Heterogenitat immer schon mitschwingen. Denn es gibt keine Arbeit ohne den Rest, keinen Diskurs ohne das Nichteinholbare oder Undarstellbare, keine Technik ohne Versagen, kein Denken ohne die Widerstandigkeit der Dinge, worin sie ebenso sehr verwickelt sind, wie sie diese verleugnen. Posthermeneutik ist der Versuch, diese andere, negative Seite neu zu denken und damit das mit einzubeziehen, was nicht Verstehen ist, aber ins Verstehen eingeht, was nicht Zeichen ist, aber notwendige Voraussetzung aller Zeichenprozesse bleibt, was nicht Sinn ist, aber die Bedeutungen stort, was nicht Medium ist, aber alle Medialitat mitpragt."

Providing a solid media-philosophical groundwork, Beyond Mimesis contributes to the theory of mimesis and alterity in performance philosophy while serving to stimulate and inspire future inquiries where studies in media and art intersect with philosophy. It collects a wide range of philosophical and artistic thinkers' work to develop an exacting framework with clear movement beyond mimesis in aesthetic experiences in uncanny valleys. Together, the chapters ask if intersubjective acts of relating that are defined by alterity, responsivity or witness and trust can be transferred to artificial beings without remainder. The proposed framework uses a particularly fruitful theoretical model for this inquiry known as the “uncanny valley�—a fictitious schema developed in 1970 by Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori. According to Mori, artificial beings or animated dolls become more eerie to us the more “humanlike� they appear. The model’s utility requires distinguishing between visual media and real life, but in general, it suggests that there is a fundamental incommensurability between people and artificial beings that cannot be ignored. This necessitates that all-too realistic representations as well as fictional encounters with artificial beings do not transgress certain limits. According to Mori, it is an ethical imperative of their design that they evidence a certain degree of dissimilarity with people. This notion seems especially applicable to artistic projects in which animated dolls or robots make explicit their “doll-ness� or “robot-ness� and thus inscribe a moment of reflexivity into the relations they establish. List of contributors: Carolin Bebek, Nadja Ben Khelifa, Misha Choudry, Elena Dorfman, Nicole Kuʻuleinapuananiolikoawapuhimelemeleolani Furtado, Stephan Günzel, Simon Makhali, Dieter Mersch, Grant Palmer, Jörg Sternagel, Anna Suchard, James Tobias, Allison de Fren.

This volume offers transdisciplinary perspectives on the study of acting and performance in moving image forms. It assembles 26 international scholars from dance, theatre, film, media and cultural studies, art history and philosophy to investigate the art of acting and the presence of the human body in analog and digital film, animation and video art. The volume includes classical case studies and essays devoted to acting history and acting and genres, but its particular emphasis is on introducing a wide range of groundbreaking theoretical approaches - from continental and analytic philosophy to new media theory and cognitivist research - all of which interrogate the fundamental conceptions of "act" and "actor" that underwrite both popular and academic notions of performance in moving image culture.

The figure of the 'other' is fundamental to the concept of communication. Online or offline, communication, which is commonly defined as the act of sending or imparting information to others, is only possible in the face of others. In fact, the reason we communicate is to interact with others-to talk to another, to share our thoughts and insights with them, or to respond to their needs and requests. No matter how it is structured or conceptualized, communication is involved with addressing the other and dealing with the ontological, epistemological, and ethical questions of otherness or alterity. But who or what can be other? Who or what can be the subject of communication? Is the other always and only another human? Or can the other in these communicative interactions be otherwise? This book is about others (and other kinds of others). It concerns the current position and status of the other in the face of technological innovations that can, in one way or another distort, mask, or even deface the other. Ten innovative essays, written by an international team of experts, individually and in collaboration with each other, seek to diagnose the current situation with otherness, devise innovative solutions to the questions of alterity, and provide insight for students, teachers and researchers trying to make sense of the opportunities and challenges of the 21st century.

The figure of the 'other' is fundamental to the concept of communication. Online or offline, communication, which is commonly defined as the act of sending or imparting information to others, is only possible in the face of others. In fact, the reason we communicate is to interact with others-to talk to another, to share our thoughts and insights with them, or to respond to their needs and requests. No matter how it is structured or conceptualized, communication is involved with addressing the other and dealing with the ontological, epistemological, and ethical questions of otherness or alterity. But who or what can be other? Who or what can be the subject of communication? Is the other always and only another human? Or can the other in these communicative interactions be otherwise? This book is about others (and other kinds of others). It concerns the current position and status of the other in the face of technological innovations that can, in one way or another distort, mask, or even deface the other. Ten innovative essays, written by an international team of experts, individually and in collaboration with each other, seek to diagnose the current situation with otherness, devise innovative solutions to the questions of alterity, and provide insight for students, teachers and researchers trying to make sense of the opportunities and challenges of the 21st century.