On the History and Aesthetics of the Digital Image

Probably the most significant event since the very invention of the image are the changes in man's conception of the image that the advent of the digital image is entailing. However trenchant and decisive this may be, the history of the image already prepared the ground for it. If we assume that the major distinction between the traditional image and the digital one is that the classical form of depiction is analogous, that is, it follows the principles of similarity, congruency and continuity, and that the electronic form of depiction is digital, that is, it uses the smallest, discontinuous, non-homogeneous elements, then we can depart our reflections to this topic from those movements in art which advanced the rupture in the traditional conception of the image. This extends from the insurrection of the abstract at the beginning of this century to kinetic art