sábado, 13 de julio de 2019

THE MENTAL CINEMA: TECHNOLOGICAL VISUAL METAPHOR IN AN ART PIECE BY 'HUANCHACO" (FERNANDO GUTIÉRREZ).

"Skull" ("Calavera") by 'Huanchaco' (Fernando Gutiérrez)
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The technological advances in data processing, with the presence of nanotechnology and the creation of "virtual worlds" that can be "phisically" visited by the users is metaphorically expressed in this resine piece made by "Huanchaco" (Fernando Gutiérrez), a Peruvian artist with a flare for sardonic social criticism hidden behind the glossy appearance of his artwork.

In this case, Skull (Calavera in Spanish) depicts a technogical advance that can be described as "mental cinema", "mind movies", or "e-motion pictures", in which the users are raised in a virtual world without knowing they are "visiting" one. This world, a MENTAL world in more than one sense (like in "go mental" = to act stupid, became extremely angry or upset; or "mental health/institution") is renponsive to the thoughts of the users, that can live scenes that metaphorically depict their thoughts and emotions. It is a bit difficult to grasp the nature of the world you are living in when you assume that you are a fleshy human being and you have been taught a conventionl physical model of nature. Unless you are a Christian Scientist and you believe that everything depends on your beliefs, you may begin to generate what you hate the most, because the lovely computer program begins to imitate your emotional states ("karma") and, due to the fact that the computer reads your thoughts directly from your mind, you must be skeptically relenteless in order to challenge the basic assumptions you have been taught (that you live in a Newtonian world, or that you just became schizophrenic.)

Luckily, in this MENTAL world, in addition to the writings by christian scientists like Mary Baker Eddy, Ernest Holmes, and Emmet Fox, or their Japanese (Sei Cho No  Ie) and philosophical equivalents (Rene Descartes), there are American movies!

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