Cinema and Visual Theory
A.Y. 2024/2025
Learning objectives
The course aims to provide students with a general knowledge of the critical tools underlying filmology as understood in the frame of visual studies. Through the integration of methodologies such as semiotics, theory of photography, theory of the gaze, and film analysis, the course will favour the comprehension of the experience of vision created by cinema, between reality and representation, visible and invisible, animism and documentary. Moreover, it will allow the familiarization with a net of questions spanning from the ontology of the technical image to the theory of the dispositif and the apparatus, without forgetting the specificity of the filmic object, its language, and its mode of signification. Preserving this double focus, the course aims to offer critical tools to be reinvested in more advanced studies in image theory, in the places of cultural dissemination, and in all those contexts in which the understanding of the images and the cognitive potential of the technologies of the visible perform a crucial political role.
Expected learning outcomes
Knowledge and understanding
At the end of the course, students
- will have developed awareness of the language of images and master the main techniques of analysis of the photographic and filmic
- will be able to trace the image back to the gaze that gave it shape, by recognizing the aesthetic and ideological implications of the point of view
- will be able to frame the role of cinema among the dispositifs of modernity, and finally grasp its contemporary postmedial transformation
Ability to apply knowledge and understanding
At the end of the course, students are expected to be able to:
- put into practice the acquired tool and apply it to significant cases
- grasp the contextual elements related to the appearance of specific images
- build paths of film analysis which open themselves to the consideration of the visual culture to which artwork belongs
- recognize and assess the experimental forms, as well as the influence of film culture on the landscape of contemporary media art
- employ the notions and critical tools acquired in different professional contexts, such as education, research, and creative industries
At the end of the course, students
- will have developed awareness of the language of images and master the main techniques of analysis of the photographic and filmic
- will be able to trace the image back to the gaze that gave it shape, by recognizing the aesthetic and ideological implications of the point of view
- will be able to frame the role of cinema among the dispositifs of modernity, and finally grasp its contemporary postmedial transformation
Ability to apply knowledge and understanding
At the end of the course, students are expected to be able to:
- put into practice the acquired tool and apply it to significant cases
- grasp the contextual elements related to the appearance of specific images
- build paths of film analysis which open themselves to the consideration of the visual culture to which artwork belongs
- recognize and assess the experimental forms, as well as the influence of film culture on the landscape of contemporary media art
- employ the notions and critical tools acquired in different professional contexts, such as education, research, and creative industries
Lesson period: First semester
Assessment methods: Esame
Assessment result: voto verbalizzato in trentesimi
Single course
This course can be attended as a single course.
Course syllabus and organization
Single session
Responsible
Lesson period
First semester
Course syllabus
The course will focus on the relationship between the filmic and the photographic, two modes of the image increasingly less distinguishable and more and more intertwined in postmedia landscapes. The recognition of the problems of visual theory that are more relevant for the interpretation of the current mediascape will characterize the first part of the course, devoted to relationship between the image and the body, to the hands-on practices and the concept of operational images, to the so called "facial society" and the construction of digital faces. The second part of the course will define the postphotographic forms from an ontological and genealogical point of view, from the use of filters to the photogrammetric techniques employed to build digital environment and in scientific contexts.
Prerequisites for admission
None
Teaching methods
Lectures, analysis of movies and videos, photographs and installations; case studies, discussion of classic pages from cinema theory and filmology.
Teaching Resources
Slides and suggested readings will be accessible on the Moodle Site, and on Team "Cinema e teorie del visuale", Channel 2023-2024, codice: ryz2b91.
Bibliography
B. Grespi, L. Malavasi, Dalla parte delle immagini. Temi di cultura visuale, McGraw Hill, Milano 2022 (capitolo 1 e capitolo 3), i.e. pp. 1-55, and 105-146 (tot. : 90)
R. Bellour, L'analisi del film, Kaplan, Torino 2005, pp. 320
B. Grespi, Cinema e montaggio, Carocci, Roma 2010, pp. 120.
Non-attending students are required to study also:
T. Elsaesser, M. Hagener, Teoria del film. Un'introduzione, Einaudi, Torino 2009, pp. 256.
Bibliography
B. Grespi, L. Malavasi, Dalla parte delle immagini. Temi di cultura visuale, McGraw Hill, Milano 2022 (capitolo 1 e capitolo 3), i.e. pp. 1-55, and 105-146 (tot. : 90)
R. Bellour, L'analisi del film, Kaplan, Torino 2005, pp. 320
B. Grespi, Cinema e montaggio, Carocci, Roma 2010, pp. 120.
Non-attending students are required to study also:
T. Elsaesser, M. Hagener, Teoria del film. Un'introduzione, Einaudi, Torino 2009, pp. 256.
Assessment methods and Criteria
Oral exam testing the knowledge of the texts in the syllabus and the acquired skills, with a particular focus on the language of images. The evaluation corresponds to:
- knowledge level of the theoretical frameworks;
- ability to traslate theoretical concepts into methods to analyze images;
- making judgments;
- ability to argue with conceptual and linguistic precision.
- knowledge level of the theoretical frameworks;
- ability to traslate theoretical concepts into methods to analyze images;
- making judgments;
- ability to argue with conceptual and linguistic precision.
L-ART/06 - CINEMA, PHOTOGRAPHY AND TELEVISION - University credits: 6
Lessons: 40 hours
Professor:
Grespi Barbara
Professor(s)
Reception:
On Monday from 15.00 to 18.00 (please send me an email at least a day before).
Dipartimento di filosofia, second floor, and/or Teams (ONLY ON TEAMS in October and November 2023)