Panel Statement

Panel: Interactivity and Metaphors

The early avantgardist film theory was the first to formulate a metaphorical interface within media: Camera movements, subjective perspectives and reflecting montages etc. destroyed the objective spy hole character of the frontal observing position and the distant aura of the former art creation was dissolving. These subjective, imagination-based thoughts of creating media as surroundings for identification lead to actual hierarchical questions: the more an extension of body senses and functions is offered, the more a virtual space is perceived as “true”. The word interactivity has to be replaced by terms like potential of involvement or identification, representation of personality and intersubjective exchange.

• Andrea Wollensak (Germany) was lecturer on the subject of Russian cinema. She was a Lecturer at the University of Leipzig and the Academy of Film in Potsdam-Babelsberg, and has contributed to various publications and projects on media, film and art. She was director and co-founder of the Center for Interactive Media (ZIM) in Cologne.