//(Hyper)linking: A workshop on Image interpretation - 2024

[This workshop was part of a series of artist-led medium workshops held at Kiran Nadar Museum of Art.]

During the workshop, we took a hermeneutic approach to interpret and understand images. We explored the evolution of hermeneutics from being an authoritative discipline following its medieval trajectory to trust the authorial interpretations of the Bible to its secularised version as a discipline to interpret God's words correctly. We also noted its modern developments that were shaped by Schleiermacher, Heidegger, and Gadamer. Schleiermacher deployed hermeneutics to understand the unique characteristics of authors. At the same time, Heidegger and Gadamer repurposed it as a philosophical tool to understand our being-in-the-world and being-with-others. Taking into account our prior situatedness with the object of interpretation, Heidegger and Gadamer emphasized the interpretation system as a circle that first makes us aware of our facticity – our position on the horizon of knowledge, our context through which we interpret things, and then with the engagement how the object of interpretation informs and broadens our horizon, thus furthering our interpretation process.

Furthermore, we found it fascinating how artists consciously or unconsciously used this method to respond to images. In this regard, we discussed Jeff Wall's, Sherrie Levine's, and Sophie Calle's attempts, which further added to or complicated our discussion of hermeneutics.

It was exciting to take up the challenge and try it on our own with exercises where we made a concealing mechanism (the 12-window frame) that allowed us to perceive an image partially, thus making us more conscious of our innate interpretative mechanisms. Additionally, the presence of another's interpretation in the final collective exercise made us aware that a "common" expresses itself where a conversation occurs. For each time in a conversation, a "common" is at stake.