Abstract
This chapter explores the nature of the subject in itself, the void at the heart of cybernetic parallax. In approaching the subject as this void, the poststructural decentred subject is developed from a constant displacement between symbolic realms towards a desubstantialised subject existing in neither physical nor digital worlds. This is the ‘nowhere’ of the subject amidst the Virtuality of consciousness. The chapter assesses the passage from void to Virtual through the analysis of digital art works that confront the emergence of Virtual surfaces and attempt to make contact with the Real of digital subjectivity. This focuses on a case study of the postdigital work of Pascal Dombis and a confrontation with the void of the subject between physical and digital modes of expression.
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Benjamin, G. (2016). The Empty Subject: Void-in-Itself. In: The Cyborg Subject. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58449-6_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58449-6_3
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