Atmospheres of Projection: Environmentality in Art and Screen Media

Bringing together cultural history, visual studies, and media archaeology, Bruno considers the interrelations of projection, atmosphere, and environment.

 

Projection has long been transforming space, from shadow plays to camera obscuras and magic lantern shows. Our fascination with projection is alive on the walls of museums and galleries and woven into our daily lives. Giuliana Bruno traces the histories of projection and atmosphere in visual culture, revealing their continued relevance in the work of contemporary artists who are reinventing the projective imagination of the past with atmospheric thinking that is invested in the use of elemental media.



To explain our fascination with projection and atmosphere, Bruno traverses psychoanalysis, environmental philosophy, architecture, the history of science, visual art, and moving image culture to see how projective mechanisms and their environments have developed over time. She reveals how atmosphere is formed and mediated, how it can change, and what projection can do to modify a site. Bruno gives new life to the alchemic possibilities of projective atmospheres, showing how their "environmentality" produces sites of exchange and relationality.