Gap
In the 1920's or 1930's Walter Benjamin's point about mechanically reproducible art was that it couldn't produce what he called Aura. Three things. In mechanically reproducible work there had to be a perceptual shift in the mind of the subject. What cannot be reproduced is the work of art's original presence in time and space. In his essay "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" Benjamin made note of what he called an optical unconscious, a subject's ability to desire physical objects, which is connected to an ability in us people to identify information by habit instead of minute inspection. Perceptual twist, an aura of authenticity, and the mental heuristic that permits assumption, all three might be popped into an envelope called Media Studies and then ruthlessly abused.
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