Note about interdisciplinarity and transdisciplinarity of images

Abstract

This article is composed of a succession of notes, linked by the commonality of the theme but not by a narrative consecutio, developed over the past two years on the theme of the multifaceted nature of the world of images. Some – 1 and 3 – are notes on readings on the theme, while others – 2 and 4 – are reflections on the study of images. Some of the contents have been anticipated and developed more extensively in the introductory essay to the proceedings of the IMG2017 conference – IMAGES? International and interdisciplinary conference on image and imagination between representation, communication, education and psychology (eds. Luigini et. al., 2017), to which we refer for further details. The first note is about how images strip us bare and the need for an interdisciplinary gaze. The second is about the multiplicity of images that interest the magazine. The third is about the genesis of visual culture. The fourth is about the relationship between image, imagery and imagination. The article wishes to present, synthetically, the discreet process that leads from degree zero to the acknowledgment of the theme’s complexity, to the recognition of a cultural tool that may help to explore it in greater depth, to finally assert the (plausible) solution to the initial question: how to investigate images?