Edition Announcement #227 - Stefanie Posavec

...technical reproduction can put the copy of the original into situations which would be out of reach for the original itself. Above all, it enables the original to meet the beholder halfway, be it in the form of a photograph or a phonograph record. The cathedral leaves its locale to be received in the studio of a lover of art; the choral production, performed in an auditorium or in the open air, resounds in the drawing room.

That right there is a quote from The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, an influential essay by the erudite scholar Walter Benjamin. It's a fascinating — if somewhat dense — read that had me alternating between nodding in agreement and nodding off in the wee hours of this morning. I got up especially early in order to reread it (or rather a reproduction of it, on the internets no less!) in anticipation of today's edition by Stefanie Posavec, who did a particularly close reading of it herself in order to create Walter Benjamin: A Literary Organism Analysis.

The day's duties took me away from my cozy home and warm laptop, so I wasn't able to get through as much as I would've liked, but just a taste of his thinking has had me wondering What Would Walter Benjamin Do? all day long. Astounded as he was by film, the photograph and phonograph, WWWBD in the face of digital printing, virtual worlds and electronic books? Sara is of the opinion that he'd be in absolute heaven — "blogs and the internet were made for him!" she exclaimed to me, virtually, just a few hours ago.

While WB wasn't unreservedly optimistic about the promise of mechanical reproduction and its impact on art, authenticity and aura, I'd like to think that he'd be pretty pleased by all beholding we've enabled here at 20x200. I've got a hunch that he'd equally tickled by Stefanie's close reading and its beautiful result.

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