This article was fairly interesting in that it opened up some new perspectives with looking at the progression of technology and it's impact on the art world. Namely, the last few sections stood out to me the most. I enjoyed his bit on film opening up new horizons in terms of enhancing our comprehension of time and providing the ability to observe things that would otherwise have been unobservable. It is true that film provides the ability to slow things down to expose realities the public has never seen before. This doesn't seem so impactful, however since being a youth of this generation, I grew up with such technologies. I could only imagine, though, how mind blowing it must have been to witness these things for the first time.
This brings into question, however, the possibility that these "slowed down" worlds never did exist before Film technology and that we only created them with our new technologies. It is almost frightening to contemplate the deeper extent of what we may have created with even the simplest, latest machines.
Another thing I enjoyed of Benjamin's article was his explanation on "Auras". I had a little bit of a conception prior but that was only on a very simple, surface degree. The overall feeling one receives from a work (painting or film) seems to fit the term Aura almost perfectly. I do not necessarily agree with Benjamin, though, when he begins comparing painting against film within all aspects of the two. I feel that the two mediums are almost within different worlds of their own. Especially when considering motion-film. A painting is a still representation of a moment. A film is a representation of multiple moments as they progress through time. It is true that a painting can give way to the possibility of multiple moments, but that includes only theories that apply to each individual viewer. A painting doesn't even represent reality as is perceived by an individual on an every-day basis. Whereas film is a more realistic representation in terms of image matter. True, there can be abstract or surreal film, but it is less than often that one will see a film shot in acrylics. That is not to say it doesn't happen; it just simply isn't the standard mode by which it is used.
Moving away from the concepts Benjamin presented, I would like to make a note on his technical presentation. I felt that he often repeated a lot of his points and his organization was a little off. It seemed that he would present multiple ideas or topics in a single section and then move on to expand on each one in later sections. This would have worked if the introductions to each topic were a little more comprehensible. I felt that the method he chose was simply a little redundant.
