Elementos de los estudios visuales: un análisis crítico de la mirada desde el esencialismo visual a los regímenes escópicos

Abstract

The objective of this article is to examine the integrating elements of visual studies that offer us a clear vision of scopic regimes ever since the origin of modernity. The research analyzes this phenomenon of visual culture caused by technological innovations and scientific advances, ideological currents of thought, and the influence particular to the cultural and philosophical heritage of the past. The methodology of this theoretical research is based on the interdisciplinary approach of visual studies. Knowledge or comprehension of the visual progresses from hermeneutics to critical theory, in search of understanding through interdisciplinarity (which includes traditional disciplines such as art theory, history of art and aesthetics). Among the results, the authors define the most important concepts visual studies; namely, visual culture, visual objects, visual essentialism and scopic regimes. In the conclusions, they emphasize the liberation of textuality that images experience in contemporary culture. The visual lends itself to interpretations that now delineate or define spectators according to their living habits or lifestyles. The way images are experienced is subject to the gaze of science or the beliefs and ideologies of those individuals who belong to a specific culture. The article offers an innovative view by revealing the rules established through scopic regimes and what characterizes a particular way of contemplating the world (a certain way of looking at things) based on the different ways of life of its actors.