What is an Image?

The concept of an image seems to me very ephemeral and indistinct, partially because the term “image” can be and has been used to describe so many different things, not just a single visual moment. “Sound images,” visual images, and even crystallized moments or ideas in our heads can be called images. In order to simplify the seemingly vast definition of “image,” I will try to determine what it is not.

            An image does not take place over a long period of time. For instance, a still from a movie or a small moment can constitute an image, but the entire film is not an image. Even when a person says they have an “image” of the film’s plot, that they “get the picture”, they are holding in their mind a brief view of the film. Importantly, this image can be comprised of sight and sound, and even other aspects like smell in the case of events. However, the image is brief, able to be consumed within a couple seconds. This does not mean that an image cannot be complex and take up more time to appreciate, but that it has the quality of being able to be generally understood quickly. For instance, a photo or gif can be an image, while a tv episode cannot be an image, but is instead composed of images and is open to representation by an image.

            Similarly, humans are said to give off “images,” a term usually used in exchange with reputation in this context. This reveals that an image is a vision that can be quickly grasped, but does not necessarily constitute the whole. A person’s “image” does not account for all their complexities, so clearly an image is not necessarily a whole picture or the “real” thing.

            The image can be the real thing, as is clear in the case of a painting, where the image is the painting itself. Even a photograph can be seen as an image in and of itself, an easily consumable moment. But more often than not, the image is representative of something deeper under the surface. This manifests in visual mediums in the fact that they represent something else, whether a scene in real life or a concept. Still, the photo, painting, and even sculpture, by virtue of being something different from what it is based off of, if anything, can be seen as an image all its own as well. This is especially noticeable in the case of paintings reproduced in photographs and via technology, where the original image is the painting and the photos of the painting are images of images.

            Oddly, images of images, when presented in the same manner, are often taken as the image itself. While a photo of a painting within a room is not considered “that painting,” a photo just of the painting, though not made of the same material, usually not by the same person, and representing only one moment of that painting’s existence, is considered the image, the particular painting, in and of itself, at least for the purposes of consuming it and understanding it more deeply. In this way it is clear that an image is more conceptual and easy to understand than it is a tangible presence.

            Based on his reasoning, an image is a single easy to understand and hold in one’s mind moment of visual, sound, or other information. Most importantly, I do not believe that an image is exclusively visual, but rather can apply to things consumed by other or multiple senses. “Image” as a word does imply something visual, but it is used to mean more than just the visual, and the uniting characteristic becomes, rather than a single “picture” or vision, a single concept, often representative of further ideas.

Finally, I wanted to include "images" in this post, because they draw attention to a piece of writing, but I decided that the words themselves are each images representing a sound and concept, so I will forgo a photograph or visual aid this week.