Looking Back to the Visual in Surveillance and Control for the 21^st Century

ARTH 6810
David Zemmels
5/9/2007

Prologue

Through this rhetorical analysis of two case studies that enact the digitally mediated panoptic gaze enabled by Internet technology, I hope to find clues about how artists and others can seek to return attention to issues of surveillance and control though the Visual.

The Post-panoptic Condition, 21^st Century

Any discussion of the Visual in the context of surveillance and control must start with the Panopticon, in which the Visual as a form of surveillance is privileged over all other means of social control over the body, which usually consisted of cruel and unusual punishment methods. The Panopticon was proposed as a more humane form of control.

The Panopticon is a prison building designed by English philosopher Jeremy Bentham in the late eighteenth century (figure 1). The concept introduces the notion of omnipresent surveillance as an effective means of control over the body, which allows for the few to supervise (and control) the many. In the case of Bentham’s Panopticon, a prison represents the concept, although the ideas can be extended to factories, hospitals, schools, etc. Individual cells are built into the walls of a circular building so that all are open inward towards the center. At the center is the guard tower with a clear backlit view into every cell.  The tower windows are shuttered and dark so prisoners cannot tell if the guards are looking at them, or even in the tower. The observed (prisoner) cannot see the observer (guard), thus does not know when (s)he is being or not being observed. The result is internalized observation and control on the part of the prisoner.

Foucault’s interest in the Panopticon is as a metaphor for modern pervasive surveillance practices that gives primacy to the disciplinary inclination to observe and normalize. The cells of the prison “are like so many cages, so many small theatres, in which each actor is alone, perfectly individualized and constantly visible” (Foucault 1979: 200). Foucault argues that the panoptic gaze is used by society to internalize the discipline of the self, and in turn internalize the rules and regulations of the State in the social body. In this conception, there is power circulating through social practices and that power is maintain in large part through an economy of visual images also circulating.

Does the panoptic gaze hold the same power in our post-industrial post-electronic age? This essay suggests that the post-panoptic condition is characterized as de-emphasizing the Visual as the primary means of surveillance and control in contemporary society. The emphasis is now on more powerful methods of control and surveillance, particularly post 9/11. And the surveillance is applied in ever more private aspects of our lives, which is aided by new surveillance technology in two distinct categories (Simon, 2005):

• Data-veillance – the collection, organization, and storage of information about the body (tracking credit card, shopping habits, Internet searches, etc.)
• Biometrics – the use of the body as a measure of identity (finger prints, DNA testing, etc.)

With the rise of the computer and the Internet as a means of communication and information gathering, we enter the age where society is produced and mediated in large part by computer technology. Both of the types of surveillance mentioned above are based on information about the body, and de-center the Visual as the primary means of surveillance and control. It is for this reason that I suggest we are in a post-panoptic era.

Despite a dramatic increase in non-visual surveillance methods (Manovich, 2002), it is my observation that society seems less concerned with its rights of privacy than ever before.  At least the reaction to recent attempts by the US government to use more invasive surveillance methods within the USA are not as strident as one would expect, despite constant news media coverage as evidenced by this convenience sample: a review of the Salt Lake Tribune on April 14, 2007 demonstrated numerous news stories focused on the use and expansion of non-visual surveillance and control methods. The noteworthy items include: evidence provided by e-mails obtained from political NGO e-mail accounts in the investigation by Congress of the firing of US Attorneys-General (pg. A1); police officials “demanding that Internet service providers retrofit the existing network to ease the wiretapping of Internet-based phone calls (pg. A6); and the White House asking authority to expand surveillance of communications from “foreign communications routed thought the United States,” as allowed by the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, to include any non-citizens in the United States “believed to possess, transmit, or receive important foreign intelligence information” (pg. A14).

Looking Back to the Visual in Surveillance and Control

I suggest that this shift towards non-visual surveillance methods has also shifted cultural attitudes about modern surveillance techniques towards ambivalence, perhaps because the methods do not seem as invasive as the notion of big brother watching you in the privacy of your home, or even in public spaces like grocery stores. Out of sight, out of mind… Or perhaps, as some news accounts suggest, many people actually view it as necessary to protect them from evildoers such as criminals and terrorists. So it may be the apparent non-invasiveness, or it may be fear, but there appears to be a general ambivalence.

Further, what once was primarily a technology of military and police control; surveillance has become a form of entertainment. From webcams to reality TV shows, individuals subject themselves to constant observation, feeding voyeuristic and exhibitionistic desires.

Whatever the reason, the result is inadequate democratic discourse on this serious subject. As a way to return attention of society to the discourse of surveillance and control, I argue that reinserting the Visual in the public discourse can help create an awareness of the new forms of the panoptic-like gaze in post-panoptic society. As producers of imagery in society, artists and others in our society can change cultural attitudes of the public about the implications and materiality of control and surveillance.

To that end I will perform a rhetorical analysis of two case studies that enact the digitally mediated panoptic gaze enabled by Internet technology to try and define the criteria by which they represent the qualities and attitudes of the modern mediated surveillance and its implications on social control. Then I hope we can use those criteria to open the discourse in other corners of the public sphere in future research.

• ACCESS – a public art installation that lets Internet users track anonymous individuals in public places, by pursuing them with a robotic spotlight and acoustic beam system.
• JenniCam.org – a popular web site using web cams that allowed Internet viewers to observe the everyday life of Jennifer Kaye Ringley. This site was selected because of its cultural popularity (in terms of ‘hits’ as well as main stream media coverage) and ontological similarities to the ACCESS Project.

What is the relationship of these cases to the post-panoptic condition? Do they hold keys to a solution to the apparent ambivalence of contemporary cultural attitudes about surveillance and control in our society? These are the questions to answer.

Case study #1: ACCESS by Marie Sester

»ACCESS« was primarily influenced by the beauty of the surveillance representations (x-rayed bodies, luggage or vehicles, 3D laser scans, satellite reconnaissance imagery, etc.), the invisibility of the collected data, and the power generated by means of surveillance practices.[1]

ACCESS is a public art installation that combines surveillance technology, a website, a unique robotic spotlight and acoustic beam system, by French architect/artist Maria Sester. According to Sester’s bio, this project is a result of her fascination with visibility in relation to “the evolution of visual culture in the 20th century, from the Hollywood star industry in the 1910s, to the explosion of advertising beginning in the 1940s, through television, Pop art, and more recently, the Internet.” This project examines the ambiguity between surveillance and the fascination/fear with forms of control in our society.

The technology behind the ACCESS project is relatively sophisticated (figure 2) but simple to use. It consists of a video camera watching an area of public space. The video image is fed to a computer system that electronically tracks individuals moving through the visual frame, much like a radar system. That information is feed to a web interface that allows Internet users to see the scene in real-time and select targets for tracking by a motorized spotlight (and later a directional audio transducer as well) within the public space. The light beam tracks the individual until (s)he leaves the video frame or an Internet user selects a different target. If no target is chosen, the computer randomly tracks targets in the video frame.

Analysis of the visual experience has two parts: the experience of the individual being seen in a public space and the web interface of the seer.

Visual documentation of the installation is limited, but I personally experienced the installation so will supplement the analysis with my own observations. There have been several installations of this project around the world including in the USA, Japan, and Europe. I saw it at the SIGGRAPH 2003 conference in San Antonio, TX.

Subjects of the gaze of the light beam seem to have different reactions (Figure 3, 6, 7). Some look confused and surprised at being singled out by a bright sharp beam of light while others in the space are not. I imagine they wondered who was controlling the light and why they were singled out. What was the purpose? The intent? These were the shy, those who do not like the idea of being targeted, of standing out, of surveillance in public spaces. I myself fell into this category. Once I understood what was happening, I deliberately skirted the active space to avoid being picked up by the spotlight. Later, I became a voyeur in the experience: I would stand to the side and watch as the light isolated others. I enjoyed their reactions, knowing what was coming (was this the sense of control through the voyeuristic gaze?). Other people seem to enjoy the moment of public display. These were the exhibitionists. They playfully engaged with the beam of light, testing its quickness and accuracy, etc. in tracking. They would strike a star pose as if this were their ‘close up,’ laughing, dancing, and seemingly enjoying their sudden fame. They seemed unconcerned about the ‘what’ and ‘why’ of it.  Yet others seemed only mildly curious, and walked on after only a moment’s hesitation. They appeared unaffected by the moment in the light. Perhaps those were the secure ones who knew they had nothing to hide or were too busy for such nonsense.

The web interface (Figure 4) is the access point for this mediated voyeuristic part of the experience and is the mode of production for the visual relationship between the seer and the seen.  The screen has 4 windows giving the observer uniquely different ways of seeing the subjects. One is the tracking camera image, which is colorless, blurred and distorted. The sense of presence, of being there, is limited, but the user is seeing what the computer sees. Another small window shows an alternative and better view of the space for the user to more realistically see what is out there. However, I assume to help build the relationship between seer and being seen, at SIGGRAPH there were computers in the space that one could use to control the spotlight, allowing immediate feedback on your choices by seeing the results firsthand.  It seems a good quality visual representation of the public space is needed to better satisfy the voyeuristic desire of the seer. The third window is the computer tracking raw data such as the coordinates of potential targets identified, etc. This speaks plainly to the data-veillance methods of detection and control: a visual representation of the body is reduced to simple numbers in a dataset that are more easily managed, catalogued, and stored. The last screen shows the tracking software data controlling the spotlight in real-time as the targets move around space, once again representing the body as data.

This project is an excellent example of what Walter Benjamin (1982) called “transcending the specialization in the process of production” by becoming the “author as producer” (p. 215). Sophisticated computer surveillance technology is not typically the domain of the artist. Sester transcends the limits imposed by her specialization to bring attention to the “productive apparatus” in our society, thus using her art to question the conditions of present-day apparatuses of surveillance and control.

Case Study #2: JenniCam.org

In a heavily networked world, surveillance and display are two sides of the same coin. […] Exhibitionism is one response to surveillance. American college student Jennifer Ringley has taken the cam phenomenon to one of its logical conclusions, installing a camera in her dorm room and linking it to the web. Whatever Jenny does, she does in front of a crowd. […] The phenomenon of a young woman quite literally anatomizing herself via the web is an extraordinary one, and Jenni's site has made her one of the web's first real stars.[2]

JenniCam.org represents digitally mediated “access” of another kind. This was a popular web site featuring web access to several web cams that allowed Internet viewers to observe the everyday life of Jennifer Kaye Ringley from April 1996 until the end of 2003. At age 19 during her junior year at Dickinson College, Ringley installed a webcam in her college dorm room, and provided images from that webcam on a webpage. The webpage would automatically refresh every three minutes with the most recent image from the camera. At first there was no charge and anyone with Internet access could observe Jenni as she went about her daily life. Later, she added a payment section that offered the web cam photos at more frequent intervals, although free access was still available.

Jenni achieved celebrity status quickly. By 1998, she appears on magazine covers, in TV shows, she hosts her own Internet talk show, and appears on The Late Show with David Letterman, The Today Show, and World News Tonight with Peter Jennings. At the height of her popularity, an estimated three to four million people watched JenniCam.org daily. Ringley shut her site down in 2003, citing Paypal's new anti-nudity policy as the main reason. Very little remains of her experiment. Going to www.jennicam.org results in a message that the server cannot be found, although a ‘whois’ search of the URL still lists Jennifer Kaye Ringley as the owner, with a Washington, DC address.

Organizing the visual references was more difficult than I anticipated. To start with, Ringley did not achieve the images initially, so the early images are mostly non-existent due to the ethereal way in which so many things on the Internet exist. Once she and others started archiving the images, the opposite was true: a new image every three minutes 24/7 for 7 years is a massive amount of image data to collate and manage.

According to Jenni’s web site home page (see figure 8: 1998), her project was to provide “a real-time look in to the real life of a young woman” as “an undramatized photographic diary for public viewing esp. via Internet.”  From this premise, I organized and analyzed the images by date as one would a written diary.

Originally, the set up was a single black and white camera in Ringley’s dorm room. She appears a little unsure about what she was supposed to do with/for it initially.  Images and testimonials from fans suggest that she begin to do little stripteases and other playful types of games for the camera.  The sense isn’t so much that the camera was anonymously documenting her every day life. Instead, she seemed to be playing to it, and very aware of its presence, hence aware of the mediated voyeuristic gaze of the Internet user. There are signs of the shyness we see with those captured by the light in the ACCESS project. It is said that Ringley would turn off the camera for more intimate moments in her life. However, there is definite evidence of the exhibitionist as well. Later on Ringley quit bothering to turn off the cameras, and let the world witness all aspects of her daily life.

The technology improves over time. The camera becomes color, titles are added, and finally each image is stamped with the time and date as they start to be archived. The scene changes as well. Apparently Jenni moves out of the dorms into an apartment, supposedly because of the popularity of the web site and the strain on the campus network. However, it remained a single camera. The strip teases seem to stop, and while there are images in which she is clearly talking directly to and responding to her ‘fans,' she seems to be less concerned with the ‘performing’ for the camera directly.

The next period 1998-99 shows her becoming more calculated about the whole project.  At this point she was becoming a celebrity in the news and on talk shows. Ringley also faced problems like death threats and hackers, which perhaps tarnishes the innocent playfulness of the relationship to the camera. She moves into a larger apartment and changes to a multiple camera set up. Now there are cameras in the living room, kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom. Images suggest that Jenni starts moving and placing cameras specifically for different activities (rather than static indexical documentation mode that preceded) such as taking baths, looking outside her window, and she even takes a camera to document a vacation.

This trend culminates in 2000 with what looks like conscious experimentation with camera angles, framing techniques, and overlaying text in images to comment on her activities in teasing, personal, and self-deprecating ways. Jenni is commenting on the images of her everyday life. However, the text was presumably added to achieved images after the fact since the original images were distributed in real time. This suggests she began to go back through her visual diary on an almost daily basis to add written comments. Was the Visual no enough? Did Jenni feel she had more to say?

In mid-2000, she documents her move to Sacramento CA, with a boyfriend named Dex, who becomes a regular in the images. By 2001, the images become very ‘domesticated.’ There is a lot of the couple sitting on the couch watching TV, gathered around the dining room table, cleaning the house, etc.  Jenni is still obviously aware of her Internet ‘fans’ but there is no sense of playing to the camera any longer.  The imagery appears to truly just documenting her everyday life, and the camera (thus the Internet user) another member of the household.

Over all, the visual trend is from an innocent experiment in exhibitionism by a single college student to a way of life for Jenni as she matures and enters a long-term relationship. However, the web cameras remain an important part of her life that needs continuous care and feeding, so to speak.  This is probably an important psychological point, which will be addressed shortly.

Summary of Analysis

Jennicam.org in many ways brings us theoretically closer to Foucault’s definition of the Panapoticon as cells that “are like so many cages, so many small theatres, in which each actor is alone, perfectly individualized and constantly visible” (Foucault 1977: 200). However, presumably she is no prisoner, at least not of the State. This is the life Jennifer Ringley chose for herself. Is she the shy, the exhibitionist, or the secure, which was seen in ACCESS, or some combination of these three?  I think the latter. In the images, I see a progression through these stages over time within the “small theatre” she constructed for herself. Does this suggest that perhaps we are all capable of the three reactions to being surveilled, ending with merely accepting being watched as a way of life? In fact, in the following discussion I will suggest that the modern formation of the subject relies on being watched to some extent.

What both these cases have in common is they bring to discourse, through the power of the Visual, the implications of surveillance, control, celebrity, desire, and their impact on society. They both interrogate (directly or indirectly) the social norms the separation of private and public, the observer-participant dialectic, the surveillance as entertainment trend, and the seeing/being seen dyad using the Internet and digital visual technologies. They gain their authority and authenticity by presenting visual imagery in real-time in public spaces such as the virtual public space of the Internet. Lastly, each of these cases represents definitive examples of the mediated voyeuristic gaze of the Internet user, satisfying a desire to see and be seen, that operates through an aesthetic of the phantasmatic gaze.

The separation of private and public

The Jennicom.org web site directly challenged many social norms and attitudes such as the separation of private and public, and the boundaries between exhibitionism and pornography. There was no part of Ringley’s everyday life that was off limits to the cameras. Is this really different than publishing one’s explicit experiences in hand-written diaries or blogs? Yes, the difference is the indexical reality of real-time digital imagery. In this way, the Internet is key to enabling the breakdown of private and public, and using the Visual to expose contemporary surveillance practices and capabilities for what they are, making it a very effective method of opening the discourse.

The ACCESS project does not explicitly explore the private as public idea like Jennicam, although ACCESS does challenge the notion of anonymity. We assume a certain amount of anonymity when lost is large crowds and public spaces. So in this way, the project does challenge our assumptions about of anonymity in public as a kind of privacy.

Both cases highlight that with new technologies, surveillance is possible anywhere, which is an important point. With the availability of modern surveillance technologies on the open market, one can see as well as be seen potentially at any time in any place, willingly or not. Ringley volunteers to allow constant surveillance of her life in intimate detail, but with new wireless webcam technologies, it can become very difficult to know if or when you are being watched.  One can buy wireless webcams hidden in clocks, cell phones, fire detectors, etc. In response, one can now buy electronic surveillance detectors that monitor for wireless transmissions in your location (figure 9).

The observer-participant dialectic

ACCESS and Jennicam represent two types of interactions: the former active and latter passive. Of the more passive JenniCan user, the modern mediated voyeur closely resembles a modern day flâneur -- which Walter Benjamin famously identified one of the archetypal figures of early modernism. The term is taken from Baudelaire's ‘detached observer,’ a person walking unnoticed through the crowded city, playing a role in city life and (in theory) remained a detached observer.  This stroller, an urban tourist of sorts, knew "the delights of possessing unpossessed and seeing unseen.”[3]  However, Baudelaire's ‘detached observer’ is derived from the modernist assumption that an observer can remain ‘detached.’ If we accept the post-modernist view that there is no true objectivity, then detachment from our cultural biases is not possible.  It becomes appropriate to use this conception to represent the digitally mediated voyeuristic gaze of the live homecam spectator. (S)he is a new breed of flâneur, enabled by Internet technology to enter more intimate spaces and moments than their 19th century forebearers. (S)he is able to see what we should not, would not, without Internet media technologies of visual production. The digital flâneur represents a passive interaction as (s)he strolls unseen through liminal public spaces where the normal rules of urban society are exempt.

Surveillance as entertainment

This is a powerful trend in television and films. ACCESS and Jennicam represent how the Visual can be a powerful tool in bringing attention to contemporary surveillance methods, but it seems a dangerous slope since the message could be lost in its presentation as mere entertainment. Perhaps beginning with George Orwell's novel "1984," first published in 1949, surveillance typically was portrayed as a menacing specter of government or corporate power. However, today with television reality shows like ‘Big Brother,’ ‘Lost,’ ‘Survivor,’ etc., surveillance has become commonplace and frivolous sources of entertainment. This may be a big source of ambivalence towards surveillance, even visual surveillance, and deflects serious discourse about control of the body.

The seeing/being seen dyad

What are the necessary elements in control in surveillance in Foucault metaphor? Participation? Interactivity? The necessary element seems to be an awareness of being seen. Surveillance is only a powerful form of social control if you know you are being, or could be, watched.

Unlike the original Panoptican design, almost all contemporary visual surveillance depends on the electronic gaze of the camera. But there is much more to this than the camera. The camera is just the mediating technology.  Someone has to watch the camera image, and someone needs to be the object of the watching. Each plays a role in the surveillance. Thus, the seeing/being seen dyad is a reciprocal dialogical relationship that can be summarized in the concept of the “phantasmatic gaze.”

Based on the notion of fantasy, or “Phantasie” in German, Freud argues that there is no separation between the desires of exhibitionism and voyeurism in the work of the imagination, but instead “exhibitionism derives from voyeurism” (Burgin 2000). Within the context of this essay, the trend of live Internet cams, which both these case studies represent, “demonstrates the elementary longing for the phantasmatic gaze of the other to guarantee the subject’s own being: I only exist in as much as I am constantly looked at” (Frohne in Levin 2002: 275).

Both cases satisfy the desire that drives the phantasmatic gaze, albeit from different perspectives, and the difference is in levels of control, I think. ACCESS Internet users control the surveillance through the web interface. They decide who is targeted and can watch the reactions in real-time. They are in control of the spotlight and experience what it is like to control the surveillance of another.  But there was no experience without the existence of the other.

Similarly, some users attempted to exert control on Ringley, the person who ran a web site. There were death threats if she didn’t do certain things on camera, hackers breaking into her site, and other such incidences. All this points to a desire by at least some of the seers to directly control her and her image, but they could not.  Thus, Jennicam does not offer the user control on the surface, but let us not assume the seeing experience is purely passive either. Viewers can see anonymously without participating and interacting, but the act of viewing is the reason Jenni did what she did. From the perspective of the phantasmatic gaze, the viewer gave Jenni, the on-line personality, her reason for existence.

The status of celebrity

A corollary of the desire to be the subject of the phantasmatic gaze is celebrity, which is an interesting aspect of being seen by the camera-mediated gaze. Sester’s Access Project actually says more about the Jennicam.org visual experience than the other way around. Sester’s interest in celebrity, no matter how momentary or fleeting, informs analysis of the images on Jennicam. Ringley’s motives for setting up the cameras are unclear, but she mostly fits the characteristics of the exhibitionist. However, different people have different reactions when confronted with being seen as outlined in the ACCESS project evaluation, but for that moment at least, they become part of our celebrity culture. They enter the mass media phenomenon of instant celebrity enabled by the Internet, but also reality TV, etc.

The difference seems to be in agency: whether one seeks the celebrity status or not. So-called reality shows hold auditions, so these most closely represent the Jennicam idea.  ‘Candid Camera’ of the 1960s, for example, did not audition its subjects, so perhaps more closely resembles the ACCESS experience for most participants.

Authority and Authenticity

Benjamin (1998) famously problematized the authenticity of the image once mechanically reproduced. Benjamin wrote: “Even the most perfect reproduction of art is lacking one element: its presence in time and space” (1107). The eliminated element is the loss of ‘aura’ produced by the original image. The aura is what gives the original its authority as an image (verses all the reproductions of the image). In the post-panoptic society, the authority of an image, where an original may never have existed, is real-time transmission: “the claim to be live” (Levin 2006). One way to reauthorize the visual image is to move the authority of the image from spatial authenticity to temporal authenticity.  Images that are seen in real–time (Internet, video, etc.) presumably cannot be manipulated.  There is no time to do so. (See Levin, 2006).

The visual image as authentic has become problematized in the digital age because the image can be so easily manipulated. Real-time is key to the contemporary conceptions of the visual, and represented in these cases. What both these case studies demonstrate is the new means of authoritative production that exists thorough the Internet.

Epilogue

Do these sites represent examples of the post-panoptic condition? Do they hold clues to the apparent ambivalence of contemporary cultural attitudes about surveillance and control in modern Society? I say yes to both.  ACCESS Project’s success is making visible the data-veillance systems of controlling the body, which was the premise for this paper. However, JenniCam leads us to a new interpretation. Instead of simply bringing attention to issues of surveillance, it appears that JenniCam represents a fundamental shift in power, which in turn suggests that the lack of resistance to contemporary surveillance tactics is not due to ambivalence alone. Instead, to acknowledge that Jenni is an exhibitionist is to acknowledge our own voyeurism and the relationship between the two.  This relationship is described by the concept of the phantasmatic gaze that operates through contemporary visual surveillance aesthetic.

Thus, the most obvious and important innovation of the post-panoptic machine that is the Internet is that it signals a shift power away from the observer as Foucault described it in Discipline and Punish (1979), and towards the subject of the mediated gaze. This shift is important in the context of this essay because we find that the observed can now control the conditions of the dyadic relationship. By being the subject of the phantasmatic gaze, Jenni is an equal partner in the power and control of the discourse through her on-camera actions and persona.  Voyeurs can only passively watch what Jenni offers, but Jenni only has power as long as she is being watched. The exhibitionist and the voyeur need one another to exist. What has emerged is a new model that is similar to what Whitaker (1999) calls a “participatory Panopticon” where control is shared.

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