Wish image is a term coined by Walter Benjamin. Wish-image is often embedded in a product which may or may not be involved with the image that it represents. Wish-image is created often by marketing strategies consisting of the ambiance of the store in which the product is sold, the images of…
(Source: foucaultscat)
Benjamin was a huge admirer of Brecht and composed a number of essays examining German Dramas. According to Adorno, Benjamin’s fascination with Brecht led him astray from Marxist Dialectics
Curse you.
![“This brings me to your new work and thus the sunnier portion of this letter. The subject matter of your study concerns me in two respects, both of which you have indicated. First, in those parts which relate certain characteristics of the contemporary acoustic perception of jazz to the optical characteristics of the film, which I have described.Eximproviso [offhand] I cannot decide whether the different distribution ofthe areas of light and shadow in our respective essays is due to theoretical divergences. Possibly it is only a case of apparent differences between our points of view; it may really be a matter of viewing different objects with equal adequacy. For it is not to be assumed that acoustic and optic perceptions are equally capable of being revolutionized. This may explain the fact that the perspective of a variant hearing which concludes your essay is not quite clear, at least for someone to whom Mahler is not a thoroughly illuminated experience. In my essay [‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction’] I tried to articulate positive moments as clearly as you managed to articulate negative ones. Consequently, I see strength in your study at a point where mine was weak. Your analysis of the psychological types produced by industry and your representation of their mode of production are extremely felicitous. If I had devoted more attention to this aspect of the matter, my study would have gained in historical plasticity. I see more and more clearly that the launching of the sound film must be regarded as an operation of the cinema industry designed to break the revolutionary primacy of the silent film, which generated reactions that were hard to control and hence politically dangerous. An analysis of the sound film would constitute a critique of contemporary art which would provide a dialectical mediation between your views and mine.What I liked most about the conclusion of your essay is the reservation about the idea of progress which is indicated there. For the time being you motivate this reservation only casually and by reference to the history of the term. I should like to get at its roots and its origins. But I am well aware of the difficulties.”
Taken from Scribd.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_leov47jcBm1qfk3cuo1_400.jpg)
“This brings me to your new work and thus the sunnier portion of this letter. The subject matter of your study concerns me in two respects, both of which you have indicated. First, in those parts which relate certain characteristics of the contemporary acoustic perception of jazz to the optical characteristics of the film, which I have described.Eximproviso [offhand] I cannot decide whether the different distribution of
the areas of light and shadow in our respective essays is due to theoretical divergences. Possibly it is only a case of apparent differences between our points of view; it may really be a matter of viewing different objects with equal adequacy. For it is not to be assumed that acoustic and optic perceptions are equally capable of being revolutionized. This may explain the fact that the perspective of a variant hearing which concludes your essay is not quite clear, at least for someone to whom Mahler is not a thoroughly illuminated experience.
In my essay [‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction’] I tried to articulate positive moments as clearly as you managed to articulate negative ones. Consequently, I see strength in your study at a point where mine was weak. Your analysis of the psychological types produced by industry and your representation of their mode of production are extremely felicitous. If I had devoted more attention to this aspect of the matter, my study would have gained in historical plasticity. I see more and more clearly that the launching of the sound film must be regarded as an operation of the cinema industry designed to break the revolutionary primacy of the silent film, which generated reactions that were hard to control and hence politically dangerous. An analysis of the sound film would constitute a critique of contemporary art which would provide a dialectical mediation between your views and mine.
What I liked most about the conclusion of your essay is the reservation about the idea of progress which is indicated there. For the time being you motivate this reservation only casually and by reference to the history of the term. I should like to get at its roots and its origins. But I am well aware of the difficulties.”
Taken from Scribd.
