Reviewing Visual Literacy Blog

I read the article Re-Viewing Visual Literacy in the “Bain d’Images” Era by Maria D. Avgerinou. “Bain d’Images,” or image bath, refers to the era of visual culture, where we are surrounded by a constant stream of images. Visual Literacy is an increasingly important skill in our image saturated world.

One of the many interesting phenomena to have arisen from our increasingly visual culture is a rise in communication that can no longer be adequately expressed in words alone. One of the important concepts of visual literacy is that very idea, the idea that a visual language exists. Visual literacy, like regular literacy, is a skill that is built over time. Many people are not expressly aware of the existence of a visual language when they are viewing it, which makes intentionally developing their visual literacy skills difficult. 

Interestingly, the article described the ways in which the visual literacy skills that may have sufficed for print media differ from the visual literacy skill used for digital media. A main driver of this difference is the sheer volume of images that a person can access in a digital format—many times more then if they needed a physical print out for every image.

With digital images in todays world, it is increasingly difficult to separate advertisement from entertainment, so while the article listed many digital visual literary skills, the one I consider most important is the ability to be an informed viewer, critic and consumer of visual information. That skill allows us to differentiate between art to be appreciated, and blatant attempts at profit and politics driven manipulation.