1. Fragmentation of the body - the body in pieces
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Ancient art body:
- preferred the eunich
- the “ideal” body
Fragmentation of the body
- the body in pieces
- anatomical fragmentation of the body dates
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries
In Camille Utterback’s article that we read for today, she explores the boundary between our own embodiment and our virtual bodies, and attempts to form a link between the two. This extension of the body- a kind of borderless body- was not arrived at instantaneously, but rather, the way we have viewed our bodies has evolved quite a bit over time.
So I’m going to give a little bit of background to this idea of the borderless body or body with extensions by looking at Professor Bernadette Wegenstein’s book, “Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete.”
The eunich was a castrated form of the male, the body was an intermediate form between male and female, in order to make the body as close as possible to their diety.

2. Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete

3. - through Enlightenment skin was regarded as
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Evolution of skin:
- through Enlightenment skin was regarded as
sensitive organ, transmitting emotions
- by nineteenth century the skin a site of communication
In the nineteenth century the skin achieved significance as a negotiating interface between the outer shape of the body and the inner physical structure, which medical science was now beginning to understand as parts that worked together (rather than as separate entities).

4. Jean- Auguste- Dominque- Ingres.
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Jean- Auguste- Dominque- Ingres.
Portrait of Caroline Riviere
The nineteenth century marked an important period on how artists were using skin to exhibit current medical and scientific thought, or to dismiss these findings, such as in the work of Jean-Auguste-Dominique- Ingres.
Here we can see that he privileged the contour and outline at the expense of an anatomically correct rendering of the body. In all of his female portraits, Ingres gives the bodies an entirely closed outline. The skin is barely varied in color- the painted skins are a sign of racial and social distinction in their muteness, which is a sign of the women’s decency.

5. OiB (organ instead of body) - a flat screen
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
OiB (organ instead of body)
- a flat screen
- the body in pieces has been overcome, or how the fragmented body has become obsolete.
In this essay, Wegenstein is breaking down how we have arrived at a body that is borderless, so to speak, that has taken on the value of a flat screen. Medical technologies and technology in general has greatly influenced how we view and analyze our bodies. Since the 1990s the inner body has been recorded and eternalized through technologies- our bodies have attained a new value through technology.
The face is overcoded
The face is no longer the most representative signifier of human appearance
Every part in the posthuman body is autonomous- the body is no longer in pieces but rather each piece stands in for the body as a whole
The posthumanism is a point of view, suggested by N. Katherine Halyles in how we became posthuman. The human body is understood as a prosthesis and can therefore be imagined as simulated by artificial devices, such as AI. Our biological embodiment is seen as an accident of history.
The face has always been overcoded than other body parts, but has now ceased to be the most representative signifier of human appearance. In the posthuman body, every part, interior and exterior, is autonomous, separate from the body in its entirety. No longer a body in pieces, it is a defaced body that has been overcoded and stands in for the body as a whole.

6. - medical technology important in development of how we see our bodies
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
The Body in Pieces:
- medicine now see the body as parts that function effecting each other, instead of separate pieces.
- medical technology important in development of how we see our bodies
The fragmentation of the body has been revived through medical technologies that archive our bodies, digitize our bodies.

7. Visible Human Project (1993)
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Visible Human Project (1993)
-researchers “scanned” - digitally recorded-
the body of Joseph Paul Jernigan
Joseph Jernigan was on death row since 1981, and in 1995 they added a female counterpart
Photographic images of over 1,800 one-millimeter cross-sectional slices of a male corpse, and the Visible Woman was composed of 5,000 images of .3millimeter slices of a female corpse
“Digital Adam and Eve”
Begin to see a workable relationship between the human body and the computer.
Bodyworlds really fragments the body and makes it accessible not only for anatomy students, but whoever is interested in the human body.

8. Visible Human Project (1993)
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Visible Human Project (1993)
-researchers “scanned” - digitally recorded-
the body of Joseph Paul Jernigan
Human Genome Project
-rewrites the human body by mapping the
genetic code in what was called the “Book of Man”
It was a human database that contains a sequence map of three billion base pairs and between fifity and one hundred thousand genes.
The two “human projects” both understood the body as a network of information systems made of codes producing signals.
Also, in these posthuman views of mankind, the human is not a socially embedded subject. The body is understood as an archive, or a form of storage. Beginning to see a comparison of the body to the computer- like Utterback says about the human-computer interface” saying from the department where she teaches.

9. - Visible Human Project - Computerized
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
The “Posthuman” Body
- Visible Human Project
- Computerized
Dominant body parts
- any one body part can attain dominance
the rest of the body
Wegenstein says that because the Visible Human Project constructs the body from a “utopian” viewpoint, because they can only be obtained through a computerized vision of the body.
(the body must be a corpse in order to become computerized, so this is not our real view of our bodies.)
Thus, this is a posthuman body.
The recent imaging technologies of the interior of the human body make clear that any one body part can attain dominance over the rest of the body.
This can be seen in advertisements where a body part is shown to represent the entire body. It can “stand in,” so to speak. What is important is that this body devolving into parts is not just lost parts or part of an ideal body, but parts that have become autonomous.

10. - human face as “screen,” window into the soul
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
De-facement:
- human face as “screen,” window into
the soul
- diminished emphasis on faciality
- The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls by Joan Jacobs Brumberg
“Faces are becoming obsolete.” (Wegenstein 223)
What had to happen first in order to get under the skin was a “de-facement”
We can see this in film theory- the “close up” shot is the moment of total identification for the viewer, when you as the audience see yourself in the medium, or screen.
This can be seen also with the way girls have thought about their faces and how it has evolved. In the nineteenth century, girls considered their skin and face as a window into their soul. But that emphasis on faciality has diminished.
This change was noted by Joan Jacobs Brumberg in her book, The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls, in which she analyzed yearbook pictures from the early sixties til the mid-nineties. The face has been replaced with images of the whole bodyy, such as those in sports. We see strong arms and legs, and again, any body part is now gaining the status of the “window into the soul” which for centuries was only the face.

11. Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
“what I am trying to show is not only the “loss” of the face… but how the priority of the face… has moved into the body, to organs, DNA, and other important hidden “information” concerning the “Book of Man.” (Wegenstein 234)

12. - similarities drawn between man and animal - between man and computer
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Erasure of the face as precursor to erasure that affects human corporeality.
- similarities drawn between man and animal
- between man and computer
Wegenstein hypothesizes that the erasure of the face could be seen as a precursor of an erasure that affects human’s tangible body. The body is beginning to be seen as extended, beyond its borders.
Wegenstein says that we have had to get rid of overcoded markers of humanness, such as the face, in order to redefine ourselves.

13. - representation of the inner becoming the outer
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Sur-face:
- if any body part can be a face, then any body part must be able to have its own skin (sur-face)
- representation of the inner becoming the outer
So, the interior body is extending itself and moving towards the outside. The skin can cover anything, and is a “border” between the inside and outside. The skin has to be broken- the border must be broken- in order to get inside the body.

14. Swiss artist Maya Rikli’s “O.T.1992”
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Swiss artist Maya Rikli’s “O.T.1992”
Artists are turning the body inside out as well. Riki’s collage resprents a fragmented body- its surface has been “cut out” but the bodily interior comes through. It is skin that seems as though it could be worn.

15. “Hautnah” Alba d’Urbano http://www.durbano.de /couture/index.html
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
“Hautnah”
Alba d’Urbano
/couture/index.html
Italian artist Alba d’Urbano works on the theme of skin within in the digital realm.
She experiment with image of her own skin which she digitizes, processes, reshapes, and cuts into patterns of “skin-suit” She “takes off her own skin” in order to allow others to walk through what is hidden underneath the skin of the artist..
I don’t have a picture of it, but Urbano took these sketches and created them into a skin suit, which could be hung on a hanger, and worn.
What is important is that these artists are inviting us to slip into their consciousness. They are cutting off the hands, the feet, etc. and allowing the skin to stand in for the entire body.

16. - fusion between human and artificial flesh
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Synthetic Flesh:
- fusion between human and artificial flesh
- blurring between the digital and the real
Orlan and Lacan
“The skin is deceptive. Breaking the skin’s surface down not necessarily assure something good. One doesn’t get anything more.”
Australian performance artist Stelarc wants to get under the skin with installations in which he merges his own body with technology.
Performance artist Orlan is a performance artist who uses her own body and the procedures of plastic surgery to make "carnal art". She is transforming her face, but her aim is not to attain a commonly held standard of beauty, but to ask questions about the status of the body in society.
Carnal Art borders between disfiguration and figuration, it is an inscription in flesh.
Orlan quotes Lacanian psychoanalytical theory while undergoing comsmetic surgery in an artistic video called “Successful Operation.” She is talking about the deceptivieness of the skin.
Orlan invokes an interpretation of the skin as a platform between the image of the self and ones body. She is looking at the impossibility of becoming one with one’s proper image in the mirror or on the screen.
Here she is referring to Lacan’s mirror stage theory. In short, the mirror stage is a moment in an infant’s development in which he realizes that the mirror image of himself is himself, that it is not connected to his body, and that there is a space in between the two. His body becomes disconnected from his mother’s, instead part of the mother, and the mother becomes the Other. The infant can see himself as a whole in the mirror, which is in contrast to how he sees his real self- fragmented pieces of a body. Remember, an infant does not have control of his limbs yet. This is what Lacan cites as the beginning of the infant’’s body image, which is a series of body schemas developed over time that make up the image of our bodies.

17. - “nothing” is really revealed under the skin
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Under the Skin:
- “nothing” is really revealed under the skin
- the skin as “no-border” or as a signifier for the empty space behind the screen mirror
- the skin is a border that deceives us constantly
Performance artist Orlan revealed that nothing was really under her skin.

18. - Philosopher Elizabeth Grosz on social extensions of the body
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Under the Skin:
- Philosopher Elizabeth Grosz on social extensions of the body
-borders of the body image are not limited by
the container of the skin (Grosz 79)
The body is capable of accommodating and incorporating a wide range of objects- anything that comes into contact with the surface of the body and remain there long enough will be incorporated into the body image.
Spatiality, the space surrounding and within the subject’s body, is important dof defining the limits and shape of the body image. The body image is capable of accomodating and incorporating an extremely wide range of objects. Anything that comes in contact wit the surface of the body and remains there long enough will be incorporated into the body image- clothing, jewelry, other bodies, objects.
Give driving into a small parking spot example- becomes an extension of the body, it is experienced in the body image. Your pen becomes an extension, etc.
These are examples of the way that Grosz says our body image builds upon itself with body schemas, which move beyond the physical limits of the body.
And, like Orlan was getting at, Grosz says the body image is always slightly temporally out of step with the current state of the subject’s body. If you think about an anorexic, the body image is always at a different state then what is actually there, In fact, we can never be on the same page as our bodies, or see them clearly.
Ubiquitous computing, such as mobile phones, goes even further by purposefully seeking to make the technology transparent. The goal is to integrate the technology with the human body so seamlessly that we no longer notice the presence of equipment.

19. - Donna Haraway’s “Cyborg Manifesto”
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Under the Skin:
- Donna Haraway’s “Cyborg Manifesto”
The instability of the skin as a border has been pointed out also by feminist biologist Donna Haraway in her “Cyborg Mainfesto,” in which the cyborg is the instaniation of the breakdown of the skin as border, merging human flesh with the machine. She says, “why should our bodies end at the skin, or include at best other being encapsulated by skin?”

20. - Deleuze and Guattari’s BwO (body without organs)
Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Under the skin:
- Deleuze and Guattari’s BwO (body without organs)
- against organ-izations
- BwO went beyond fragmentation
- OiB (organ instead of body) is the posthuman body, borderless.
Deleuze and Guattari view the body as made up of zones and matrices of intensities. The body is a “plane of consistency.” They emphasize the flatness of body. This is a body is not directed against the specific organs of our bodies, such as the skin, but against organ-izations.
They view everything as a machine, everything produces everything. For example, our organs work as seperate machines, each their own flow, but are all connected. Each machine produces a flow or energy but is stopped by another machine, stops, produces new flows. Machine not necessarily technology, they can be organic. This decentralized body image is affected by the spaces our body inhabits, the environment, and society
- BwO went beyond fragmentation - New medical and represenational technologies allow for organs to code in the way the face did before. But because of this potential, the posthuman BwO no longer needs the holism of the body and it has become an OiB, and organ instead of a body.

21. Melissa Berman
Getting Under the Skin, or, How Faces Have Become Obsolete
Under the skin:
“For the skin is “flat’ and in its digitized representation it has a slippery surface, exactly like Deleuze and Guattari’s BwO. In other words, the body and all of its organs not only serve as a medium of expression through appearance to the outer world, but have themselves adopted the characteristics of the medium.”
She continues on to say that this discourse of getting under the skin was ncessary to “free” the strata of a given hierarchy. The skin and other organs, thus freed, have taken on the role of the flat screen, of the sur-face on which the body as such is produced.