Media Aesthetics in the Age of Technological Generation - Focusing on Memory, Impulse, and Value -

Central concept

Age of Technological Generation — English canonical concept

Lee’s 2026 article examines these media conditions through memory, impulse, and value, with attention to human purposes, judgment, and responsibility.

Publication details

Korean Language & Literature, issue 133, pp. 319–382 · 31 July 2026

ISSN 1229-1730 · Publisher: 한국언어문학회

DOI 10.21793/koreall.2026.133.11

KCI publication record · Full-text access via Kyobo Scholar

Published abstract

This paper argues that generative artificial intelligence constitutes a media condition that cannot be reduced to technological reproduction or technological editing. Whereas reproduction distributed identical copies and editing dynamically rearranged existing data, technological generation organizes knowledge through an asymmetrical interaction between a human agent, who sets purposes and bears judgment and responsibility, and a generative system, which produces outputs conditionally from learned statistical distributions.

The paper examines this transformation through the categories of memory, impulse, and value. First, drawing on Bernard Stiegler’s theory of tertiary retention, it defines the dialogic reconfiguration of memory not as an exchange between two equivalent memories but as a relational transformation of human memory triggered by probabilistic machine output. Second, it reconstructs Friedrich Schiller’s play drive as an emergent impulse composed of a generative motive and a resonant motive. Third, it reworks Walter Benjamin’s aura into Artura, a relational and processual form of aesthetic presence grounded in relational originality rather than in the material presence of an original.

Artura is distinguished from digital aura, synthetic or postdigital aura, and the algorithmic sublime. Its distinctive explanatory power lies in identifying when traces of a generative process become legible, produce interpretive friction, and reorganize a viewer’s memory, sensation, and judgment. This distinction also clarifies the difference between participatory Artura, which may arise within the process of generation, and receptive Artura, which may arise for viewers who did not participate in that process. A limited analysis of Refik Anadol’s Unsupervised-Machine Hallucinations-MoMA demonstrates that immersive spectacle or algorithmic awe alone does not constitute Artura. Artura emerges only when generative conditions are critically apprehended and transformed into a new constellation of judgment.

The paper concludes that media aesthetics in the age of technological generation should analyze not only generated artifacts but also the asymmetrical relations, visible frictions, and human responsibilities through which those artifacts are produced and received.

Keywords: Age of Technological Generation; Transparency of Friction; Dialogic Reconfiguration of Memory; Emergent Impulse; Relational Originality; Receptive Artura; Artura

Korean synopsis

게재본 영문 초록의 내용을 한국어로 요약한 안내입니다.

이용욱의 이 논문은 기술생성시대를 기술복제·기술편집으로 환원할 수 없는 매체 조건으로 분석하고, 그 미학적 변화를 기억·충동·가치의 세 범주를 통해 논증한다. 인간은 목적을 설정하고 판단과 책임을 맡으며, 생성형 시스템은 학습된 통계적 분포에서 조건적으로 출력을 산출한다는 비대칭적 관계를 전제로 한다.

논문은 스티글레르의 3차 파지 이론을 바탕으로 기억의 교감을 설명하고, 쉴러의 유희충동을 생성 동인과 공진 동인으로 이루어진 창발충동으로 재구성한다. 또한 벤야민의 아우라를 관계적 원본성에 근거한 아투라로 재검토한다.

생성에 참여하는 과정에서의 아투라와 그 과정에 직접 참여하지 않은 수용자의 아투라를 구분하며, 레픽 아나돌의 Unsupervised 사례를 제한적으로 분석한다. 생성된 결과물과 함께 그 결과가 생산되고 수용되는 관계, 드러나는 마찰, 인간의 판단과 책임을 검토해야 한다는 것이 논문의 결론이다.

Records citing this source

• Artura
• Age of Technological Generation
• Poetics of Technological Generation

Rights

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