In this paper I focus on the concept of diagrams, as they have been appropriated from a Deleuzean discourse into the philosophy of Manuel DeLanda. For strategical reasons Gilles Deleuze reiterated on several occasions a caution against subjecting diagrams to history. Yet, this is exactly what DeLanda seems to invite us to do. To counter this tendency, without abandoning DeLanda's perspective, a new passage between the virtual plane of consistency and concrete machines is invented. This paper is not a final solution, but an elaborated strategy which points ahead towards intensified efforts in investigating the evolution of visual screens.
In this article, the post-war institutional interpretation of Jacob A. Riis' photographs is measured against their nineteenth-century capacity for mass media communication. The conventions that today determine the proper meaning and origin of these celebrated photos first emerged with
an exhibition held in 1947. The ensuing, and dominant, mode of interpretation is shown here to be fundamentally at odds with the conditions for image use in early mass media communication. This article examines the clash and argues for an alternative mode of interpretation that is capable
of accounting for the distinct production of iconic meaning afforded by the media that Riis employed.
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