{"id":160,"date":"2026-04-23T17:55:52","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T21:55:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/?post_type=chapter&p=160"},"modified":"2026-04-29T18:28:49","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T22:28:49","slug":"introduction-by-mira-kopanarov-and-riley-wilson","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/chapter\/introduction-by-mira-kopanarov-and-riley-wilson\/","title":{"raw":"Introduction, Mira Kopanarov and Riley Wilson","rendered":"Introduction, Mira Kopanarov and Riley Wilson"},"content":{"raw":"In \u201cBraiding Sweet Grass\u201d Robin Wall Kimmerer (2013) shares her deeper knowing of what the spoken word is. She teaches us that words merge with the plants in seasonality and emotions, not just as shapes of latin letters or photographed images of flowers in a textbook page. Knowing the stories of the plants, addressing them as equals, speaking their language, and being grateful for their wisdom is a worldview of reciprocity with the natural world. When traumatic events impact an ancestral memory, or commerce subsumes a symbol, a culture, language, bodies or forests, the greater consciousness archives the events even in the grains of sand. Walter Benjamin calls such luminous quality of the original works of humans and nature, an \u201caura\u201d. In the collection of works \u201cHow to See- Visual Culture\u201d the reader will learn to see the aura in the marks on the body, the letters, fabrics, games and graves. In an interplay with the changing environment, the graduate project spans across 30,000 years looking for the individual effects of visual culture, but also as a part of collective memory.\r\n\r\nIn Chapter I and II, Jadi Darawi takes us through engaging research- creation of seeing bodies as a universe of continuously renegotiated meaning within and with others. How do you observe bodies, around you, on the screen, in books, and of the past? Darawi weaves a meaningful artpiece as an embodiment of Armenian culture, showing the seeing of the body as a felt experience. Shaming, but also touch and symbols of belonging, become a groundbreaking approach to an archive of the female struggle and image.\r\n\r\nChapter III takes us on a pop culture analysis of perhaps the most telling paradoxes of our times. Riley Wilson\u2019s research discusses the symbolic and commercial interplay between Labubu and Karl Marx. She invites us to discover a new way of seeing the commodity- subsuming not only ancient mythologies, sacred spaces, but the very minds that conceived them as concepts.\r\n\r\nZahra Dorafshan explores cultural nuances captured through documentary photographs in India and Nepal. Chapter IV is a visual storytelling of the subtle signs in the face, posture, traditional clothing, and eyes of women in distraught regions. As a photographer, Dorafshan shares with the reader the journey of the marginalzied woman, broadening the understanding through the use of documentary photography, but also through the perception of the artist. She opens an important cross-cultural dialogue using framing, lighting, composition, and interaction as a meaning-making technique.\r\n\r\nIn Chapter V and VI, Amanda Monasar dives deep into the market forces lurking behind some of our most beloved sites of fandom and play. She maps out the intricacies of the K-Pop photo card market, revealing how our emotional attachments work in tandem with business interests to influence the economic value of an object. Following from this, she embarks on a long form visual analysis of the predatory mechanics of gacha games\u2014mobile games which encourage gambling behaviour via their randomized loot-box mechanics. Her work takes the form of an essay and an accompanying research-creation video-project. In her meticulous breakdown of the animation sequences featured in the Tears of Thesis gacha game, Monasar asks how semiotics and spectacle are leveraged to encourage spending and influence player\u2019s emotions in the game space.\r\n\r\nIn Chapter VII, Mira Kopanarov traces the historical emergence of Glagolitsa, a sacred script originating in the ninth-century. Drawing on her findings from her trans-national exhibition, bringing together photographs of the script and mixed-media artwork by various artists, Kopanarov provides us with a kaleidoscopic toolkit for seeing Glagolitsa not simply as a static form of communication, but as a living cultural artifact. When seen through this lens, this centuries-old script becomes a site of spiritual wisdom ready to reveal to us more hopeful systems of care, connection, and morality.\r\n\r\nChapter VIII explores the visual components of reggae records as Jean-Christophe Bourgault breaks down the genesis of the album cover art industry. With careful attention to the Jamaican roots of reggae music, Bourgault finds that the cover art of an album can reveal the layered dynamics of colonialism, colorism, and commodification that were at play at the time of an album\u2019s conception.\r\n\r\nIn Chapter IX, Jude Tabra weaves together theory and history in her account of how to see a keffiyeh. Tabra moves from the micro to the macro, narrating the inspirations behind the keffiyeh\u2019s intricate design before speaking about its importance as a symbol of belonging and resistance within the pro-Palestine movement, and its subsequent co-option within western fashion markets. With care and passion, this piece unveils the keffiyeh as a cultural symbol with global consequences.\r\n\r\nChapter X discusses how even the most mundane aspects of life, like the contents of a backpack, are a continuously negotiated terrain between marginalized identities and capitalism. M. Paula Vidal Valdespino offers a fresh perspective on the politicized sight in bedrooms and everyday meaning-making spaces and belongings. It is through the simplest of objects that we can discover identities often marginalzied, hidden in the world of commerce and zest for power.\r\n\r\nChapter XI by David Coulson discusses his work photographing over 100 stories for Patient Voice<\/a>, an online platform that publishes first-person health narratives accompanied by portraits and images, with the aim of fostering understanding, reducing stigma, and building community around health experiences in Canada.\r\n\r\nThe Afterward by Monique Tschofen closes the volume with thoughts about the volume and the nature of theory.\r\n\r\n \r\n
\r\n
Works Cited:<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n
\r\n\r\nBenjamin, W. (1968). The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction. In H. Arendt (Ed.), Illuminations<\/em>. Schocken Books. (Original work published 1935)\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
\r\n
Kimmerer, R. W. (2013). Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants<\/i> (1st ed.). Milkweed Editions.<\/div>\r\n<\/div>","rendered":"

In \u201cBraiding Sweet Grass\u201d Robin Wall Kimmerer (2013) shares her deeper knowing of what the spoken word is. She teaches us that words merge with the plants in seasonality and emotions, not just as shapes of latin letters or photographed images of flowers in a textbook page. Knowing the stories of the plants, addressing them as equals, speaking their language, and being grateful for their wisdom is a worldview of reciprocity with the natural world. When traumatic events impact an ancestral memory, or commerce subsumes a symbol, a culture, language, bodies or forests, the greater consciousness archives the events even in the grains of sand. Walter Benjamin calls such luminous quality of the original works of humans and nature, an \u201caura\u201d. In the collection of works \u201cHow to See- Visual Culture\u201d the reader will learn to see the aura in the marks on the body, the letters, fabrics, games and graves. In an interplay with the changing environment, the graduate project spans across 30,000 years looking for the individual effects of visual culture, but also as a part of collective memory.<\/p>\n

In Chapter I and II, Jadi Darawi takes us through engaging research- creation of seeing bodies as a universe of continuously renegotiated meaning within and with others. How do you observe bodies, around you, on the screen, in books, and of the past? Darawi weaves a meaningful artpiece as an embodiment of Armenian culture, showing the seeing of the body as a felt experience. Shaming, but also touch and symbols of belonging, become a groundbreaking approach to an archive of the female struggle and image.<\/p>\n

Chapter III takes us on a pop culture analysis of perhaps the most telling paradoxes of our times. Riley Wilson\u2019s research discusses the symbolic and commercial interplay between Labubu and Karl Marx. She invites us to discover a new way of seeing the commodity- subsuming not only ancient mythologies, sacred spaces, but the very minds that conceived them as concepts.<\/p>\n

Zahra Dorafshan explores cultural nuances captured through documentary photographs in India and Nepal. Chapter IV is a visual storytelling of the subtle signs in the face, posture, traditional clothing, and eyes of women in distraught regions. As a photographer, Dorafshan shares with the reader the journey of the marginalzied woman, broadening the understanding through the use of documentary photography, but also through the perception of the artist. She opens an important cross-cultural dialogue using framing, lighting, composition, and interaction as a meaning-making technique.<\/p>\n

In Chapter V and VI, Amanda Monasar dives deep into the market forces lurking behind some of our most beloved sites of fandom and play. She maps out the intricacies of the K-Pop photo card market, revealing how our emotional attachments work in tandem with business interests to influence the economic value of an object. Following from this, she embarks on a long form visual analysis of the predatory mechanics of gacha games\u2014mobile games which encourage gambling behaviour via their randomized loot-box mechanics. Her work takes the form of an essay and an accompanying research-creation video-project. In her meticulous breakdown of the animation sequences featured in the Tears of Thesis gacha game, Monasar asks how semiotics and spectacle are leveraged to encourage spending and influence player\u2019s emotions in the game space.<\/p>\n

In Chapter VII, Mira Kopanarov traces the historical emergence of Glagolitsa, a sacred script originating in the ninth-century. Drawing on her findings from her trans-national exhibition, bringing together photographs of the script and mixed-media artwork by various artists, Kopanarov provides us with a kaleidoscopic toolkit for seeing Glagolitsa not simply as a static form of communication, but as a living cultural artifact. When seen through this lens, this centuries-old script becomes a site of spiritual wisdom ready to reveal to us more hopeful systems of care, connection, and morality.<\/p>\n

Chapter VIII explores the visual components of reggae records as Jean-Christophe Bourgault breaks down the genesis of the album cover art industry. With careful attention to the Jamaican roots of reggae music, Bourgault finds that the cover art of an album can reveal the layered dynamics of colonialism, colorism, and commodification that were at play at the time of an album\u2019s conception.<\/p>\n

In Chapter IX, Jude Tabra weaves together theory and history in her account of how to see a keffiyeh. Tabra moves from the micro to the macro, narrating the inspirations behind the keffiyeh\u2019s intricate design before speaking about its importance as a symbol of belonging and resistance within the pro-Palestine movement, and its subsequent co-option within western fashion markets. With care and passion, this piece unveils the keffiyeh as a cultural symbol with global consequences.<\/p>\n

Chapter X discusses how even the most mundane aspects of life, like the contents of a backpack, are a continuously negotiated terrain between marginalized identities and capitalism. M. Paula Vidal Valdespino offers a fresh perspective on the politicized sight in bedrooms and everyday meaning-making spaces and belongings. It is through the simplest of objects that we can discover identities often marginalzied, hidden in the world of commerce and zest for power.<\/p>\n

Chapter XI by David Coulson discusses his work photographing over 100 stories for Patient Voice<\/a>, an online platform that publishes first-person health narratives accompanied by portraits and images, with the aim of fostering understanding, reducing stigma, and building community around health experiences in Canada.<\/p>\n

The Afterward by Monique Tschofen closes the volume with thoughts about the volume and the nature of theory.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
Works Cited:<\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Benjamin, W. (1968). The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction. In H. Arendt (Ed.), Illuminations<\/em>. Schocken Books. (Original work published 1935)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
Kimmerer, R. W. (2013). Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants<\/i> (1st ed.). Milkweed Editions.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":518,"menu_order":2,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-160","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":3,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/518"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/160\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":257,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/160\/revisions\/257"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/3"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/160\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=160"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=160"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/visualculture-howtosee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}