Metapictures, Hypertext, and the Fear of Self-Reflexivity

We live in frightening times. The average person is inundated by scores of interactions that could not have been conceived of fifty years ago. Your phone can talk to you. Your search engine of choice customizes results for you, based on recent searches. Even your books interact with you, allowing terms and references to be searched, while you are still reading. The future is here, and George Orwell is rolling in his grave. Or so it would seem, based on the vitriolic response of critics and theorists to this new age of self-reflexivity. An example of this hair-trigger, fear-induced response can be found in Mitchell’s Metapictures. He quotes Saul Steinberg’s analysis of his own drawing, The Spiral, as “a frightening picture”.

“He sees this as a terrifying, sublime image of the danger of self-reflexive art.” (Mitchell, 41)
In an era when television shows and their creators go out of their way to reference fan theories and indulge in audience participation, it’s easy to understand why some critics hold the views that they do.

But if we were to travel back through the centuries, to the dawn of handwritten manuscripts, would we be safe from the horror of self-reflexivity? The short answer is no. The long answer will take some explaining.

To begin with, what actually defines hypertext, metapictures, and self-reflexivity?

Hypertext, in the context of our assigned readings and class discussions, can be defined as a text that is linked to another text. In modern times, many have taken hypertext to exclusively apply to online texts. However, hypertext can also refer to a text that implicitly references another. According to George Landow, “Hypertext here permits one to make explicit, though not necessarily intrusive, the linked materials that an educated reader perceives surrounding it.” (Landow, 35)

An example of this is also provided by Landow, who describes allusions in a specific novel, written well before the dawn of the Internet.

Well, you might say, if you are of the self-reflexivity is bad persuasion, what about before that? What about before the era of industrialization and increased human connectivity?

As anyone who has taken History of Text can tell you, there was a surprising level of self-reflexivity present in medieval texts. Scribes wrote notes in the margins of illustrated manuscripts, and it was not uncommon to find pictorial depictions of the scribes and artists in these manuscripts. Were these the first metapictures?

A metapicture is defined by Mitchell as “pictures that show themselves in order to know themselves: the stage the self-knowledge of pictures” (Mitchell, 48)

A widely known example of a metapicture, which is also discussed in Mitchell's Metapictures, is Diego Velazquez's Las Meninas, painted in 1656, in which Velazquez has inserted himself as a subject. Velazquez is not only a subject in the painting, he has depicted himself as the painter/ creator, explicitly referencing his position and drawing attention to the fact that what you are gazing upon is, in fact, a painting. This painting hangs in the Museo Del Prado in Madrid, Spain, alongside works by Ruben and Goya, and is considered to be a masterpiece. 

If we accept these definitions, we must also accept that self-reflexivity is not a modern construct, but instead an inescapable facet of human creation. It may be impossible to separate a creation or work from having a dialogue with it’s audience.

And this might not be such a terrible thing. Since I (see that self-reflexivity at work?) have grown up in the generation that has always had computers, I might be less resistant to seeing the fourth wall shattered. I might be biased.

I believe that Mitchell’s discussion of Las Meninas exemplifies my thoughts on hypertext, meta pictures, and self-reflexivity: If we can consider Velazquez’s painting a masterpiece, why can't we also accept the notion of reading Pride and Prejudice on an eBook? Or a hyper-mediated online text as valuable? Why is the concept of self-reflexivity so reviled?

- Caitlin Lang