# Laura U. Marks [Wikipedia Link](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_U._Marks) ( b. 1963 ) ## Description Canadian-based philosopher and media theorist who coined "haptic visuality," describing cinema and media that appeal to touch as much as sight, prompting viewers to feel textures and cross-sensory memory through the image rather than simply decode it optically. - embodied frameworks of intercultural and diasporic cinema, - shared aesthetics of classical Islamic art and contemporary new media art - the environmental politics and carbon footprint of streaming video. ## Key Tags #theorist #decolonial #phenomenology #vision #media-archaeology #haptic ## Essential Works - *The Skin of the Film: Intercultural Cinema, Embodiment, and the Senses*. Duke University Press, 2000. - coins "haptic visuality"; foundational study of embodied, cross-sensory spectatorship in intercultural and diasporic cinema - *Touch: Sensuous Theory and Multisensory Media*. University of Minnesota Press, 2002. - extends haptic theory toward smell, eroticism, and electronic media - *Enfoldment and Infinity: An Islamic Genealogy of New Media Art*. MIT Press, 2010. - traces shared aesthetics of unfolding and enfolding between classical Islamic art/philosophy and contemporary new media art - *Hanan al-Cinema: Affections for the Moving Image*. MIT Press, 2015. - Deleuze-inflected study of experimental, essayistic, and documentary cinema from and about the Arab world - *The Fold: From Your Body to the Cosmos*. Duke University Press, 2024. - most recent book, generalizing folding/unfolding into a wider aesthetic and philosophical figure ## Details ### Concepts and Theories - [[Phenomenology]] - grounds haptic visuality in Merleau-Ponty's embodied perception, theorizing cinema spectatorship as a form of touch rather than distanced optical looking - [[Vision]] - reworks vision as potentially haptic and tactile, an alternative to the disembodied, distanced "optical" spectator of classical film theory - [[Media Archaeology]] - *Enfoldment and Infinity* traces a genealogy connecting contemporary new media art's unfolding/enfolding aesthetics back to classical Islamic art and philosophy - [[Third Cinema and Socio-political Cinema]] - *Hanan al-Cinema* reads experimental, essayistic, and documentary cinema from and about the Arab world through affect and political history ### Creative and Technical Practices %% none yet %% ### Collaborators - Dana Polan - co-credited on the "Filmography/Videography" back matter to *The Skin of the Film* (2000) - Radek Przedpełski - co-author on streaming and AI media's carbon footprint (active 2020s) - Stephen Makonin - SFU engineering collaborator building streaming-media energy and carbon footprint calculators (active 2020s) ### Institutional Affiliations and Associated Movements - [[Simon Fraser University]] - Dena Wosk University Professor, School for the Contemporary Arts, Vancouver (2003–present) - [[Small File Media Festival]] - founder; annual festival advocating small-file, low-bandwidth video as experimental and ecological practice (2020–present) - [[Substantial Motion Research Network]] - founding member ## References ### Primary Sources Bibliography Marks, Laura U. *The Skin of the Film: Intercultural Cinema, Embodiment, and the Senses*. Duke University Press, 2000. Marks, Laura U. *Touch: Sensuous Theory and Multisensory Media*. University of Minnesota Press, 2002. Marks, Laura U. *Enfoldment and Infinity: An Islamic Genealogy of New Media Art*. MIT Press, 2010. Marks, Laura U. *Hanan al-Cinema: Affections for the Moving Image*. MIT Press, 2015. Marks, Laura U., and Dana Polan. "Filmography/Videography." In *The Skin of the Film*, 275–84. Duke University Press, 2020. [https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822381372-012](https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822381372-012). ### Secondary Sources Bibliography Perkins, Claire. "This Time It's Personal: Laura U. Marks, *Touch: Sensuous Theory and Multisensory Media* (review)." *Senses of Cinema*, no. 33 (October–December 2004). [link](https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2004/book-reviews/touch_laura_marks/).