Intersections between Showing and Concealment in the History of the Concept of Screen

The genealogical reconstructions of the word and concept of screen in media archaeology have often stressed that “surface for presenting images” is a relatively late meaning that came into use in the first half of the nineteenth century, associated with the spread of pre-cinema devices such as the phantasmagoria and magic lantern. The original meaning would instead refer primarily to concepts of concealment and protection. I believe, however, that another, broader – and hence inevitably unsystematic, incomplete and simplifying – exploration of the concept of screen is required, to establish that it embodies two coexisting meanings: an instrument of ‘protection’ or ‘concealment,’ on the one hand, and of ‘showing’ or ‘monstration,’ on the other. Some episodes in the history of this concept, which we shall discuss, show how we should not be too hasty in jumping to the conclusion that the nineteenth century was a crucial time of discontinuity, of breaking with the past, a “point of diffraction” between two incompatible meanings (to use Foucault’s terminology). The aim is not merely to court controversy but to make a profitable contribution to an archaeology of the screen that demonstrates the intimate relationship between the two orders of meaning. This relationship may even seem obvious sometimes but problematic and theoretically fertile at others. Perhaps it lays the foundations for the concept itself: the screen probably needs to be considered not as an object but as a function, or rather as a combination of functions.