This photograph was taken from the WTC site observation platform; I have not re-touched or manipulated it in any way. The platform has three layers of material that separate viewers from the site (see below left). One is a rigid metal grid (below right), another looks like a fishing net, and the final layer, shown above, is a fine mesh. These layers presumably protect tourists from flying debris coming from the construction site, and keep people safely witihin the confines of the viewing platform, but they also mediate our experience of the WTC site. The grids, nets, and screens effectively break up our perception of the site into chunks; it pixellates the subject of our gaze. The grids and meshes are more than a barrier: they are a lens through which our perception of the site is mediated.

Does this make it easier or more difficult to engage with the site? Does it constrain our interpretations? Does it change our emotional reaction? The grids and meshes certainly do something. For the sake of pushing my themes, I will go so far as to say that pixellating this site renders it partially artificial; it makes it less real, and therefore less painful. We are encouraged to see the site as an acumulation of pixels, a series of excavation units, and this tempers our immediate emotional reactions. I do not claim that this is an intentional, positive, negative, or even universal effect, just that this case provides a very clear example of how raster-thinking and an archaeological sensibilty can mediate our visual perception of the world.

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