Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book explores the importance of novel sensing and intelligent technologies for the human environment, and the tasks of shaping it materially, aesthetically, functionally and normatively. It presents the results of continuing reflections by artists, critics and theorists on the relationship between different senses employed by cultural artefacts, and the ways in which such artefacts give meaning to sensory phenomena and a sensory presence to meaning. The book discusses the increasing number of gastronomic art practices making their way into museums and galleries, and explores the changing philosophical terrain first used to block such gastronomic experiences from the museum. It analyses how artists have challenged their graphic competencies, identifying where traditional methods help and where they break down. The book also presents some important episodes in changing approaches to the senses in the recent history of the arts and design.