In her dissertation entitled DISJECTA MEMBRA, Marine de Dardel examines how representations of the dismembered body in architectural and audiovisual media shape our understanding of space, identity, and collective memory in the digital age.
Through transdisciplinary analysis combining architectural history, media studies, and iconological examination, the research traces recurring motifs of bodily fragmentation from gothic narratives to contemporary digital formats, employing audiovisual essays as embodied research methodology. Drawing primarily on Lacanian psychoanalysis and Kristeva’s theory of abjection, the project investigates how fragmented bodies function as sites of meaning production and cultural identity formation.
By examining the transition from architectural wholeness to digital fragmentation, this research reveals how embodied perception and corporeal memory operate in contemporary media landscapes, offering new perspectives on trauma processing and identity construction in an increasingly digitized world where the grotesque body serves as a metaphor for postmodern experience.
Image: de Dardel, Marine. (DÉS)ASTRES.ai (Film Still), 2025.
