The image by proxy

The exponential growth of image production has created a condition in which images no longer depict, but organise. The Image by Proxy introduces mass-microimaging as a framework for understanding how images function as infrastructural agents: automated and recursive, embedded in the logics of the attention economy. In this regime, visibility is pre-configured rather than chosen. Images operate by proxy, through algorithmic substitution and systemic validation. Their proliferation erodes perception, replacing memory and history with a perpetual present, while authenticity fades in a circulation where images reference only each other.
This book addresses the epistemic, ethical and political consequences of such automation. What forms of thought and responsibility remain possible when images dictate the conditions of recognition? How do infrastructures of imaging extend beyond representation to shape the terms of social, political and ecological existence?
Drawing on philosophy, media theory and cultural critique, The Image by Proxy argues that imaging has become the fastest-growing system of production on the planet, yet its control does not reside in any network of ethical accountability. Proxy images do not merely reflect perception; they structure reality. The book challenges the belief that visual abundance ensures democratic access, showing instead how mass-microimaging narrows thought, compresses experience and consolidates power in favour of the machinic infrastructures that sustain platform capitalism.
Dr. Marc Boumeester is a researcher, author and education-developer whose work pursues a sustained inquiry into the ontology of imaging. His theory of perception examines autopoiesis and entropy in relation to how images emerge, circulate and structure reality. He holds a PhD from Leiden University, where his research explored non-anthropocentric desire, architectural conditions and unstable media. Boumeester has taught and developed programmes at leading institutions, including Delft University of Technology, the Royal Academy of Art, Fontys School of Fine and Performing Arts, and ArtEZ University of the Arts, where he served as dean of the AKI Academy of Art and Design. He founded departments such as Moving Image and Interactive/Media/Design, and designed curricula that foster cross-disciplinary collaboration and critical inquiry. He has delivered lectures and keynotes worldwide and contributed to the image-ontology discourse through participation in research groups and numerous conferences. His work is widely published, including The Desire of the Medium (2018) and chapters in edited volumes and journals. A former television and film producer, Boumeester continues to bridge theory and practice, offering critical insights into how imaging and technology shape contemporary reality. His research, informed by new materialism, agential realism and affect theory, explores the dynamic interplay between imaging, perception and socio-cultural formations.

The Ecologies of Architecture Book Series promotes a transdisciplinary approach to architectural thinking and doing by extending its interest to topics that bring together the three ecological registers: the environment, the social and the individual. Such an approach accounts for what the built environment will come to be, and speculates about who will become alongside it. The series focuses not only on the why, what and how of architecture, but also on the who, who with and for whom.

The exponential growth of image production has created a condition in which images no longer depict, but organise. The Image by Proxy introduces mass-microimaging as a framework for understanding how images function as infrastructural agents: automated and recursive, embedded in the logics of the attention economy. In this regime, visibility is pre-configured rather than chosen. Images operate by proxy, through algorithmic substitution and systemic validation. Their proliferation erodes perception, replacing memory and history with a perpetual present, while authenticity fades in a circulation where images reference only each other.
This book addresses the epistemic, ethical and political consequences of such automation. What forms of thought and responsibility remain possible when images dictate the conditions of recognition? How do infrastructures of imaging extend beyond representation to shape the terms of social, political and ecological existence?
Drawing on philosophy, media theory and cultural critique, The Image by Proxy argues that imaging has become the fastest-growing system of production on the planet, yet its control does not reside in any network of ethical accountability. Proxy images do not merely reflect perception; they structure reality. The book challenges the belief that visual abundance ensures democratic access, showing instead how mass-microimaging narrows thought, compresses experience and consolidates power in favour of the machinic infrastructures that sustain platform capitalism.
Dr. Marc Boumeester is a researcher, author and education-developer whose work pursues a sustained inquiry into the ontology of imaging. His theory of perception examines autopoiesis and entropy in relation to how images emerge, circulate and structure reality. He holds a PhD from Leiden University, where his research explored non-anthropocentric desire, architectural conditions and unstable media. Boumeester has taught and developed programmes at leading institutions, including Delft University of Technology, the Royal Academy of Art, Fontys School of Fine and Performing Arts, and ArtEZ University of the Arts, where he served as dean of the AKI Academy of Art and Design. He founded departments such as Moving Image and Interactive/Media/Design, and designed curricula that foster cross-disciplinary collaboration and critical inquiry. He has delivered lectures and keynotes worldwide and contributed to the image-ontology discourse through participation in research groups and numerous conferences. His work is widely published, including The Desire of the Medium (2018) and chapters in edited volumes and journals. A former television and film producer, Boumeester continues to bridge theory and practice, offering critical insights into how imaging and technology shape contemporary reality. His research, informed by new materialism, agential realism and affect theory, explores the dynamic interplay between imaging, perception and socio-cultural formations.

The Ecologies of Architecture Book Series promotes a transdisciplinary approach to architectural thinking and doing by extending its interest to topics that bring together the three ecological registers: the environment, the social and the individual. Such an approach accounts for what the built environment will come to be, and speculates about who will become alongside it. The series focuses not only on the why, what and how of architecture, but also on the who, who with and for whom.