The Aesthetics, Science, and Politics of Gelatinous Creatures, or Rancière and Latour at Sea

Jellyfish and other gelatinous creatures float beyond human comprehension in a zone where science and aesthetics flow together in puzzling ways. As scientists have struggled to capture, distinguish and categorize these fragile and fluid forms of life, which become “shapeless see-through gelatinous blobs” or “unrecognizable mush” (Madin) when brought up in trawls, striking photographs represent them as distinct aesthetic objects--glittering “jewels,” perfectly set against black backgrounds. Departing from the standard critique of highly aestheticized “eco-porn,” Alaimo argues that photographs of jellyfish can be understood as moments of care, wonder, and concern, which may foster posthumanist recognitions of these creatures. Floating at the far reaches of human imagination and scientific discovery the gelata reconfigure the sensible—both what we can perceive and what can make sense to us. If politics is “an aesthetic affair,” because it is a “polemical form of reframing common sense” (Rancière) representations of jellies argue for the recognition of creatures at the distant reaches of what an animal may be, provoking a bluer political sphere. Even though Latour does not include art within his posthuman collective, aesthetic representations of some of these heretofore invisible entities may play a crucial role in opening up the very possibility for the collective that he envisions, as it is these arresting images that may reconfigure the conditions of possibility for the entry of the nonhuman. And yet the highly aestheticized jellyfish portraits provoke a pleasure and wonder that cannot be directly channeled into the ethics, politics, or practices of species protection, as the seemingly flimsy gelata are proliferating in polluted and disturbed ecosystems.