(Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú. Instituto Riva-Agüero, 2018-12-10) Rodriguez, Mariana
In his research on art history, Georges Didi-Huberman takes images from distinct insects –butterflies, phasmidas, moths, flies etc.– to analyze visual objects and to assign them a value with respect to their image and historic position. In Survivance des lucioles (2009), the author takes the firefly as a symbol to reflect upon the power of several artistic manifestations with respect to their quality as images. In that sense, what is proposed is the idea that these insects survive as images (images survivantes) that –representing art, and metonymically humans– are bearers of an aesthetic and political resistance by emitting their dim lights (lucciole). Hereafter, the present paper (1) analyzes the definition of fireflies as images survivantes, as well as delves into how the author incorporates those images to the study of other insect-images such as butterflies or moths in previous studies; (2) examines the aesthetic and political value that Didi-Huberman confers to these firefly-images as cultural and divergent remains, in times of resistance; and, finally, (3) assesses Didi-Huberman’s position regarding the supposition that “fireflies have disappeared”, understanding this assumption as the disappearance of experience in its purest sense.