[11] Dickey, W. Zenobia, Queen of Palmyria. 1995. (aesthetic)

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Wlliam Dickey's works are in HyperCard and are not readily available. However, his experiments with hidden anchors are stunning connotative commentaries on an aesthetic exploration of meaning and emphasis. His works consist of a graphic with a line or two of text, and then an invisible anchor on a relevant image. The text comes alive when the reader scrolls over the images and clicks.

In HyperCard, the hand does not change when it hovers over an anchor, so the user must try to click in many areas. Unlike the same click and hope strategy in afternoon, a story [27] where every click will yield something, only selected images have an an anchor that will yield the next screen . In fact, in Zenobia, Queen of Palmyria [10], there is only one anchor per node. In William Dickey's work, the image selected as the anchor becomes the key to unravelling the language.

Graphic importance of anchors

On this screen, the only anchor is on the bull's eye. Here the gaze that matters is not centered but off center, thus undermining the literal text: stabs when the gaze centers. The eyes are empty, without a pupil focus, thus further underplaying the key "gaze." The two main figures are not whole and this sense of incompleteness is furthered by their "marginalization" their relatively unimportant status as non-anchors.

Had the anchor been on the center figures fighting, the connotative interpretation would be different and would privilege the text "stabs" rather than the text "gaze" as the anchor over the eyes does. Thus the key to interpreting the text centers directly on the anchor.

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Screenshot used by permission from editor.

Anchor as navigation

The reader soon learns the language of the anchors. Once the reader finds the link is in the gazing eyes of the bull on one screen, she is more likely to gravitate to the gazing eyes in the center of a succeeding screen.

When this strategy does not work, she will then face more questions:

  • Why is the gaze important on the first screen, and not the second?
  • What does function as the anchor, and why?
  • How do the privileged and non privileged graphic portions relate both on the original and destination screens?