ART IN THE AGE OF DIGITAL REPRODUCTION: RECONSIDERING THE CONCEPT OF "AURA" IN DIGITAL ARTS

Since Walter Benjamin wrote his renowned essay "The Work of Art In The Age Of Mechanical Reproduction" in 1936, the aura of an artwork has always beean an issue of debate. Benjamin describes "aura" as an "art work's unique existence at the place is happens to be" and claims that the aura of an artwork is born out of the combination of factors suck as uniqueness, tradition, distance and authenticity. Benjamin announces the "death of aura" as a consequence of new Technologies which enable artworks to be reproduced mechanically. Considering Benjamin's aura in digital arts, it can be observed that a majority of digital art forms do not match with Benjamin's aura criterias. However, aura has not definetively decayed in the age of digital reproduction; it has transformed into a new form as a result of the advancements in media technologies. This paper aims to discuss how Benjamin's aura finds its reflections in digital art. The paper proposes that digital reproduction has not exterminated the Aura of artworks but transformed it into a new form, which can be named as "digital aura".