Abstrakt
The opposition between the imaginary and the real prevents us from understanding either one. The imaginary embodies a certain intuitive presence of the thing and not an empty signitive intention.
Moreover it is able to compete with perception and to offer an increased presence, a sur-real display, of the things, as shown by Merleau-Ponty's analyses of art in Eye and Mind. As a result, we have to overcome the conception according to which the imaginary field is a mere figment of my imagination, a mental entity that I could still possess in the very absence of its object.
On the other hand, the presence of reality is never complete or solid: "The transcendence of the far-off encroaches upon my present and brings a hint of unreality even into the experiences with which I believe myself to coincide." Therefore, first, the imaginary has to be redefined as a special hovering modality of the presence of the beings themselves. Second: is not the imaginary always intertwined with perception? Merleau-Ponty advocates the thesis that there is an ""imaginary texture of the real."" What is the meaning of this assertion? To what extent will it be able to blur the classical categories without arousing confusion? Can we avoid reducing reality to illusion? Lastly, this reflection leads to discover, in the imaginary mode of being, an ontological model (the ontological model?), the canon enabling Merleau-Ponty to think Being, an "Oneiric Being." Thus we will venture the paradoxical contention that the imaginary is the fundamental dimension of the real.
The notion of "fundament" becomes problematic and receives an ironical connotation, however this is precisely what is at stake in a non-positivist ontology. Existence "lies" in a ghost-like, sketchy and unsubstantial (absence of) ground, in a restlessly creative being that is open to creative interpretations.
And there it finds the principle of the ever-recurring crisis that both tears it apart and makes it rich in future promise.