This paper investigates GIFs that use famous paintings and art collages in order to discern if their possible interpretations justify the label of ‘floating signifiers’. For this purpose, I explain what ‘floating signifier’ means and describe what happened with the term when it was correlated with the issues of information and digital materiality. Thus, in new media, the parallel term for ‘floating signifier’ is Hayles’s ‘flickering signifier’. In a subtle manner, GIFs represents perfect instantiation of both concepts. The paper also addresses the main “portrait” of GIFs, examining them in both online (Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook) and offline discursive contexts. The signifieds attributed to particular examples of GIFs, and to GIFs in general, delineate their profile in terms of floating signifiers.

中文翻译：

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GIF作为浮动指示符

本文调查了使用著名绘画和艺术拼贴画的GIF，以识别其可能的解释是否证明“浮动指示符”的标签是正确的。为此，我解释了“浮动指示符”的含义，并描述了该术语与信息和数字重要性问题相关时发生的情况。因此，在新媒体中，“浮动指示符”的平行术语是海尔斯的“闪烁指示符”。GIF以一种微妙的方式代表了这两个概念的完美实例。本文还讨论了GIF的主要“肖像”，在在线（Tumblr，Instagram，Facebook）和离线话语上下文中对其进行了研究。这些指代归因于GIF的特定示例，并且一般来说归因于GIF，它们根据浮动指示符来描绘其轮廓。