REFLECTIONS ON MY READINGS
Having taken time to digest these readings, it seems that the documentary photography that I took at more so at face value at the beginning of this course, is becoming less and less trustworthy or certainly pure. And that is without even a photographer, curator or editor’s intention, all of which I have also become more aware of. Images are definitely open to those who want to take charge of them (Campany,2020:8).This is especially so in our digital and post photographic age.
There also seems to be a theme that there must be some belief in the truth of photographs or they lose their value. Therefore it is important to have some transparency in those with power over the meaning, photographer, editor, publisher, curator. It is also important that viewers ask questions of the image whilst reading it, as ultimately an image has no meaning without a spectator. Certainly a photograph can only be a representation of reality not reality itself.
The cultural and political space of the photograph has also been made clear to me, as have the many ways that people can take power over an image. Whether images can move above these influences I will need to investigate, watch and see. As Batchen (1999) says whilst its vital that we determine the difference between reality and representation we also need to save its indexical (contextual) relationship with reality otherwise it simply becomes another sign.
In the meantime I intend to explore the various layers of truth that photographs may contain, and as Bogre suggests different times of truths possibly,and how I might use them in my own work, by taking some of this forwards into my proposal for assignment 5 “layers of Truth”: https://nkssite5.photo.blog/2021/04/09/assignment-5-draft-proposal/
Additional references:
Batchen, G. (1999) Burning with Desire: The Conception of Photography. MIT Press.
Campany, D. (2020) On Photographs. London: Thames and Hudson
Photography 2: Documentary 