Phenomenology
and Digital Photography:
Methodological Tools for Understanding the Relationship between
Digital Photography and how we Perceive Modern Images.
Methodological Tools for Understanding the Relationship between
Digital Photography and how we Perceive Modern Images.
From the early
days of photography there has always been a line between photography and other
means of creating an image, such as painting and illustration. From the
beginning, photography has been defined by its ability to represent life with
brutal and unbiased truth. With this quality of verisimilitude, the viewer has
been given a unique way of experiencing an image not found previously. In
Mikael Petterson’s essay, Depictive
Traces: On the Phenomenology of Photography, he discusses that the
photographed image is not merely a representation of the subject, but in effect, is the subject. This causes what
Petterson describes as a proximity aspect.
One cannot argue the epistemological attributes of a photograph. Photography’s
role to document truthful representation of the subject can be seen throughout
our daily lives, from pictures on our driver’s license to items listed on eBay.
In most instances, the visual consumer entrusts the image with a certain amount
of legitimacy. This mindset was the norm during the early stages of photography
(Petterson, 186).
With
photography, the concept of proximity begins with an assumption that the
elements within the photograph have existed at some point in time. Even in the
early 20th century, when photo collage emerged, the viewer found a
level of closeness to the elements because it was assumed that these pieces of
the larger image were not contrived but more so, manipulated. The phenomenology
of photography depends on the viewer’s ability to discern the images origins to
be genuine or contrived (Petterson, 187).
One
of the methods of the phenomenology of the modern digital image is its ability
to “jolt” the viewer when a seemingly truthful account of reality is found to
be contrived (Petterson, 188). The viewer of a photograph is aware of the
medium’s ability to truthfully represent life to its smallest detail. Because
of this assumption in truthfulness, the viewer may be easily misled. To
describe how photographic images are imparted these attributes, Petterson
describes the method of “traces”, “A footprint in the sand is a state of the
sand, and sometimes we say it is a trace of the person who stepped there, or of
his or her foot (both being cases of things), and at other times we say it is
of the event of the stepping “(Petterson, 189). By using this example, we are
able to transcend the epistemological evidence of an image of a footprint and
are allowed to explore the phenomenological experience.
I
believe, that this is the aesthetic that separates modern digital photography
from the production of traditional photography. Through the subtle
juxtaposition of realistic images with modern digital editing technology we are
now able to produce a unique art form.
PETTERSSON,
MIKAEL. "Depictive Traces: On the Phenomenology of Photography."
Journal of Aesthetics & Art Criticism 69.2 (2011): 185-196. Academic Search
Complete. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
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