date | 16.02.09
chapter context
Barthes discusses what it is, as humans, we do when we know a photo is about to be taken. We transform ourselves into what we would like the image to look like – in essence, we transform our selves into the image in advance. But, when the photo is taken there is a moment of uncertain filiation – what type of image will be ‘born’.
Even though one consciously poses for a photo it is important to differentiate between the essence of the person and his effigy – he is more than his image.
In the past, there was a fascination with the mysticism of the vision of the double, often hallucinations (maybe due to schizophrenia, epilepsy). The action of taking a photo means that anyone can see a vision of themselves (unlike in a mirror). Barthes is concerned that no one has thought of this disturbance to civilization. He says that “photography is the advent of myself as other: a cunning disassociation of consciousness from identity,” (Barthes, 12). It is when our identity and our essence can be separated and considered each on its own. One still does get the feeling of the mythic theme of seeing a double, when one looks at him/herself on a piece of paper, as an object.
Because photography transforms a subject into an object, once on that piece of paper, who does the photograph belong to?
Barthes explains there are four image-repertoires that intersect when he is sitting in front of the lens. They are the one I think I am, the one I want others to think I am, the one the photographer thinks I am and the one he makes use of to exhibit his art.
There is a constant self-imitation when taking a photograph and because of this, when photographed, one suffers from the sensation of inauthenticity, or imposture.
That moment when the photograph is taken, one is neither a subject nor an object, but a subject who feels oneself becoming an object- a micro-version of death (when a person dies, they become an object – and the same occurs when a photograph is taken of them). When we look at a photograph taken of us, (the product of this operation) we see what has become of us – Total Image or Death in a person. We experience ourselves as an object. That object can now be filed, used, stored by the photographer – returning to the question (who does the photograph belong to?).
When Barthes looks at a photograph of himself, he looks for Death because he believes it is the eidos of that photograph. The only thing he enjoys (or tolerates) about having his photo taken is the sound of the camera. The organ of the photographer (the finger not the eye) is such because it is linked to the trigger of the lens and to the metallic shifting of the plates. That metallic click breaks through what he describes as the mortiferous (deadly) layer of the pose.
“For me the noise of Time is not sad: I love bells, clocks, watches - and I recall that at first photographic implements were related to techniques of cabinetmaking and the machinery of precision: cameras, in short, were clocks for seeing, and perhaps in me someone very old still hears in the photographic mechanism the living sound of the wood,” (Barthes, 15).
chapter context
Barthes discusses what it is, as humans, we do when we know a photo is about to be taken. We transform ourselves into what we would like the image to look like – in essence, we transform our selves into the image in advance. But, when the photo is taken there is a moment of uncertain filiation – what type of image will be ‘born’.
Even though one consciously poses for a photo it is important to differentiate between the essence of the person and his effigy – he is more than his image.
In the past, there was a fascination with the mysticism of the vision of the double, often hallucinations (maybe due to schizophrenia, epilepsy). The action of taking a photo means that anyone can see a vision of themselves (unlike in a mirror). Barthes is concerned that no one has thought of this disturbance to civilization. He says that “photography is the advent of myself as other: a cunning disassociation of consciousness from identity,” (Barthes, 12). It is when our identity and our essence can be separated and considered each on its own. One still does get the feeling of the mythic theme of seeing a double, when one looks at him/herself on a piece of paper, as an object.
Because photography transforms a subject into an object, once on that piece of paper, who does the photograph belong to?
Barthes explains there are four image-repertoires that intersect when he is sitting in front of the lens. They are the one I think I am, the one I want others to think I am, the one the photographer thinks I am and the one he makes use of to exhibit his art.
There is a constant self-imitation when taking a photograph and because of this, when photographed, one suffers from the sensation of inauthenticity, or imposture.
That moment when the photograph is taken, one is neither a subject nor an object, but a subject who feels oneself becoming an object- a micro-version of death (when a person dies, they become an object – and the same occurs when a photograph is taken of them). When we look at a photograph taken of us, (the product of this operation) we see what has become of us – Total Image or Death in a person. We experience ourselves as an object. That object can now be filed, used, stored by the photographer – returning to the question (who does the photograph belong to?).
When Barthes looks at a photograph of himself, he looks for Death because he believes it is the eidos of that photograph. The only thing he enjoys (or tolerates) about having his photo taken is the sound of the camera. The organ of the photographer (the finger not the eye) is such because it is linked to the trigger of the lens and to the metallic shifting of the plates. That metallic click breaks through what he describes as the mortiferous (deadly) layer of the pose.
“For me the noise of Time is not sad: I love bells, clocks, watches - and I recall that at first photographic implements were related to techniques of cabinetmaking and the machinery of precision: cameras, in short, were clocks for seeing, and perhaps in me someone very old still hears in the photographic mechanism the living sound of the wood,” (Barthes, 15).
No comments:
Post a Comment