The Changing Photograph
Writing about Selves: Autobiographically, Photographically, and Digitally
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Aayushi Gupta
The self has been the site of exploration for practitioners across all disciplines. If the philosopher has questioned the ontological value of the self, the artist has deconstructed the self, and the author has written about it in retrospection. We seek for our reflections in the cultural objects of today, but are these not taking us further away from defining ourselves? The advent of photography provided nineteenth century writers with a new set of vocabulary to describe themselves; the language of literature transformed from being imaginative to photographic. Seeing that the Internet has been the next big thing since photography, what kind of transformation will literary forms have to go through, or have they already gone through, to keep up with the digital age? While comparing the self-portrait in photography with that in autobiography, and discussing how both overlap in the genre of photobiography; this paper aims to explore the ways in which technology -since the advent of photography and other media based production and reproduction technologies- has led to an evolution of the literary vocabulary. I intend on further questioning how the unstoppable progress of digitization (or technological advancements) has, continues to, and will continue influencing this literary evolution. From photographic memories to digital archives; the image that once promised reality is now not only photographic, but also digital which opens access to a hyper-reality. Instead of writing about ourselves with photographic detail, are we now thinking digitally?
Mirrors and Patterns: Reflections on Creative Practice
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Kurt Espersen-Peters
This paper reflects upon the subject-object relation of visual art from the perspective of producing and experiencing visual compositions. By eschewing socio-historical statements or specific messages on behalf of the artist, this investigation explores how visual aesthetics can structure and guide interpretation. This premise emerged from an examination of the author's creative and reflective process in making and presenting a series of photographic compositions. The surprising results of audience interpretation lead to a reexamination of the creative process and how viewers read and decode visual information contained in the visual artifact. The paper explores these themes in two stages. The first examines the production of visual compositions including original intentions and reflective adjustments. The second investigates the imaginative interpretations of the compositions by the viewer. The paper concludes by examining the agency of the artist in the production and presentation process and the cross-dialogue that emerges with the viewer’s subjective interpretation of the compositions based on the visual elements presented in the artwork. The paper concludes with recommendations about how this approach could inform interpretations of other visual media and mediums, such as the built environment.
Still Photography a Distant Memory
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session David Julian Cubby
Whilst it is true that analog and digital systems capture and hold a definite range of the electromagnetic spectrum in different ways and, for the most part, the outcome is comparable, there are inevitably useful characteristics of electronic capture that have already altered and extended or even shifted photography’s vernacular into new trajectories. Some of these changes are in terms of exposure, extended dynamic range, color fidelity, resolution and/or still images culled from HD video. Even so, it may be seen that the digital/analog divide over claims to veracity may close in short order as non-sequitur as digital photography proceeds at the least as a powerful parody of the analog or persists with arguments that the latent image exists electronically, resulting in a parodically similar camera obscura/lenticular apparatus and single point perspective, for the time being. Yet, as we attend to new media technology within its discrete, objective liminalities and possibilities, amongst these novel forms and paradigms, again and again, the question needs to be asked and shall be asked with increasing frequency: do we desire or need to continue to produce and consume still images?
