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Truth claim, in photography, is a term Tom Gunning uses to describe the prevalent belief traditional photographs accurately depict reality. He states that the truth claim relies on both the indexicality and visual accuracy of photographs. [1]
Charles Peirce's term 'indexicality' refers to the physical relationship between the object photographed and the resulting image. [2] Paul Levinson emphasises the ability of photography to capture or reflect "a literal energy configuration from the real world" through a chemical process. [3] Light sensitive emulsion on the photographic negative is transformed by light passing through the lens and diaphragm of a camera. [4] Levinson relates this characteristic of the photograph to its objectivity and reliability, echoing Andre Bazin's belief that photography is free from the "sin" of subjectivity. [5]
A similar argument has been made for motion pictures by Stephen Maguire. Lev Manovich labels cinema the art of the index, its traditional identity lying in its ability to capture reality. [6] Denis McQuail likewise argues that film is capable of manipulating the "...seeming reality of the photographic message without loss of credibility." [7]
Gunning states that a photograph must also have "iconicity". To represent "truth" it must resemble the object it represents, which is not an inevitable characteristic of an index. [4]
Levinson suggests that icons have a powerful effect on individuals, particularly the "direct image" due to the "sheer ease and sensual satisfaction" of viewing it. [8]
Gunning attributes the human fascination with photographs with a sense of the relationship between photography and reality, though he claims that the "perceptual richness and nearly infinite detail" of the image itself is more significant than a knowledge of its indexicality. He cites Bazin's idea that photography has an "irrational power to bear away our faith." [9]
Further, Susan Sontag relates the belief in a photograph's ability to capture 'reality' to the development of certain human practices. Since a picture confers on events "a kind of immortality (and importance) it would never otherwise have enjoyed," [10] she explains, the act of taking photographs has become essential to the experience of world travel. The possibility of 'true' photographs leads to a compulsion to "[convert] experience into an image" to "make real what one is experiencing." [11]
David Croteau and William Hoynes suggest that the prevalence of photographic images has blurred the distinction between image and reality, referring to pseudo-events, in Daniel Boorstin's words – such as press conferences, televised political debates, or 'photo opportunities' - that exist only to create images. [12]
Further, Neil Postman argues that the photograph has redefined society's understanding of information and truth: "Truth is in the seeing, not in the thinking." [13] Postman suggests that the proliferation of photography led to the replacement of language with images as "our dominant means for constructing, understanding, and testing reality". [14]
Sontag shares this view, suggesting that "the 'realistic' view of the world compatible with bureaucracy redefines knowledge as techniques of information. [15]
In Sontag's view, a consequence of photography becoming a primary means for understanding reality is the emergence of "bureaucratic cataloguing". She claims that photography's perceived ability to give information results in the bureaucratic organization of modern states. Institutions of control, such as the police, are able to survey and control "increasingly mobile populations" through photographic documents, such as passports or identity cards. [16]
Sontag also argues that through repeatedly capturing and viewing reality through photographs, their subjects can become less real. She claims that "aesthetic distance seems built into the very experience of looking at photographs," and also that the sheer volume of horrific images throughout the world has produced a "familiarity with atrocity, making the horrible seem more ordinary – making it appear familiar, remote … inevitable". [17]
Sontag's view is akin to Jean Baudrillard's theory of 'hyperreality', where "reality itself founders" as a result of an endless "reduplication of the real" via media such as photography. [18] He claims that the possibility of infinite identical objects creates a "relationship of equivalence, of indifference,"...leading to the "extinction of the original." [19]
It has been argued that the digitisation of photography undermines its truth claim.
Levinson suggests that the digitisation of photography undermines "the very reliability of the photograph as mute, unbiased witness of reality" [20] because of the fallibility of technological manipulation and the potential for human refinement of production. [21]
Lev Manovich likewise questions the indexical identity of motion pictures, rather labelling cinema a subgenre of painting, since it is possible to digitally modify frames, generate photorealistic images entirely using 3-D computer animation, and "...to cut, bend, stretch and stitch digitised film images into something which has perfect photographic credibility, although it was never actually filmed." [6]
It has also been argued that digital photographs inevitably lack indexicality, based on an understanding of "crucial distinctions between the analogue and the digital" in the way they record 'reality'. [22] For instance, Frosh describes photographs as "codes without a message" – "repurposable visual content made of malleable info-pixels." [23]
Gunning alternatively argues that digital photography, the process of encoding data about light in a matrix of numbers, is indexically determined by objects outside of the camera like chemical photography. [4]
Likewise, Martin Lister claims that even with a digital camera, "The images produced are rendered photo-realistic, they borrow photography's currency, its deeply historical 'reality effect', simply in order to have meaning." [22]
Susan Sontag challenges the "presumption of veracity" associated with photographs, arguing that they are "...as much an interpretation of the world as paintings and drawings are." She describes the role of the photographer in determining the exposure, light, texture and geometry of a photograph. [24]
Gunning points to the physicality of the camera as a mediator between the photograph and reality. He notes that the use of a lens, film, a particular exposure, kind of shutter, and developing process "...become magically whisked away if one considers the photograph as a direct imprint of reality." [4]
Sontag also describes the inability of a photograph to capture enough information about its subject to be considered a representation of reality. She states, "The camera's rendering of reality must always hide more than it discloses…only what which narrates can make us understand." [25]
Further, Roland Barthes notes that the human subject can be made less real through the process of being photographed. He notes, "Once I feel myself observed by the lens, everything changes: I constitute myself in the process of 'posing', I instantaneously make another body for myself, transform myself in advance into an image." [26] [27]
Kirlian photography is a collection of photographic techniques used to capture the phenomenon of electrical coronal discharges. It is named after Soviet scientist Semyon Kirlian, who, in 1939, accidentally discovered that if an object on a photographic plate is connected to a high-voltage source, an image is produced on the photographic plate. The technique has been variously known as "electrography", "electrophotography", "corona discharge photography" (CDP), "bioelectrography", "gas discharge visualization (GDV)", "electrophotonic imaging (EPI)", and, in Russian literature, "Kirlianography".
Photography is the art, application, and practice of creating images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is employed in many fields of science, manufacturing, and business, as well as its more direct uses for art, film and video production, recreational purposes, hobby, and mass communication. A person who makes photographs is called a photographer.
Roland Gérard Barthes was a French literary theorist, essayist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. His work engaged in the analysis of a variety of sign systems, mainly derived from Western popular culture. His ideas explored a diverse range of fields and influenced the development of many schools of theory, including structuralism, anthropology, literary theory, and post-structuralism.
Pictorialism is an international style and aesthetic movement that dominated photography during the later 19th and early 20th centuries. There is no standard definition of the term, but in general it refers to a style in which the photographer has somehow manipulated what would otherwise be a straightforward photograph as a means of creating an image rather than simply recording it. Typically, a pictorial photograph appears to lack a sharp focus, is printed in one or more colors other than black-and-white and may have visible brush strokes or other manipulation of the surface. For the pictorialist, a photograph, like a painting, drawing or engraving, was a way of projecting an emotional intent into the viewer's realm of imagination.
Jean Baudrillard was a French sociologist and philosopher with an interest in cultural studies. He is best known for his analyses of media, contemporary culture, and technological communication, as well as his formulation of concepts such as hyperreality. Baudrillard wrote about diverse subjects, including consumerism, critique of economy, social history, aesthetics, Western foreign policy, and popular culture. Among his most well-known works are Seduction (1978), Simulacra and Simulation (1981), America (1986), and The Gulf War Did Not Take Place (1991). His work is frequently associated with postmodernism and specifically post-structuralism. Nevertheless, Baudrillard had also opposed post-structuralism, and had distanced himself from postmodernism.
Susan Lee Sontag was an American writer, critic, and public intellectual. She mostly wrote essays, but also published novels; she published her first major work, the essay "Notes on 'Camp' ", in 1964. Her best-known works include the critical works Against Interpretation (1966), On Photography (1977), Illness as Metaphor (1978) and Regarding the Pain of Others (2003), as well as the fictional works The Way We Live Now (1986), The Volcano Lover (1992), and In America (1999).
Hyperreality is a concept in post-structuralism that refers to the process of the evolution of notions of reality, leading to a cultural state of confusion between signs and symbols invented to stand in for reality, and direct perceptions of consensus reality. Hyperreality is seen as a condition in which, because of the compression of perceptions of reality in culture and media, what is generally regarded as real and what is understood as fiction are seamlessly blended together in experiences so that there is no longer any clear distinction between where one ends and the other begins.
Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography is a short book published in 1980 by the French literary theorist and philosopher Roland Barthes. It is simultaneously an inquiry into the nature and essence of photography and a eulogy to Barthes' late mother. The book investigates the effects of photography on the spectator.
Photograph manipulation involves the transformation or alteration of a photograph. Some photograph manipulations are considered to be skillful artwork, while others are considered to be unethical practices, especially when used to deceive. Motives for manipulating photographs include political propaganda, altering the appearance of a subject, entertainment and humor.
Simulacra and Simulation is a 1981 philosophical treatise by the philosopher and cultural theorist Jean Baudrillard, in which he seeks to examine the relationships between reality, symbols, and society, in particular the significations and symbolism of culture and media involved in constructing an understanding of shared existence.
On Photography is a 1977 collection of essays by American writer Susan Sontag. The book originated from a series of essays Sontag published in the New York Review of Books between 1973 and 1977.
A snapshot is a photograph that is "shot" spontaneously and quickly, most often without artistic or journalistic intent and usually made with a relatively cheap and compact camera.
Fine-art photography is photography created in line with the vision of the photographer as artist, using photography as a medium for creative expression. The goal of fine-art photography is to express an idea, a message, or an emotion. This stands in contrast to representational photography, such as photojournalism, which provides a documentary visual account of specific subjects and events, literally representing objective reality rather than the subjective intent of the photographer; and commercial photography, the primary focus of which is to advertise products or services.
War photography involves photographing armed conflict and its effects on people and places. Photographers who participate in this genre may find themselves placed in harm's way, and are sometimes killed trying to get their pictures out of the war arena.
Hyperrealism is a genre of painting and sculpture resembling a high-resolution photograph. Hyperrealism is considered an advancement of photorealism by the methods used to create the resulting paintings or sculptures. The term is primarily applied to an independent art movement and art style in the United States and Europe that has developed since the early 1970s. Carole Feuerman is the forerunner in the hyperrealism movement along with Duane Hanson and John De Andrea.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to photography:
Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology is a book by Neil Postman published in 1992 that describes the development and characteristics of a "technopoly". He defines a technopoly as a society in which technology is deified, meaning “the culture seeks its authorisation in technology, finds its satisfactions in technology, and takes its orders from technology”. It is characterised by a surplus of information generated by technology, which technological tools are in turn employed to cope with, in order to provide direction and purpose for society and individuals.
Girl Imagined by Chance is a postmodern novel by Lance Olsen, published in 2002 by Fiction Collective Two. It is a work of metafiction designed to trouble the unexamined assumptions of the memoir.
Photographs have been taken in the area now known as Canada since 1839, by both amateurs and professionals. In the 19th century, commercial photography focussed on portraiture. But professional photographers were also involved in political and anthropological projects: they were brought along on expeditions to Western Canada and were engaged to document Indigenous peoples in Canada by government agencies.
Photography and non-logical form is a book and research concept by art critic and art historian Ekaterina Vasilyeva. The book provides an idea that draws attention to the irrational basis of photography. The study considers photography as a tool that reveals the irrational and archaic principle of thinking. Considered one of the formative books in the field of photography theory. The book is created as a collection of essays published in the 2010s in academic sources. The texts touch on aspects of a single topic and raise the general problem of the phenomenon of the non-logical in photography. It was published as a separate book by New Literary Review in 2019.