Date: Sat, 4 Jan 2003 04:26:38 -0800
From: "William Sommerwerck" <williams@xxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [OM] photography = truth?
>"Only with effort can the camera be forced to lie. Basically it is an honest
>medium, so the photographer is much more likely to approach nature in a
>spirit of inquiry, of communion, instead of with the saucy swagger of
>self-dubbed 'artists'."
> -- Susan Sontag
>Uh -- yes. A photograph is assumed to be a literal representation (which it
>usually is). Drawings and paintings are not.
While a photograph may accurately render the light that played over a scene when
it was taken it cannot accurately convey the meaning of that scene. It is this
way that photographs lie. (I suppose it unfair to blame the photograph for the
misinterpretations that people place on the image it presents.)
Photographs also lie by ommision. Things the photographer chooses to leave out
do not get to be assesed by the final audience. With a photo, you only get to
think about whatever the photographer decided to take a picture of.
Photographs can be a very powerful propaganda tool.
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