While reading In Plato's Cave; on Photography, I had many random thoughts and criticisims. I liked the reading, but also seemed to have many negative thoughts while reading it. The idea that taking pictures is like sex struck me quite odd, but at the same time, I can see what they mean; taking pictures is no longer an "only certain people can do it", or secret thing... Literally EVERY ONE IS DOING IT!!!!
When Sontag was explaining that a photograph is meant to capture one's experience, I questioned whether it would be better to capture the experience for ones self rather than base it on someone elses experience. You can look at a picture from the Hubble Space Teloscope and say "look I've been to Mars, this is what it looks like" but in reality you have most likely not been, and therefore, who is to say that that tiny red square is really what Mars looks like? Sontag is correct in saying that photographs are just pieces of the world; one could gather every single picture ever taken of New York and still be missing key parts of it.
When Sontag wrote about the pictures being in books, I agreed that it is a nice way to keep them, but not everyony will agree with the sequence, and it is extremely rare that anyone will ever spend more than 5 minutes looking at a picture book. Thats why I love walking into a friend's house and seeing their family photo album laying out in the open- why?- why have pictures out for anyone to see when you know for a fact that the viewer is going to have no idea of what the picture is about; let alone whom is even in the picture; without the owner guiding them through it.
When I read about the documentary photography, it struck me with the realization of how we demean all people in photographs... it is all one psychological defense mechanism- you take pictures of those in poverty to make you feel bad because secretly you think you are better than they are, and with rich people you focus on their flaws and demeaning them; trying to make them look bad or worse than you because deep down you are jealouse of them.
When discussing how in the early 1840s, the only professional photographers were the inventors; I decided that nothing has really changed, yea there are those who say they are "professional" but all they have done is studied and aced the final, amateurs are simply in the studing stage but they refuse to take the final because they refuse to learn anything.
When Sontag talks about photography as an art, I also agree with her; but at the same time I wondered if it was safe to explain that photography is only art to the photographer; simply because the photo only has real meaning to that one person.
Back to the "Photography as promiscuous sex" idea... WE ARE ALL CAMERA WHORES!!!!! The only form of contraception is not owning a camera, but yet you are still raped with exposure. The photograph is the child; Photoshop is the coverup for the protection that failed; and simply deleting the photo is like aborting it. Learning to practice safe photography is taking pictures of meaning and substance, not of how many bruises you got because you were dumb enough to stumble down the stairs after an overdose of alcohol, pictures like those are for telling the world how dumb you are, and what another person would see as /use for blackmail if anything.
When discussing families and pictures, I understand wanting to capture the little sweet moments of children before they grow up and become trouble makers, but at the same time, this can also be taken too far; no one cares about what your child's first bowel movement looked like (well maybe aside from the doctor, but that is only in extreme cases). I was talking to my aunt about how I have absolutely no pictures of my mom either pregnant with me or holding me as an infant. My aunt then told me about when she was pregnant with my cousin Seth and how she refused to have pictures of herself taken. She said that she was doing the week by week pictures after she found out she was pregnant with her first. Unfortunately, she had a miscarriage in week 7. Because of the miscarriage, she refused to take any pictures of her 2nd pregnancy, she said it created a sort of superstition. Now she regrets not having those pictures of her soon to be 7 year old son, but she is also glad she does not have them.
I love when Sontag states "It hardly matters what activities are photographed so long as photographs get taken and are cherished" I completely agree with that; if you cherish how dumb I think you look in your drunk picture, more power to you.
"Photography has become one of the principal devices for experiencing something, for giving an appearance of participation" says Sontag. Again I agree with her; why do we have to prove that we did something? That goes back to traveling; Why do people spend so much time taking pictures when they know that eventually they are going to forget what the picture's subject even was; people get so caught up into taking pictures that they waste the experience of the vacation or trip. I know that while I was growing up and going on girl scout trips I would always make my mom buy me a bunch of disposable cameras. Looking back on the photos now, I have no idea what they were about. I did go on one trip in which I forgot my camera. I LOVED IT!!! the freedom of not having to worry about leaving it somewhere, getting it wet, etc was liberating. Of course all the other girls had cameras and so I got copies of many of their pictures. Miraculously, in looking at those pictures, I can tell you that "Allie was standing on the ground below me and another group of girls, we were looking down at her over a ledge at hocking hills...." and so on about this one single picture that she took. She is right when she says that taking pictures can be an experience itself, but at the same time it should be based on priority of experience rather than proof. I also liked when she explained that the picture gives an avent a kind of "immortality" that we cherish forever, well that may be true in some cases, but what about the many pictures taht have been destroyed, cut, and burned simply because it's subject was of an ex, or a time that made the person upset? Why did we have those pictures to begin with?
Sontag talked about how a disabled person cannot act upon what he sees; this made me feel as if a camera makes people disabled as well. One can only see so much through a tiny view finder, and one can only capture so much of an image, so does a picture really capture an experience? My guess brings me back to the "small piece" idea; that it isn't the whole thing, but a trinket to remind you of it.
About the Peeping Tom movie; How ingenious!; capturiong the exact moment of how someone looks just as they are killed. Yes, very morbid, but at the same time very interesting. Many people would argue that it is insane and gruesom, but at the same time, how many people tried to be the first to get their hands on the photographs? Wanting to actually see the photographs makes them hypocritical, it is the same as wanting to take the picture in the first place. The same goes for the man who recorded the hanging of Sadam Hussein; many people found it horrible, but yet, those same people rushed right in to be the first to get the photos.
When Sontag discussed how cameras are more like guns, it reminded me of a riddle: "I stand in one spot, sometimes I move about, sometimes you know im there, sometimes you do not, all day, everyday I shoot people... Who am I?" Many people would say assassin, but the answer is "Photographer".
Upon reading the closing of the article, it made me realize some af the actural reasons why I enjoy photography;it can be good, bad anf far inbetween; it can show you something, tell a story, show other people what shocked you , shock other people, etc. Mainly because there are so many, many extremes to photography; it becomes an undying art; and with that comes many opportunities to advance in learning, like the film of a camera itself. I like most how the artistic idea of photography is not narrow minded, it is as broad as anyone will ever make it.
