There is no doubt in my mind that I will
need to read this book again, if I am even to begin to get to grips with
it. It’s no secret, I’m sure, this is an
incredibly difficult book to take in and I certainly found it so. However, I read it relatively slowly and
tried to absorb each of the chapters as much as I could before moving on.
I think that although the book is
challenging, Roland Barthes does give the reader a bit of a roadmap during the
first quarter of the book, detailing what he is aiming to explore – what
exactly is a photograph and why are some photographs important either
culturally at large or to individuals. This roadmap comes in the shape of specific
language, which he uses to describe himself as accurately as possible. As you work your way through the beginning of
the book his discourse is difficult to penetrate but once you've absorbed the meaning of the following terms you are helped somewhat.
Studium – studied cultural details and elements in a photograph. That which we recognize and rationalise .
Punctum – a word that describes the impact of a photographed scene that “shoots
out of it like an arrow” or a “sting, speck, cut, little hole”. [1]
This second word describes how a photograph works at a deeper level than the
culture we see and which we recognize. “Punctum…
is that accident which pricks me (but also bruises me, is poignant to me)”[2]
He also describes the various contributors
to the making of a photograph – the Operator
(camera person), Spectator (viewer of
the photograph) and then the Spectrum
which is the subject, be it person, object, place or mood/atmosphere.
It is at this point that Barthes introduces
the subject of death and how everything that photographed is essentially dead
once it’s been captured: “this word (spectacle) retains through it’s root, a
‘relation’ to spectacle and adds to it that rather terrible thing which is
there in every photograph: the return of the dead.”[3]
Being that this book is about facing death,
the death of his mother and subsequently the notion of his own death, Barthes returns
to this theme throughout the book. And I will too later in this blog.
I understand that in my above adumbrated
version of Barthes’ work I have attempted to condense some very complex ideas,
and that I probably really only have a fairly superficial understanding at this
point but I hope I’m heading in the right direction.
There are several pivotal points for me in
the book. In particular when discussing
the methods by which the Operator (photographers) create their work which aim
to surprise the Spectator he lists various methods for doing so. One of these methods is when photographers
use “contortions of technique: superimpressions, anamorphoses[4],
deliberate exploitation, of certain defects (blurring, deceptive perspectives,
trick framing).”[5]
I mention this as I am interested in
blurring and motion. The punctum which
Barthes speaks of is often more readily accessible to me in some of this type
of photography, however, he is fairly dismissive of it even though he concedes
that there are some very accomplished photographers using these contortions. “…great
photographers have played on these surprises, without convincing me, even if I
understand their subversive bearing”. [6] I have felt quite conflicted since reading
this and agree with him one moment, believing I should focus on getting ‘real
photography’ right rather than being distracted by my desire to blur with long
shutter speeds on my camera or fiddle for hours with my iphone (using the Snapseed
app for instance to distort and paint and create little scenes that remind me
of something very dreamlike and sort of internally ancient and linked more to
our unconscious inner worlds) and then swing the other way, wondering if I
should just allow myself to really enjoy that side of photography – since I do
so enjoy it. I’m sure there is time for
both if I think rationally about it but I have an inner nasty parent saying –
‘Stop that, silly stuff!’
(This conflict has led to me wonder if
there is Photography Art as opposed to Art where photography is the
medium. I shall have to explain this in
more detail elsewhere I think as this entry is really about Barthes’ book.)
Earlier I mentioned that Barthes discusses
the relationship between death and photography throughout this book which is
hardly surprising as he was prompted to write it when grieving for his late
mother whom he had lived with all his life.
He felt her loss deeply and as one does when a loved one dies looked for
some connection in photographs. He found
something of what he was looking for in a photograph of his mother as a child
where he believes he saw her essence even though she was very young and not the
adult he had always known.
During the last section of the book Barthes
describes powerfully how we react to photographs, and how we relate to the
truth in every photograph, which is the ‘catastrophe’ of inevitable death. “…the photograph tells me death in the
future. What pricks me is the discovery
of this equivalence. In front of the
photograph of my mother as a child, I tell myself: she is going to die: I
shudder, like Winnicots psychotic patient, over a catastrophe which has already
occurred. Whether or not the subject is
already dead, every photograph is this catastrophe.”[7]
I clearly remember my horrific realisation
when my first son was about a year old that he would, if he is lucky enough to
have a full life, grow old and one day die.
And that it is very unlikely that I should be there with him, if all
goes well with his life that is, so that he would be without me at that time. It was a heartbreaking realization, and one
we humans could not or should not dwell on as we go about our day to day. I think Barthes is discussing how photographs
have the potential and ability to punch this realization into our consciousness
when we look at them in happy times.
And, of course, when we look at them in times of grief can bellow that
reality back at us. Death is unavoidable.
“It is because each photograph always
contains this imperious sign of my future death each one, however attached it
seems to be to the excited world of the living, challenges us, one by one
outside of any generality.”[8]
Barthes often refers to the photograph as a
performance. In fact he likens
photography to theatre; “Photography is a kind of primitive theatre, a kind of Tableaux Vivant, a figuration of the
motionless and made up face beneath which we see the dead”[9],
and this is a very encouraging for me. I
would like to think I can and should use photography to create my own little
theatrical moments. I am torn between
photographing others and photographing myself as an ‘actor’ in a still tiny
moment that is nevertheless a drama of sorts.
I must look at Cindy Sherman’s work more as she is the most obvious
example I can think of in relation to this sort of work, although am also
reminded of Jessa Fairbrother, whose work was recommended to me by my tutor.
Roland Barthes’ book was not an easy read
but it was intensely interesting and valuable.
I am left once again with a sense of deep frustration that I haven’t
read Sartre or Nietzsche, or a host of others not even mentioned in the Barthes
book. It is so annoying to be so
ignorant. I can put all these people on
my very long list of books to read but who knows when I will get to them. However, it does make me wonder if I would
enjoy Understanding Visual Cultureperhaps later on if I continue with these studies, as I have been following
someone’s blog who is doing that module. It looks very interesting indeed!
All references aprt from no. 4 to Camera Lucida by Roland Barthes, Vintage Books, Translated by Richard Howard, Published by Vintage 2000, Copyright Editions du Seuil 1980, Translation Copyright Farrarm Straus and Girouux 1981
[1] Page 26
[2] Page 27
[3] Page 9
[4] a distorted projection or drawing which
appears normal when viewed from a particular point or with a suitable mirror or
lens: Google dictionary
[5] Page 33
[6] Page 33
[7] Page 96
[8] Page 97
[9] Page 32
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