3 : 2, The ontology of photographs in the phase of a new imagination
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School of Arts, Design and Architecture |
Master's thesis
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Date
2014
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Mcode
Degree programme
Language
en
Pages
90+7
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Abstract
This thesis is intertwined with an ongoing practice that I have been producing during MA studies in Photography. The thesis starts with images of my practice of which working title is 3 : 2, followed by a theoretical investigation on the ontology of photographs. The main thesis consists of a personal essay and several literature reviews on the ontology of photographs that encompasses the old and new medium. In the first section of the thesis, I begin with a short personal essay based on ‘1 hour photo service’. In the following chapter, ‘Photographs’, I investigate theories on the binary state(image/object) of photographs by adopting Patrick Maynard’s analysis in his book The Engine of Visualization. From there two main references emerge: On Photography by Susan Sontag and Camera Lucida by Roland Barthes. From these investigation, my aim is to clarify how the ontology of photographs has been analysed until recently. In the third chapter, ‘Photographs, now’, I reveal my doubts regarding the analysis made by the previous authors through introducing a very recent article The Ontology of Photography: From Analogue To Digital (2013) written by philosophy analyst Peter Benson. I follow his summary on various analysis done by key philosophers and critics on the ontology of photographs. The main writers to whom he refers are André Bazin, Roland Barthes, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Jean Baudrillard. Towards the end of the chapter, I counteract his summary and claims by juxtaposing them to Maynard’s analysis. I continue to discuss parts of Benson’s summary on Nietzsche and Baudrillard in the next section. The entire second section ‘Photo Readymade’ deals wit the essay The Photograph as Post-Industrial Object: An Essay on the Ontological Standing of Photographs (1986) by Vilém Flusser. In the first chapter ‘objects’, I summarize the ontology of objects according to the analysis of Flusser. In the second chapter, ‘Post-industrial photos’, I approach the ontology of photographs from the perspective of post-industrial objects. By doing so, I juxtapose Flusser’s summary on the ontology of objects with Nietzsche and Baudrillard’s simulacra phases. In the last chapter ‘New photos’, I analyze a new notion introduced to the ontology of photographs in the current transition by discussing Flusser’s different essays. From this new notion, one may gain a positive translation of seemingly disappearing existence of photographs that we are used to.Description
Supervisor
Elo, MikaThesis advisor
Goodwin, MarcKeywords
photographs, ontology, objects, flusser, snapshot
