Bildfähig!

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This pair of photographs found on flickr (here and here) is pointing at the principal condition of photography that at any given moment at any given location multiple photographs are possible. They underscore that photography never tells us „what really happened“ and provide a convincing visual critique of any realist approach towards photography. Assertions that the new masses of non-professional image-makers like on flickr will only bring „a flood of naive pictures, that only show us the world as it is.“ (Süddeutsche Zeitung, 26.09.2008), as photographer Ken Schles has written recently, are therefore just plainly false.

Interestingly, these two photographs by dramamath are very close to the works of artist Barbara Probst, whose photographs offer the same insights into the nature of the photographic medium but are meant to be presented not on flickr but in exhibitions or on her gallery’s website. How do the different modes of presentation affect in each case the way we understand these images? If we look at Probst’s photographs on her gallery’s website the only text that we will encounter is the typical set of description that tells us about author, title, object (medium and size), year. As a result we see Probst’s pictures in just two ways: firstly, we make a causal relation between her as the author and the image; secondly, title and year make us see the image as a singular, special object, that is different and isolated from all other existing pictures not shown.
In the case of dramamath’s picture on flickr, we also find author, title and time indicated by the posting photographer. But in this case that is only the starting point for a variety of other ever changing collective image descriptions that with time override in importance the one made by the photographer in the first place: there are tags, i.e. interpretive keywords about the image, comments about the picture by the author or other users, the number of views, and there is information about its inclusion into different groups of related pictures composed by other users or the author himself.

This has considerable effect on how the lesson about the photographic medium given by both photographers comes to us: in Probst’s case, we are offered access to a sphere of objects outside time and place, where the viewer can feel safe that nothing will change and that the picture in a way will only belong to himself and nobody else. If he learns from Probst that photographs don’t really tell the truth, he will likely believe that that’s an insight which privileges him over others and which rests for him primarily related to Probst’s photographs. dramamath’s image promises by contrast, that there are always other people looking at the same pictures and that there are always more options: other interpretations of the same picture and thousands of other pictures by thousands of other image makers instantly accessible. Here, the lesson appears rather as shared knowledge that should be applied to any other picture on flickr. It functions rather as material for the playful making of other photographs in the future than as an addition to somebody’s personal epistemology. In the long run, the later will have less real consequences on how we look at photographs than the former.

Note: This blog will offer each week a post in English language for all English speaking readers. English posts can be searched by the category tag: English posts.

Image source: 1 dramamath/Kris Adams. Self-Portrait of a Self-Portrait, here und 2 dramamath/Kris Adams. The Other View, shown in flickr-environment, screenshot, 10/3/2008: here.

References:

Schles, Ken. “Das Bild als Gefäß. Die Schwierigkeit, Fotografie historisch aufzuarbeiten.” Süddeutsche Zeitung Nr. 225, 26. September 2008, S. 17. (not available online)