Roland Barthes is not a photographer.
This much is apparent in Camera Lucida, a book that proposes to try and pin photography down, try to assign sets of values and give it significance. When I picked it up to read, I knew I was potentially in for a good one, but I didn’t realise how empathetic I would become whilst reading it. You see Barthes’s book is just as much about life and death as it is about photography; the entire second half is a hair’s breadth away from being a memorial to his mother, to whom he was grieving for at the time of writing. For me, whilst reading, my grandmother died and the book took on a somewhat deeper significance.
I am almost certain that I have the two very last photographs of her alive, and although I knew at the time her condition was terminal, I didn’t know it would be just 24 hours after their creation that she would pass away. Those images haven’t been developed yet; I’m not even sure I want to look at them when they arrive even though I know I will. In the past week or so, I have dwelled on this topic a lot in my mind, trying to work out where I’m at with photography.
I think about photography rather a lot, and sometimes I do question why I continue shooting, what the point of it is. I realise now that it is art, there is no point. I don’t have to create a photograph, and if I do create one it probably wont ever serve a purpose. Why then do we take photographs? I think it is because they are very useful in a plethora of applications; journalism, science etc. But why do laypeople like myself take images? I think the reason is two-fold:
1. To be expressive and creative, to release a little bit of emotion through your work.
2. To remember.
Barthes puts across the point of photographs proving almost without a shadow of doubt that the subject once existed at a specific point in space and time when the image was taken. I think it is foolish, however, to call a photograph a “memory”. Memories are things retained by living creatures, cameras are machines – remembering machines – and the photographs they produce are simply, how do I put it? Evidence. Validation. If anything was ever in doubt, we can call upon images to provide proof of something. Once a person dies, the memories that they carried with them are irrefutably lost forever, but the photographs they took in life may remain to retain some of those sights and feelings of that person now gone. As Barthes himself puts it;
“The effect it produces upon me is not to restore what is abolished, but to attest that what I see has indeed existed.”
This seems like a very cold way to approach photography, but at it’s heart that is all it is. The camera is a mechanical device; cameras do not discriminate, they are unbiased and uncaring. They are merely the thing we use to take images; making images is an entirely different proposition.
There are three other things involved in what truly makes an image; the Subject, the Photographer (Operator) and the viewer (Spectator). It is the human influence in photography that makes it so special, so beautiful. The human subject provides, on a rare occasion if the photographer is lucky enough to capture it, an insight into their lives, they exude an “air” about themselves, an intangible quality that cannot be described, only known and understood. It is as much about personality and character as it is about their very soul. Barthes was angry and sad that none of the images of his mother when she was alive and younger really showed her as he remembered. He saw her, in the literal sense, and knew it was her from her images, but couldn’t connect. Afterall, photographs are not really people, only ghosts, remnants of a living organism, their image caught forever.
Until he found the “Winter Garden Photograph”.
Here, Barthes constructs his entire understanding of photography. While not necessarily able to recognise his mother based on physical appearance, he could tell by her “air”, that mysterious quality that we all possess, and the way she held herself that it was her, and that he had “found” her, so to speak.
This is all getting quite heavy isn’t it? Are you keeping up, or should I reiterate and be a little clearer?
Barthes found his mother in that image. Not like the way he had found her in all the other images, they were just photographs, they didn’t retain her essence, that “air”. It’s extremely difficult to put this across, so if you haven’t got it, I’m going to assume you have and move on.
Let’s rewind back the first half of the book, back before he begins talking about his mother. How is it that he approaches photography then? He breaks photographs down to their fundamental level, their characteristics. He believes that there are two aspects to any photograph, but they don’t have to contain both. These are the studium and the punctum.
The studium is the study. A good example would be a photograph of an old house. If we knew when the house was built, we would be able to look at the house and the materials used to create it and say that, back then when the image was taken, they used x,y,z materials to build their houses in such-a-such style. The study is social, cultural and historical. The studium is present in all images, and on it’s own it can make good images, but it requires something else to make the image great or special.
That something is the punctum. It means break or puncture, and that is what it does. It breaks or disturbs the peace of the studium, it stabs at you and you are attracted towards it. Barthes describes it normally as a little detail, perhaps something odd within the image (although not necessarily), but something that stands out for you, something that you remember the image by. He uses examples of jewellery, rings and necklaces catching his eye.
I disagree not with his idea of the punctum, because I do think there are aspects of images that draw us in, that catch us unawares and attract us to an aspect of an image, but the details he calls the punctum are wrong in my mind. He calls little details the punctum, and I suppose this is relevant for him, but what about other things? Certain facial or bodily expressions? An arresting gaze?
While Barthes’s non-photographer (Operator) approach is somewhat refreshing, I have difficulty stomaching a large chunk of what Barthes puts forward as the bulk of his argument. He claims that only an amateur photographer is capable of taking images that capture a person’s very soul, their “air”, since amateurs do not try to deliberately, therefore because professionals try to hard they can’t take images that are truly candid and that express the very essence of someone.
From the standpoint of the photographer, this is somewhat offensive. For a start, Barthes isn’t even a photographer, and all his assumptions about photography are being based on his one experience. At the time of the book’s creation, there was an outcry from the photographic community about the light it put photographers in. But it highlighted something about photography that is perhaps even truer today than it was then: anyone can take a photograph. The is one of the greatest advantages of the medium, but also its greatest failing. Photography allows anyone and everyone to take images now, but the result is that for those that want to make use of photography for its creative potential their own worth is diluted, and many can remain unnoticed. The staggering number of photographers worldwide proves it is the most attractive artform, since little perceived effort is required compared to most other forms of art (drawing or writing &c). Yet what gets forgotten by Barthes is that the greatest photographs of all time have been taken by professionals, not amateurs. Personal, intimate images taken by amateurs of their family and friends have deep significance to the photographer and the relevant people, especially under the circumstances where a person passes away. This is why the image was so powerful to him, and also why it caused him to draw the conclusions that he did. Do I agree with them? Not all, but that’s ok, because I don’t have to. Barthes is speaking his personal opinion, there is no right and wrong, true or false. Barthes isn’t asking us to agree with him, only to hear what he has to say, which is the way it should be. Photography is subjective, nobody is right or wrong, and everyone has an opinion.
Ok, time to get back on track and start talking about where I’m going with all this.
I am of the belief that good photographers have minds that work in a particular way, assessing scenes and seeing potential images around them develop and unfold, they have a knack. Practising photography only gets you up to a point in my mind; you can be extremely technically competent, but that doesn’t mean you have that necessary mindset to capture great images. That’s what it takes to move yourself away from being an amateur photographer for me. You must be able to not only understand how your equipment works and the technical aspect of capturing images, but also have that creative or artistic spark. Amateur photographers do, on occasion, strike lucky and capture something special by accident. I’m not saying that amateur photographers don’t try, because it’s very clear that they do, but many amateur photographers lack the skills and that certain mindset to advance any further photographically. It’s a very sticky business that I think I’m going to have to cover in a new post at some point (public outcry).
I’d like to believe I have some photographic talent. Not everyone will agree with this statement, but even if they don’t it doesn’t matter. I don’t like to create photographs with the express purpose of satisfying another individual, I have never cared whether someone likes my images or not, my images are my own. The fact that over the years people have enjoyed them is merely an additional bonus. I realise now that the only reason I continue making photographs is to satisfy my own desire to take photographs. It’s that simple. Photography is an expression, as escape. I want to make this point very firm, even though I have voiced it before it has never been clearer to me.
Photography is a personal medium, the people around you may very well be inspired and in admiration of your work, it may even have some relevance to them and be emotionally significant, but nobody, nobody is more important than you, the photographer, to your own images. The Spectator is someone who has appeared after the fact, looking for that “air” in these fragments of time you’ve captured, like Barthes was.
I’ve run out of steam. There’s more that I could say, maybe even should say, but I wont. I’ve made my points clear I think. Like all my posts, this has once again tapered off rapidly.
And preferably a better DAC, the E7 probably wont cut it for long with me, it’s just a stop gap. *looks longingly at a Cambridge Audio DACmagic*
