- Photography and War – Pippa Oldfield October 31, 2019
Reaktion books have an excellent series on photographic issues and theme, Exposures. A recent edition is by Pippa Oldfield, on Photography and War.
The book is ...
Read more... - Place and Placelessness August 18, 2019
As I have been finalising the book edit, I have increasingly been drawn to maps to help tell the story – both the Khmer Rouge ...
Read more... - Bending the Frame – Fred Ritchen August 14, 2019
Notes from Ritchin’s 2013 book:
Chapter 1: The Useful Photograph
Sets stage for profusion of images, loss of professional monopoly, power of tech and the web.
Citizen journalists ...
Read more... - Let Us Now Praise Words August 13, 2019
During the Depression, Fortune sent writer James Agee and photographer Walker Evans document the lives of cotton sharecroppers in Alabama. It was meant to be ...
Read more... - Stereotypes and Navajo August 9, 2019
Photography’s Other Histories, edited by Christopher Pinney and Nicolas Peterson, is a well-researched work covering a lot of ground on two broad issues – the ...
Read more... - Ethics of Photography – Participation August 8, 2019
Ethics has two broad modes of definition – personal and organisational.
In everyday use, the word ‘ethics’ gets used in many different ways. For example, sometimes ...
Read more... - Without Honor – Arnold J Isaacs August 2, 2019
The U.S. intervention was a military, political strategic, and moral catastrophe for which only Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, not the acts of ...
Read more... - A Sense of Place July 13, 2019
I have been reading James Tyner’s book, The Killing of Cambodia: Geography, Genocide and the Unmasking of Space.
It is well established that in defining Year Zero, ...
Read more... - James Tyner – The Killing of Cambodia – Notes July 12, 2019
Book Notes
Chapter 1: Imaging Genocide
Can we define Genocide?
Mick Q: Am I structuralist or post-structuralist?
Mick Q: Role of power/knowledge nexus in ethical framework
‘Given that knowledge is ...
Read more... - Jae Emerling – Archives and Time July 1, 2019
At Gary’s recommendation, I have been reading Jae Emerling, particularly on time and archives, as being highly appropriate for my FMP.
Whilst I find Emerling’s style ...
Read more... - Notes on Paul Martin Lester’s ‘Visual Ethics’ June 9, 2019
Preface
Lester considers six philosophical ethics ideas as a way to ‘judge’ photography:
Categorical imperative – Kant, role-based rules
Utilitarianism – useful to the many
Golden Mean – Aristotle, ...
Read more... - Looking is Necessary June 4, 2019
Gian Butturini (1935-2006) was an Italian graphic designer who travelled to London most likely in 1969. He took photographs of what was happening in the ...
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- Afterwards April 16, 2019
I thought that I had posted about Afterwards before, but somehow it got missed. It was one of the first books that I bought, early ...
Read more... - Setting Sun – Quotes – Part Two April 7, 2019
MEDIA
Introduction
‘In postwar Japan, the photograph in its truest form is widely understood to be a reproduction imprint. It might almost be said that the fine-art ...
Read more... - Setting Sun – Quotes – Part One April 7, 2019
Quotes and notes:
INTRODUCTION
Anne Wilkes Tucker
Daido Moriyama states that photography is ‘ .. not a social business, but personal work’. (pg 18)
Tucker comments:
‘There is no separation ...
Read more... - Photographing the Holocaust – Janina Struk February 16, 2019
I have just finished Janina Struk’s Photographing The Holocaust. Michelle Caswell’s Archiving the Unspeakable was ‘book of the year’ for me last year, Struk’s might ...
Read more... - A Question of Authenticity February 6, 2019
In Camera Lucida, Roland Barthes states that
‘From a phenomenological viewpoint, in the photograph, the power of authentication exceeds the power of representation‘. (Camera Lucida: pg 89)
In ...
Read more... - Walter Benjamin – The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction February 3, 2019
Walter Benjamin’s work is refreshing, in his attempt to deal with photography as a unique medium, rather than transpose the traditions of painting and sculpture ...
Read more... - A Book Brief January 18, 2019
In 2019, I plan to publish a book in Cambodia, about Sarath and family’s ‘Unfinished Stories’. Printing capability is competent but not sophisticated in the ...
Read more... - The Photographic Message – Roland Barthes January 16, 2019
I wrote about Camera Lucida at the beginning of the MA. As I concluded then, I found it rather depressing.
The Photographic Message, an essay in Image ...
Read more... - Dorothea Lange December 19, 2018
A while back I was asked to make a short presentation to the PhotoBath group on an image that has always inspired me (September, 2016). It ...
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- Martha Rosler, Decoys and Disruptions March 20, 2018
Martha Rosler, Decoys and Disruptions (2004)
Lookers, Buyers, Dealers And Makers: Thoughts On Audience (1979)
‘More and more clearly the subject of art has become the self ...
Read more... - The Cruel Radiance – Susie Linfield March 18, 2018
I just read The Cruel Radiance: Photography and Political violence, by Susie Linfield (University of Chicago Press, 2010), and found it totally fascinating. Essentially, Linfield ...
Read more... - Some notes on Ariella Azoulay’s writing March 10, 2018
These notes are not a full book review – more the key points that struck me, appropriate to my project work.
On ‘The Civil Contract of ...
Read more... - The Camera as Judge and Executioner February 15, 2018
Archiving the Unspeakable, by Michelle Caswell, is a fascinating read. It deals with the role of photographic archives in the activities of the Khmer Rouge ...
Read more... - Roland Barthes – Camera Lucida – An ultimately depressing book February 10, 2018
Camera Lucida, by Roland Barthes, is an odd book. It has become a classic text on the subject – yet Barthes was not a photographer, ...
Read more... - Photography and … February 6, 2018
Coursework this week is to consider what discipline I feel photography of any kind has a particularly interesting or relevant relationship to.
I would like to look ...
Read more... - Other than … Year Zero February 4, 2018
In April 1994, Ingrid and I first visited Cambodia, with our three youngest children. Michala was 6, Victoria was 4, and Dan was just over ...
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- A Conversation on ‘Reality’ December 5, 2018
I am going to start this (overly long) post with my conclusions:
Photography always has and always will depict a constructed reality.
Photography is, like all art ...
Read more... - Beyond the Shadows – Judy Glickman Lauder December 4, 2018
Judy Glickman Lauder married Leonard Lauder, the cosmetics magnate, in 2015. But that is not why I am writing this post.
Glickman Lauder is a photographer, ...
Read more... - Daido Moriyama – Record December 2, 2018
Daido Moriyama, when history is written, will be noted as one of the greatest photographers of his generation.
Japanese photography has always interested me, even before ...
Read more... - Week Seven Reflections – Paris Photo November 14, 2018
It was the week of a Falmouth Face to Face around Paris Photo, which we combined with family time in the city. Here’s my reflections ...
Read more... - Discordia – Moises Saman October 21, 2018
Moises Saman is an American / Spanish photojournalist, and a member of Magnum. I just got a copy of his 2016 book, Discordia. It is perhaps the ...
Read more... - Punctum is a Duration – Jacques Derrida October 18, 2018
I have been wandering through the pages of Fifty Key Writers on Photography (edited by Mark Durden), and was stopped by Derrida.
He argues that Barthes‘ ...
Read more... - Digital … October 14, 2018
Just to get something off my chest.
I have been reading a few books on the ‘digital revolution’, and almost all manage to use the word ...
Read more... - The Photograph as Contemporary Art October 13, 2018
I have been looking again at The Photograph as Contemporary Art, by Charlotte Cotton, 2014 3rd edition, and decided this time to write a few ...
Read more... - Banksy and Tejaratchi on Advertising & Going Viral October 11, 2018
I was thinking about this weeks’ ‘viral’ exercise, alongside the latest Banksy escapade. By way of background, I have spent a large part of my ...
Read more... - Perception: the Analogue, the Digital and the Eye October 7, 2018
I am re-visiting a brief conversation that I had last module with Stella Baraklianou, driven by a certain deja-vu in a couple of books I ...
Read more... - David Hurn – A Life in Pictures September 23, 2018
Just finally catching up with the excellent documentary on David Hurn from the BBC. It only has a few hours left to be available – ...
Read more... - David Hume – Photography’s Patron Philosopher? September 12, 2018
David Hume has been a ‘philosophical hero’ since I was a teenager. Here’s a quote (in classical, sceptical, style) which illustrates partly why that is:
Hume ...
Read more... - Bill Jay – ‘Occam’s Razor’ September 2, 2018
Bill Jay (1940-2009) is a favourite writer, partly because of his acute insight into photographers (as opposed to photography), but mainly because of his love ...
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