Monday, October 25, 2010

Susan Sontag – Response to Family Photograph


  This image seems to be the family’s futile attempt to preserve the moment in the picture.  Through the presumption that unlike a painting or drawing a photograph does not show an interpretation but a piece of reality that would be irrevocable proof of their existence. This image appears to be evidence of how that family interacted, showing the different personalities of the family, and the beauty of what is presumably their home. However the appearance of the family could all be an interpretation of how the photographer thought they ought to be captured, the youth of the motherly figure standing behind the stoic younger daughter, the way the older daughter smiled surrounded by pets. The next image that is only half shown could show the family standing in a line, with the dog lying complacently in front, and the cat curled in the arms of the youngest daughter.

  This image is a way to certify the experience of the family; it is a piece out of what is likely a chronicle of their family portraits. It is a way give the family possession of a past that they wish to remember, mattering little what activities the photograph is of, but only that it is cherished.  This activity of documenting their family experience is to sooth their anxieties of the brevity of their quickly passing family life.  For the family photography has become how they experience and embrace each other, whether a wedding, birthday, vacation, reunion, or funeral it is all recorded by a camera. This image represents the leveling of all these events of the family, placing the camera between each other. Unsure of how to react emotionally to their family changing they take pictures to fill the gap.  So this family, these children, pets, and this moment exists to be photographed.



To find five images I looked for images where either the photographer or the subject used the camera as an attempt to posses these moments.






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