Photography: To the Problem of Thing

Abstract

This article analyzes the problem of image and object in photography. The study proceeds from the assumption that the presentation of a thing implies its special status in photography. The article considers the position of things in photography as a semantic and ideological problem. A photographic demonstration of an object can be interpreted as a special pictorial strategy. The thing is the condition of the shot: a photography is impossible without an object. The problem of the relationship between photography and things looks like a large-scale contradiction. Photography fundamentally changes the object both visually and qualitatively. Acquiring the status of an image, a thing loses its material qualities. The object in the frame is deprived not only of its practical meaning — it loses its subject program. From a three-dimensional object, a thing turns into an ephemeral and phantom unit. The thing as a given experience in photography becomes an illusion. The constituted qualities of the subject are lost in the frame. In photography, a thing becomes a false distorted image, an element of a deceptive perception of the world. The subject in the photograph is an ephemeral entity, an imaginary and non-existent phantom. The frame verifies the presence of the object and, at the same time, endows the meaning of the authentic that which is not. Within the framework of this study, it is important that the status of a thing in photography is not only possessed by an object with strict outlines and boundaries. The disembodied and formless acquire the quality of an object in photography. The study draws attention to the fact that photography turns the world into a set of units, where the quality of a thing is possessed not only by the object, but also by the surrounding space.