PH0710: Reading a Photograph

Roland Barthes was an extremely influential philosopher who explored in detail the semiotics of popular Western culture. He believed that when we read an image we look at 2 factors simultaneously. The first, Studium, meaning what we can see, or describe. This is intellectual and knowledge based. The second, Punctum, which describes how the image affects us emotionally.

Lester (2002) breaks it down further into the categories; personal perspective, historical perspective, technical perspective, ethical perspective, cultural perspective and critical perspective. We spent this week’s webinar and seminar analysing photographs formally using a structured approach. This is new to me. I realised during the exercise that my connection with an image has been solely based on my emotional reaction. Infact, that emotional reaction is influenced by many other factors. For example, my own cultural and social background, and the influential events in my life. I will use these categories when making and analysing my own work. I have always been interested in using storytelling in my images, but this will help me to explore that further.

BARTHES, R. (1982) Camera Lucida. LONDON: Jonathon Cape

LESTER, P.M. (2002) Visual Analysis in Visual Communication: Images and Messages. LONDON: WadsworthPublishing Co

Last week someone gave me a bag of vintage film camera’s. I managed to clean a couple of them up and loaded some black and White Ilford films. I haven’t shot in analogue for many years. This has happened at a good time for me. I purchased a book by Jesse Alexander called ‘Silent Land’. It is my first exploration into landscape photography. This book has opened the door for me and I’m beginning to understand how landscape photography relates to me and my practice. This week I visited The Photographers Gallery to see the Chris Killip exhibition ‘Retrospective’ and was equally inspired by his landscape work. I decided to try my hand at making a few landsape images myself, using film. The experience was much slower, thoughtful and reflective than my usual practice. Looking forward to seeing the results.

Fig 1. Chris Killip ‘In Flagrant’ 1973-1985

Fig. 2 Jesse Alexander No 1 ‘This Silent Land’ 2022