man & nature # 190 ~ it's one thing + another thing
Saturday, August 1, 2009 at 03:44PM 
It's a tree - but what else is it? • click to embiggenAs discussed here on a number of occasions before, studium - the cultural, linguistic, and political interpretation of a photograph and punctum - the "wounding", personally touching detail which establishes, with the viewer, a direct relationship with the picture's referent are ideas put forth by Roland Barthes in his 1980 book, Camera Lucida. Simply put, studium is the visually obvious subject (referent) of a picture - the thing denoted. Punctum, on the other hand, is the not-so-necessarily-obvious thing(s) the picture can call into being - the connoted.
The denoted in a picture is easily recognized - I see it, I know what it is. The connoted in a picture is most often a very ethereal thing - very open to personal interpretation - of feelings and thoughts that a picture can incite. I have often used the the phrase illustrate and illuminate to describe the same ideas.
What I am curious about is this - I suspect that most picture makers focus more on making pictures that are illustrative than illuminative. [CAVEAT: I am intending no value judgement here, I'm merely stating an observation.] I also suspect that most picture makers look at pictures with the same bias, that is, a picture's illustrative qualities are foremost in the viewer's mind rather than its illuminative possibilities. In other words, picture-wise, a cigar is always a cigar.
That said, it should come as no surprise to anyone who has followed The Landscapist for any period of time that I most value pictures that are rich with the possibilities of both the illustrative and the illuminative. Pictures that are not only pleasing to the eye but also to the intellect. Pictures that incite, irritate, instigate, and infatuate not just the eye but also the mind. To my eyes and sensibilities, a cigar is not always a cigar.
But, back to my curiosity - how about you? What side of the fence do you come down on with your own picture making? Is it the same side you come down on for your picture viewing?
Reader Comments (2)
When's a cigar a smoke, Groucho?
Taking: I take pictures that appeal to me on the spot. Intuitively. I like the look of something - I make an image. I don't get too intellectual about it - moreso since I've gotten a digital camera. That could come later - once the image is in the pubic domain anyone can fabulate what it's about - and these speculations are largely irrelevant. The image, like the subject, can stand without any background ideas.
Viewing: There's so much to see - I'll look at anything once. To come back to an image I have to feel connected to it somehow (the charm of family snaps). So I suppose those things which join us all in the human condition will invite me to repetedly view an image.
Barthes is my favourite writer on photography (Can't help it, but I like those French intellectual snobs...). Punctum is in my mind what separates art from what is not art. There will always be a gray area of course, but I am not trying to start one of those futile "what is and what isn't art discussions". Whatever form of art you study there is studium and punctum present, something people tend to forget when reading a book or watching a movie. There is always something to read between the lines and the action in a good movie is more often than not a connotation of something grander - a fable or life lesson for instance.
I create all kinds of photography. Creating images with punctum requires more effort in my mind, although it can often happen by accident (or as a result of good photographic instincts). It's hard to value one type of photography over another, but I tend to enjoy images that tells a bigger story, intended or not. It's hard to prevent viewers from finding unintended punctums. I tend to agree with Todd Papageorge who said to one of his students something like this: " Your work looks like it was made by someone who has never read a book.