The Photo-As Thing, Article Critique Example

Julia Breitbach’s essay, “The Photo-as-Thing, Photography and Thing Theory” (2011) explores the idea that photographs in addition to being a record of things or events, are themselves things. The concept seems simple enough on the surface, but is actually based in a fairly complex set of psychological and philosophical ideas. One of the primary ideas that is important in regard to understanding Breitbach’s point of view is her assertion that “Photography manifests itself in a concrete and tactile form, both with regard to the carrier of the image itself […]and its presentational form” (Breitbach, 32). For most casual onlookers, photography is merely the recording of an image. Additionally, to the casual onlooker photographs have no meaning or existence outside of the thing or event that they record. The emphasis of Breitbach’s article is on trying to delve deeper into the meaning of photographs as things in themselves.

Another interesting assertion that Breitbach makes is in regard to digital images. The main emphasis in this regard is that digital photos are also material things even though they may not seem to be at first glance. Breitbach writes that “Digital images, too, are dependent on sohd matter” ” (Breitbach, 32) which is of course self-evident but nevertheless likely to be overlooked by many people. The way that Breitbach attempts to reinforce her original thesis is by an appeal to philosophical ideas. For this reason, many of the supporting lines of argument are complex and somewhat difficult to follow.

One example of the complexity that is involved in the essay is Breitbach’s attempt to define “things.” Obviously anything that has a material existence can be considered a “thing,” but such a definition is more or less too general to build any kind of argument on. Therefore, Breitbach attempts to forward a more restrictive or definite idea of what makes a thing. She writes: “The term ‘thing’ itself […] challenges with its ‘specific unspecificity’ oscillating as it does between crude materiality and ephemeral generalities” (Breitbach, 33). This is an exceptionally dense philosophical definition. The way that the essay attempts to connect such profound philosophical ideas to the medium of photography is both challenging and somewhat too abstract. Unfortunately, for Breitbach, the article never recovers from this early entanglement with philosophy. The entire paper is devoted to a highly complex examination of both linguistics and philosophy.

No doubt, photographs do carry with their very existence certain philosophical questions. Some relatively easy questions that might be associated with photographs are: Do photographs show more – or less- about reality than real-time perception? Another question might be: do photographs indicate latent qualities in things that could not otherwise be sensed or known? These are good questions and they do factor in to the scope of the article to some degree. However, the article as a whole takes place on a much deeper – much more nakedly philosophical level. In this regard, the essay carries the same weakness that any deeply complex philosophical argument is apt to carry, which is the weakness of abstraction.

This means that it is very nearly impossible to determine the exact nature of Breitbach’s points in the paper without spending a lot of time tracing back one sub-argument and another to find out where they connect with her overall thesis. One example of this is when she writes that “the cultural transparency of objects is pitted against the opaque nature of things” (Breitbach, 34). What this statement seems to mean is that works of ‘art” such as photographs reflect fairly straightforward ideas that are rooted in a particular cultural perspective. On the other hand, objects that are not art but are merely things are almost impossible to describe in terms of absolute qualities. So, for example, a photograph taken of the Statue of Liberty by a souvenir company reflects an obvious design of commercial appeal. But a rock sitting by the side of a stream reveals little that can be said with absolute conviction.

This is the basic underpinning of the idea of photographs as things: that they have a reality that goes beyond the artistic or cultural qualities that they reflect. According to Breitbach, the inability for things to be known absolutely by their qualities is a factor in the perception of photographs even if this factor is not known by most observers.   One of her most radical statements during the first half of the article is the suggestion that “in the final analysis such temporal succession has to give in to an ‘all-at-onceness’. In other words, every humble object, at any time, might reveal itself to be a ‘wild thing’” (Breitbach, 34). This is a deeply philosophical assertion and it smacks of abstraction. After-all if all things, including photographs, are in some way “wild” and beyond the sensory or rational definition of human-beings, does this actually impact the pragmatic function of photographs?

The balance of the article is meant to explore the potential that photographs like natural objects carry with them significance and meaning, as objects, that go beyond human understanding. One of the most important things about seeing photographs as things is to recognize that they are acted on by time in the same way as any other object. This is not an understanding that is commonly associated with photography. Instead photographs are often understood to preserve images through time. The article tries to show that time impacts photographs with the same degree of change and meaning as time impacts natural objects such as tree, rocks, or any man-made object.

This is a powerful and very compelling idea. It is also an idea that is almost impossible to prove by an appeal to evidence or to the basic understanding, intuitive or otherwise, which most people hold about the nature of photographs. The sense of Breitbach’s argument change after this point is made. She begins to descend even deeper into questions of philosophical relativity. At one point, she makes the claim that “a latent thingness resides in even the most trivial and negligible objects waiting to erupt in the sudden confrontation with an interacting subject” (Breitbach, 35). This kind of reasoning is powerful in terms of making a logical philosophical argument, but it is almost meaningless in terms of how photographs are functionally experienced in the real world. The influence of abstraction has taken over the essay and most readers will probably feel that whatever point Breitbach was trying to take, no matter how earnestly, has been lost in a maze of philosophical hair-splitting.

What does it actually mean to accept that photographs are, in fact, things? Does understanding that they are things mean that the “thingness” of photographs places a barrier between the observer and the photograph? And if so, are there any ways to get beyond the barrier? Is it even desirable to get beyond the barrier? The majority of Breitbach’s argument rests on assertions that are not substantiated but are steeped in abstract concepts. The article has the feel of a philosophical treatise that is more concerned and focused on the nature of human perception and the perception of time than on the reality of photography and photographs. This makes the article not only difficult for the average reader to follow, but it brings the average reader to a point of such abstraction that there is no outlet for understanding why the assertions made in the article matter at all.

The article is a fascinating and provocative but fails to rest on any firm ground. For this reason most readers will probably come away from the article without having found a deeper understanding of photographs. This same idea holds true for the way the article will impact the average viewer’s understanding of things. If it was Breitbach’s intention to create ambiguity about the nature of photography and also about things, the article can be considered a great success. In any other estimation it must be held as an example of philosophical abstraction atht will defy any understanding by the general reader.

References:

Breitbach, Julia.  “The Photo-as-Thing, Photography and Thing Theory”.  Eurapean JoLtnal al Enslish Studies Val. 15, No 1, April 2a11, pp. 3143