There are a lot of advantages to being a professor- steady paycheck, the support that comes from being part of an academic environment, the energy that comes from working with photo students, summer break, etc. However, the flip side of it means there are times when my job overwhelms all other aspects of my life. The end of the semester is usually one of those times, and this spring it was especially bad. We’re now two weeks into summer, and I’m still going to school every day trying to get myself caught up on things. I’ve spent part of the morning cleaning the spam out of my blog (5000+ spam comments! I’ve got to figure out how to get better spam fighting plugins working), and am now anxious to start posting again.

I’ve got all sorts of things to report from the last month, so I hope to get several post up in the next few days.

By now most people with even a passing interest in photograph have probably seen the Newsweek article from last month about the death of photography. This argument is really quite tired, having been around for 15 years or so, and in my mind, misses the point. If its truthfulness is the cause of our love for photography, how do we explain our love of cinema, closely related, yet bearing not even a superficial relationship to any notions of truth?

One of my daughters’ favorite presents this Christmas was a kid digital camera.  They have been running around with the thing, which is pink (an added attraction of course) and takes pictures of about the quality of a three year old cell phone camera ($75 well spent), ever since they opened it. With every picture they take, they immediately look down at the LCD screen. I don’t have to observe them very long to realize that their fascination with photography has absolutely nothing to do with it’s “truth value.” I think  this observation is emblematic of the true heart of our fascination with the medium. When have we as a society ever been particularly interested in “truth” to begin with? Without even getting into the issue of what a hollow notion the idea of truth is to begin with, we seem to for the most part believe what we are told, and not spend a huge amount of time verifying its validity or analyzing the agendas that might lie beneath the surface. I am of course grossly over generalizing for the sake of argument…

I really think our collective fascination with photography comes simply from the particular set of languages it uses to portray the world in front of the lens. These languages (one-point perspective, indexicality, relationships to time) provide a unique intersection of ideals going all the way back to the renaissance. They are deeply engrained in our culture, and until those values change or we find something that represents them better, photography isn’t going anywhere.

As an academician, I have to add a footnote here. My thoughts on this subject were heavily colored by Geoffrey Batchen’s essay “Ectoplasm: Photography in the Digital Age.” It’s a great essay, and well worth reading, especially if people are going to keep obsessing about the death of photography.

I’ve been and bad blogger recently. I’m going to do my best  to get back, but I have myself spread mighty thin these days.

I promise I’ll be back soon! Various aspects of life, including an in-town move with a family of five (lot of stuff!!!!), the beginning of the semester, and several forrays into university administration have left me completely out of touch with the online photo world. Having a full time job 9 months of the year leaves me with times when I have to remove myself from my art and the larger community I hope it is a part of. I never know whether these sabbaticals leave me better or worse off.