| This paper addresses the nature of photographic perception. I discuss the work of Magritte and the theory of indexicality as initially proposed by Roland Barthes and Rosalind Krauss. In On Places, Photographs and Memory, I reflect upon the relationship between photographs and memory and the limitations to objectivity inherent to the medium. In The Language of Representation, I discuss the work and words of artist Clifford Ross, the exhibition Actual Size by Michael Heizer, the way that photographs are talked about, and what that says about the way that photographs are thought about. In Metzker's Composites , I discuss how Ray Metzker used the ambiguity of the relationship between photography and the real to produce a compelling body of work. Finally, in Changing Perceptions, I attempt to complicate, revise and apply the theory of indexicality in the context of the digital and contemporary visual culture. In the Appendix I discuss two of the images in my MFA thesis exhibition that relate to the themes of this text. |
