Reducing the subject to an object

[aizan]

When I take a picture of a person, that person remains a subject. The picture changes nothing about that.

but the photo does influence the way you see that person. maybe it reaffirms something you already believe about the subject, or maybe your perception completely changes.

there's also the condition of whether the photo is of a person you know, or have at least met once, or if it's someone you've never met, or will never meet.

oddly, the issue of how photographs objectify people is the most controversial when it involves people you have never met and will probably never meet, e.g. celebrities, models, and pornstars. i guess that's because the subject doesn't have a chance to speak for themselves in person.

but what if you actually did meet somebody in real life that you had previously only seen in photos? how does seeing photographs of someone before you meet them affect the way you eventually relate?

 

[Peter_wrote:]

you started the thread at sunday 5 a. m.? hmm.. i love beer-induced propositions...

maybe a photograph is rather a subjective perception of an object, than an objective perception of a subject.

to go further... is even the subject the object of the photograph, or is the subjective view of the photographer the object? who said once, "on a large scale every talk is just self-talk." so you may say, every photograph is just a self-portrait.

 

[haempe]

...
Is photography reducing the subject into an object for the viewing pleasures of the audience?
...

Considered factual - Yes.

What happens in the mind of the beholder is a different question...

 

[John E Earley]

If you never develop the film, is it then a latent objectification or is it a proto-object.

 

[gho]

Hey, thanks for the interesting input so far! I like the idea of turning an object into a subject for closer examination or highlighting something within ones visual frame of perception with the camera. And I too think that photography has a strong subjective component that may reveal as much about the photographer as about the photographed subject.

The idea that a picture changes nothing about the subject and that the picture is the object seems rationally understandable. But viewers may subjectively attribute certain characteristics onto a person based on a photograph and come to certain conclusions. Or subjects may utilize photographs to project a certain image or to make a certain impression.

So even if the distinction between the photograph and the subject is rationally understandable, I think it works a bit differently in actual practice and people are aware of that.

As for the idea that feelings that are being evoked by a photograph are purely subjective, I tend to disagree. I think there are certain well known techniques in photography that may shine a certain light onto a person. Just think about the angle, the facial expression, the pose, the lighting, the clothes and the environment and context in which the person is depicted. If all this does not work into forming a certain judgement and emotional impression in the viewer, why putting so much effort in it?

Recently I have started experimenting with excluding persons actively out of my photographs. But that also poses a certain dilemma. Well, actually it is not a dilemma, but what seems to happen is that photographs without a human subject do not attract as much viewers as photographs in which a person is depicted. The human figure seems to be a strong point of interest in a photograph.

I also had a few conversations about photographing strangers and being photographed by strangers. Some people I talked to hold the position that they felt very uncomfortable when being photographed by a stranger as a main subject in public space. Based on some observations and conversations responses by the subject tend to go into the direction of being used as an object for unknown purposes (e.g. "I do not want to show up in a strangers photo album") or not being treated respectfully (Something along the lines: "I am not an animal in the zoo."). Well, the photographer may consciously do not have any dis-respectfulness in mind (glorifying the subject), but what the subject perceives may be something quite different. And rationalizing does not necessarily help.

 

[Addy101]

but the photo does influence the way you see that person. maybe it reaffirms something you already believe about the subject, or maybe your perception completely changes.

there's also the condition of whether the photo is of a person you know, or have at least met once, or if it's someone you've never met, or will never meet.

oddly, the issue of how photographs objectify people is the most controversial when it involves people you have never met and will probably never meet, e.g. celebrities, models, and pornstars. i guess that's because the subject doesn't have a chance to speak for themselves in person.

but what if you actually did meet somebody in real life that you had previously only seen in photos? how does seeing photographs of someone before you meet them affect the way you eventually relate?

However, this is not an attribute of the person in the picture, but a cconstruction in the head of the viewer 😱
If the question would've been "does a picture of a subject make you see the subject as an object", the answer would have been yes, though more people probably would have voted no 😀