Overview- "On Photography"

 

Overview of “ON PHOTOGRAPHY” By Susan Sontag

• The essay begins with specificity and specialties' that photography holds. Photography means putting oneself into certain relations to the world that feel like knowledge and more like power. They are miniatures of reality that anyone can make or acquire. Chris Marker’s film, Si j’avais quatre dromadaires, is an in-depth glance into the still photographs, how they create an impact in visual legibility and emotional impact. Another major aspect that comes with photographs is its ability to furnish evidence. It provides very specific proof of something that happened. The picture may distort; but there is always a presumption that something exists, or doesn't exist, which is like what is in the picture. 
• From 1840, photography got its golden age in which the world was considered a set of potential photographs. From the beginning photograph was a trial to capture largest number of possible subjects. Later there was a progression in photograph that it was the way to capture and save the special moments of life. In the early times photography had no social use, it was not considered a profession. Later through industrialisation, photography turned out to be one of the art forms. I t was considered as a social rite, a defence against anxiety, and a tool of power.
• The position of photography was stick to family circumstances in those times, especially as it was associated with wedding photography. It becomes a place for the family to capture and store the memorable moments of the family members especially the children. It becomes the space for them where they recollect their childhood, when they are at their adults. Especially in the present community with nuclear families, photographs often become the providers of dispersed relatives.
• Another major role that photographs plays is in the area of tourism. Whenever we go out for a picnic, or visit, we all carry a camera with us. Thus, camera has the power to capture the most beautiful moments that we will have with this trip. Such innovations are sometimes very relevant in the history like the pictures taken by Albert Nile of the boat trip, or the Eifel Tower or Niagria waterfalls. At the same time, there is also a fact that this adventure on photography will make a stop to the natural flow of individual that he is put to work even at times of vacation, which is actually for pleasure. Photography has become one of the principle devices for experiencing something, for giving an appearance of participation. Taking photograph has se t up a voyeuristic relationship to the world which levels the meaning of all the events.
• A photograph is not just result of an encounter between photographer and an event, it is an event in itself. It can save the event for a long time, that it seems alive even after the vent is over. Photography is also an act of no-intervention. The person who records cannot intervene, and the person who intervene cannot record. A photographer is someone who is moving through a penora of desperate events. Even if incompatible with interventions in s physical sense, using a camera is still a form of participation. Even though camera is an observation station, the act of photographing is more passive observing. The process of photography is completely depended on the choice of interest of the person who is taking them. What he has captured may be a misfortune or sorrow for another observer.
• The essay “On Photography”, by Susan Sontag, is an analysis on the various aspects of photography. It shares the progress of ideas of photography which is shared from various angles of the writer. The essay shows light on the importance and role of photograph is memorising events and memories of life.