Abstract
This paper develops a Husserlian analysis of photography. Based on Husserl’s account of the constitution of images and image-consciousness, the photograph can likewise be understood as constituted according to the tripartite distinction image-thing, image-object, and image-subject. As this essay argues, however, the mechanical production of (traditional) photography is a mirror of memory that enjoys a special phenomenological relation to the past.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsNotes
- 1.
Page numbers of the German edition are cited first followed by the page numbers for the English translation for all the Husserl citations in this essay.
- 2.
It is important to recall that I am not concerned with manipulated photographs in this essay. Photographic evidence can always be challenged on the grounds that the photograph has been doctored, but the challenge makes sense only if we can assume that generally photographs have not been altered in ways that distort their evidential value. Any photograph, of course, will reflect the location and interpretation of the photographer, and will require interpretation by the spectator. As evidence, photographs are self-explanatory only in a minimal sense.
References
Barthes, R. 1981. Camera lucida. New York: Hill and Wang.
Baudelaire, C. 1980. The modern public and photography. In Classic essays on photography, ed. A. Trachtenberg. New Haven: Leete’s Island Books.
Bazin, A. 2004. The ontology of the photographic image. In What is cinema? vol. 1. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Friday, J. 2005. André Bazin’s ontology of photographic and film imagery. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 63(4): 339–350.
Holmes, O.W. 1980. The stereoscope and the stereograph. In Classic essays on photography, ed. A. Trachtenberg. New Haven: Leete’s Island Books.
Husserl, E. 1969. Zur Phänomenologie des inneren Zeitbewusstseins (1893–1917). Dordrecht: Springer.
Husserl, E. 1980. Phantasie, Bildbewusstsein, Erinnerung (1895–1925). Dordrecht: Springer.
Husserl, E. 2005. Phantasy, image consciousness, and memory (1898–1925). Dordrecht: Springer.
Husserl, E. 2008. On the phenomenology of the consciousness of internal time (1893–1917). Dordrecht: Springer.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2015 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Brough, J.B. (2015). The Curious Image: Husserlian Thoughts on Photography. In: Bloechl, J., de Warren, N. (eds) Phenomenology in a New Key: Between Analysis and History. Contributions To Phenomenology, vol 72. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02018-1_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02018-1_3
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-02017-4
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-02018-1
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawPhilosophy and Religion (R0)