Photography

In a world where online sharing has become incredibly popular, feeling essential to most, photography is widespread and performed frequently, even by those amateur to the art. This abundance of sharing, or oversharing, forces everyone to ask the question: What purpose do these photos serve? While every individual may have their own answer to this imposing question, Susan Sontag’s collection of essays On Photography provides a response; Photographs reveal significance.

As stated by Sontag in her essays, in the history of photography, family events and shared occasions hold an important role in the spread and rise of the art. Photography memorializes events and helps people hold onto the moments in their lives that can easily feel fleeting: “As photographs give people an imaginary possession of a past that is unreal, they also help people to take possession of space in which they are insecure”. The desire to capture and immortalize something comes from the fear that it will one day be lost, creating an impulse to capture the things that are important to us. Often, when we know that something is not easily accessible to us, or that it will not be in the future, we take photographs and substitute them for memories and connection.

Also, taking photos provides comfort that you will not lose what you have in that moment, at least in one sense. Thus, those who have dealt with loss frequently feel an out-of-the-ordinary compulsion to photograph their experiences: “People robbed of their past seem to make the most fervent picture takers, at home and abroad”. This craving comes from a desire to hold onto things that hold some importance in that person’s life. Similarly, photography is often taken up by those with an intention to persuade others.  Sontag explains “Like sexual voyeurism, [photography] is a way of at least tacitly, often explicitly, encouraging whatever is going on to keep on happening”. In other words, when events are significant to a person, they may attempt to have these movements persist, and one way to encourage that is by sharing their message through an image that depicts its value.

Photography also serves to capture what is important to a generation, not just individuals. When times and ideals begin to shift, photographs shift with them. Whether through changes in style or subjects, photographs can reveal overtime the things that feel most significance to an age of people, especially when viewed together. For example, when revealing that the current age feels “nostalgic”, Sontag mentions that photographs do as well. Even when representing a larger movement as opposed to an individual, photographs capture what is most valuable to their creators.

Throughout time, photographs may have served tactical purposes, such as documentation, but photographers have never ceased to capture the things in life that are important to them, revealing, through their images, the most significant items and events they have experienced. Though each photographer may have a different motivation in capturing these meaningful moments, every image can be connected to the purpose of showing what is most important in life, as supported by Susan Sontag in her essay.