Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Regarding Sontag

pg 3 "Men make war. Men (most men) like war, since for men there is 'some glory, some necessity, some satisfaction in fighting' that most women do not feel or enjoy....the killing machine has a gender, and it is male."

I wish I didn't agree with this - but I totally do.

pg 5 "War is an abomination; a barbarity; war must be stopped."

I am sooo glad that I agree with this.

pg 12 "The destructiveness of war...is not in itself an argument against waging war unless one things...that violence is always unjustifiable."

It truly is.

pg 18 "If it bleeds, it leads."

Hey - this is just capitalism at work. "Good taste" seems largely irrelevant. The government can't make laws governing EVERYTHING.

pg 20 "...a photograph has only one language and is destined potentially for all."

And yet - one's culture will help dictate what is taken from the photograph.

pg 23 "Beauty will be convulsive, or it will not be." -Andre Breton

A little confusing - but what an amazing idea. That which is boring, even-keel, cannot be beautiful. I don't necessarily agree unconditionally - but I understand the gorgeousness of what is new, unexpected, shocking.

pg 24 "...photography [keeps] company with death."

pg 29 "...its meaning...depends on...words."

Language persists in importance - even when talking about a captionless photo!

pg 35 "Most wars do not acquire the requisite fuller meaning."

Does this increase the pain felt? Decrease empathy?

pg 39 "The photographer's intentions do not determine the meaning of the photograph."

pg 40 "Suffering from natural causes, such as illness or childbirth, is scantily represented in the history of art."

I'd like to research this more...

pg 41 "...the appetite for pictures showing bodies in pain is as keen, almost, as the desire for ones that show bodies naked....There is the satisfaction of being able to look at the image without flinching. There is the pleasure of flinching."

The pleasure of flinching - like going punch for punch. I don't really understand it - but I practice it."

pg 42 "...there is shame as well as shock in looking at the close-up of a real horror."

pg 49 "...that invaluable substitute for war, international sports."

Haha. Also - mostly male-dominated, like war. Injuries, great battles - oh yeah.

pg 59 "To catch a death actually happening and embalm it for all time is something only cameras can do..."

I like looking at old-school funeral daguerrotypes.

pg 60 "More upsetting is the opportunity to look at people who know they have been condemned to die."

I really don't want to know.

pg 63 "...the 'terribly distinctness'...gives unnecessary, indecent information."

Indecent. What exactly crosses the line?

pg 75 "The image should appall, and in that terribilita lies a challenging kind of beauty. That a gory battlescape could be beautiful...is a commonplace about images of war made by artists."

Epic films about battle are always beautiful - but real life is so difference.

pg 78 "A photographer that specializes in misery - Sebastiao Slagado." !!!

Interesting job title!

pg 80 "...the spectacular is very much part of the religious narratives by which suffering, throughout most of Western history, has been understood."

Those crazy Catholics. Kidding. But seriously - the Crucifix is a horrible icon for a kid to have to deal with. I liked church somewhat when I was a kid - but that dead body nailed to the splintering wood was most disconcerting.

pg 82 "Habituation is not automatic."

pg 83 "People want to weep."

Why do we?

pg 86 "...the photographs of genocide have gone under the greatest institutional development."

pg 88 "Americans prefer to picture the evil that was there."

Ha - I certainly do!

pg 89 "Narratives can make us understand. Photographs do something else: they haunt us."

pg 93 "...we have a duty to look at lynching pictures..."

(do we, as Americans?)

pg 95 "Not all reactions to...pictures are under the supervision of reason and conscience."

pg 95 "...images of the repulsive can...allure."

pg 97 "...we have a degree of delight...in the real misfortunes and pains of others."

1 comment:

ms. mihaylova said...

ok well first off I don't want to sound creepy, but I love hearing you talk and reading your blog I can see you saying some of these responses...it makes me chuckle. I agree with you on alot. Most importantly the Crucifix. Haunting, to put it simply. And this is at the core of our religious being? Really? I suppose we should all love pain then. My fave quote was definetly pg7 "the photographers are a means of making real matters that the privilaged and the merely safe might prefer to ignore", pretty much sums up the book and images of war all together.