The history of photography has been beset with problems. Early on, photographers pressed the need for photography to be considered an art form. If a table is a table, it is anything but a table. If a photograph is a photograph, it is anything but a photograph. Photography, at its genesis, was tacitly and shamefully understood by all to be an incomplete thing—born handicapped. Photography is itself in itself when it is not itself. Call it then a painting, a filmic sequence, etc.—but do not claim that that is a photograph! It comes as no surprise that soon after the invention of photography in 1826, stereopsis was successfully applied to photography. The true call of photography was, is, and always will be virtuality. It is there that it feels most at home. The virtual brings back the components missing in a photograph: depth, sound and movement (sound and movement, as applied in the virtual, in no way allude to cinematography—stasis still reigns in the virtual, just as it did in the photograph—the virtual, just like the photograph, is the domain of stasis—stasis is the dynamic in photography, and, by extension, in the virtual too [and what is this stasis after all? Time and timelessness at the same time!]). The virtual was, is, and always will be the domain of photography. Does applied virtuality complete the mission of photography? Can we say that with the practical application of the virtual now at last photography has reached completion? No! The virtual can never be complete and can never compete with the actual simply because it is by its very nature virtual—a frozen hypothesis, a hypothesis in stasis. (The actual is what is actual and hence what is complete [or complete in its incompleteness], no?) Photography was, is, and will remain in eternum an incomplete thing. Hence why the history of photography has been beset with problems. Hence why if a photograph is a photograph, it is anything but a photograph.
Representation is a mental suggestion of something—say, the world. A representation is an incomplete thing. Representation is necessarily photography.
‘The photographic’ is image encountered in mind.
The fear of photography can be stated as such: what if light is not all?
In ‘Being and Time’, Heidegger intentionally leaves the question of Being unresolved. In questioning Being, Heidegger astutely perceives that in questioning Being one necessarily questions Being in Time. Hence the reason why he unavoidably comes to the conclusion that Being is to be defined as temporality. The Other is infinite in his being otherwise to his otherness. Derrida, correctly rebukes the language employed in ‘Totality and Infinity’. But his rebuke does not in any way claim error in the way Levinas’ mind mindfully gave genesis to that work. What stands in opposition to the Other? Nothing! ….And within this nothing, the Other’s pretence that this nothing is somewhat otherwise to the nothing it verily is—that is to say, the pretence that this nothing is nothing—which it is! Is one eternally possessed? Yes!
A step taken in Memory is a step taken in the World. Hence why the illusion of Time.
Ethics is the time of the Messianic. The time of the Other has not yet come. The only thing that does not change is change itself; and what is this change if not that which is being in its Being?
Time does not belong in the otherwise. Time is external, is the outside. The collapse of Time is the moment of ‘the photographic’.
Are even the axioms of the Self apodictically self-evident? The photography apparatus, just like all apparatuses, cannot commit a true error. The Real is intuited as an allusion to infinite detail, hence, an allusion to the world. We refer to this experience as the moment of ‘the photographic’, invoked, for example, when we commonly say, “it looks like a photograph”. In photography, we fail to distinguish the photograph as object from the photograph as a manifestation of ‘the photographic’. From this oversight arises the misshapen notion of indexicality. The post-aesthetic comes with no subject.
Returning things to their pure state, everything is as it should be. The world is outside, as it always has been; and there is no grey matter between these ears. Then, pretence is just that—pretence. We can go about pretending it is otherwise, knowing very well in our pretence that it is always otherwise to all that. So violence is just that: pretending, in our pretence, that we can go about pretending ad infinitum. Like pop music, and like El Greco shedding doubt on Michelangelo’s painterly talents, mind is everything everything is not. One would be tempted to call this mind the nothing, then, was it not for the fact that this mind we would be venturing to call the nothing has been defined a priori as thought. And thought, just like pop music and El Greco’s remarks, is dialogued. Dialogue, belonging to mind, neigh, being the dimension we refer to as mind, and which is by definition blind to all perception, and which makes do without any data from the senses, is the thing-in-itself (das Ding an sich). Hence, everything else is nothing—everything, except that which stood and still does stand outside—the world.
The Other and the World take the same position—as a unitary duality. And in standing there, the Other and the World stand, with an effortless strain, in front of you (the magic of perception). Levinas’ genial statement, now reads: “Intention is the intention of a person”. Ultimately, words and images fail to keep the space open.
A measurement is in arbitrary relation to the measured, the world. The world, as the measured, is its own measure—is the measure in itself. Hence, any measure is worth its salt. Linearity is but one aspect of chaos. As long as things are somewhat readable, one can paint anew. And this process can be iterated indefinitely—even made larger. With photographs, applying such a process indefinitely past the elbow point will only give glimpses of an illegible bitmap. Things get smaller. What if it can’t get more real than this? What if?
Goodness is only good when one wills the good in the Other. Being, defined as that which is being in its Being, is. To be, Being must originate after something which is prior to its being. Being is willed by the Other. God finds his fulfilment in the Other. God as divine absence; the Other as the Word made flesh; and the Spirit that ensures that there should be nothing equivocal about the World.
One doesn’t change a thing in reality. Hence, one has defeated mythology. To be, for no other reason than to be. The first time, we call it occurrence; the second time, it’s called history. It is our life which writes history.
If time is not, if separation and distance are not, what is? What humbles us is love.
There are many ways how to shine a light. The answer is never within oneself.
Language, like photography, is optics. And all of those Beings that lie outside of the shores of Time, come to the rescue. “Photography” is the antonym of “photography”.
Why photography? We’re pressed for time.
What brings Time to an end is not the closing of time, but the opening of time.
Such is death: reappearance. Such is separation: return.
Nothing negates nothing. Hence, only Alterity.
Death. Depeche mode 🙂
What if the rule of ‘the photographic’ can, after all, be broken? The photography apparatus, after all, takes photographs. And, presumably, will keep on taking photographs.
Featured Image:
A photograph (magic). May 2025 at Sliema, Malta. Image by the author.
Image:
Siġġu. May 2025 at Paola, Malta. Photograph by the author.