Symposium: 'Pathologies of Photography'
Opening statement
Conference
'Pathologies of photography'
Shankar, Department of Art
Why photography was invented?
I will try to look beyond the insights that are known and familiar to us, that include (among others) the prolonged widespread use of the 'Camera Obscura', accompanied by optical, chemical and technological advancements, the complex development of painting, and the accelerated evolution of emerging sciences of the 17-18 centuries up to mid 19 c.
My pursuit was to discover deeper motives in western culture, accompanied by a thought that photography played an important role in the development of modern consciousness and modern society more than any other artistic medium. (My broad conception of photography position and identifies its fields of production as broader than just Art). But the photographic nature had proceeded its invention and is centuries old.
This research claims that photography as consciousness, passion, and as a profound need, accompanies the development of western culture and art consistently over its many years of maturation and development.
In ‘Pathologies of Photography’ I would like to trace photography’s roots, to find aspects of presence and development across preceding periods, the aggregate of past events in the sense that mark, map and chronicle the processes through which the development of photography can be depicted.
to produce a literary work, with its many ingredients and extensive history through divers works of art, literary texts and informative related material, science, history and the effects of various events on social and political processes, philosophy and theoretical thinking.
