Mitt examensarbete utgår från ett tidningsfotografi som var med i Svenska Dagbladets näringslivsbilaga den 4 augusti 2009. Det är ett fotografi av tre män i motljus som rör sig i Kaupthing Banks huvudkontor i Reykjavik på Island. Tidningsbilden illustrerar en dramatisk händelse i den isländska finanshistorien. Rubriken lyder "Kompislån drev på bankkrasch". Artikeln och artiklarna som följer under några år, beskriver hur ett fåtal islänningar har lånat pengar och köpt upp norska och brittiska banker, för att senare låna ut tiotals miljoner kronor till bankens ägare och sina kompisar, ofta utan säkerhet. Följden blir att Islands ekonomi kraschar och varenda islänning dras med i den största ekonomiska krisen som landet har varit med om i modern tid. Jag fascinerades av det till synes lugnt estetiska fotografiet som är ovanligt som illustration på närngslivssidorna i en dagstidning. Jag fick lust att undersöka bilden närmare med hjälp av metoden semiotisk näranalys. Det är denna analysmetod och tillämpningen av metoden på tidningsfotografiet och hela tidningsidan som uppsatsen handlar om. I den gestaltande delen av mitt examensarbete har jag målat en förstoring av tidningsfotografiet och lagt till en leksak som visar på de personliga associationer som bilden väcker hos mig. Kontrasten mellan det strikta lite dämpade motljusfotografiet av tre kostymklädda män och ansiktet av ett litet lyckotroll som spränger genom duken förändrar bilden påtagligt. I den semiotiska näranalysen försöker jag analysera det konnotativa budskapet som bilden förmedlar på en kollektiv nivå. Mitt lyckotroll får stå för något som i semiotiken kallas för punctum, det vill säga individuella assiociationer som uppstår hos mig. Genom att måla motivet har jag genom handens arbete lärt känna bilden på ett annat sätt än när jag endast ser på den.

Cette thèse s’appuie sur une pratique de la vidéographie, du montage et de la photographie et explore le thème de l’intime. Son hypothèse est que l’espace interrogé de la quotidienneté est identique avec celui de l’exploration des intimes. La réflexion se base sur une analyse des textes théoriques ou des réalisations artistiques de Gaston Bachelard, Roland Barthes, Henri Bergson Sophie Calle, Eliane Chiron, Gilles Deleuze, Georges Didi-Huberman, le Groupe Mu, Pierre Huyghe, Maurice Merleau-Ponty ou encore Agnès Varda, et s’appuie sur un matériel plastique qui permet de cristalliser et situer les déplacements et les objets appartenant aux rituels du quotidien. La première partie explore la sphère intime par l’intermédiaire de photos de famille et d’un medium pictural, le cercle bleu. La seconde partie analyse la sphère intime au travers d’images extraites de films vidéographiques réalisés en suivant des personnes ou dans des espaces privés. La troisième partie est dédiée aux espaces parcourus par les personnages que je filme lorsque je les suis, que je parcours lorsque je marche et par les spectateurs au sein de mon installation. Cette thèse interroge le rôle du corps in situ, au contact des lieux et des situations, dans l’élaboration d’un code narratif et poétique afin d’identifier et d’établir les relations de réciprocité et d’interactions qui lient mon matériel plastique à la durée, au temps et à l’espace, au quotidien qui passe et qui s’étale. Par un jeu de miroirs, ce travail cherche à faire résonner notre mémoire et celle des spectateurs et en hyper-multipliant la banalité du quotidien qui devient extraordinaire. / This thesis is based on a practice of videography, editing and photography and explores the theme of intimacy. Its hypothesis is that the interrogated space of everyday life is identical with that of the exploration of intimates. The reflection is based on an analysis of the theoretical texts or artistic achievements by Gaston Bachelard, Roland Barthes, Henri Bergson Sophie Calle, Eliane Chiron, Gilles Deleuze, George Didi-Huberman, Mu Group, Pierre Huyghe, Maurice Merleau-Ponty or Agnès Varda, and relies on a plastic material that can crystallize and locate the movements and objects belonging to the rituals of everyday life. The first part explores the intimate sphere through family photos and a pictorial medium, the blue circle. The second part analyses the intimate sphere through images extracted from video films made following people or in private spaces. The third part is dedicated to the spaces travelled by the characters that I shadowed, that I walk when I walk and by the spectators within my installation. This thesis questions the in situ role of the body, in con-tact with places and situations, in the development of a narrative and poetic code in order to identify and establish the relations of reciprocity and interactions that bind my plastic material to the duration, the time and the space, the daily life that goes on and spreads. Through a game of mirrors, this work seeks to resonate our memory and that of the audience and hyper-multiplying the banality of everyday life that becomes extraordinary.

My thesis is composed of three parts. First of all, based on the three essays of early Roland Barthes, Le message photographique, Rhetoric de l¡¦image, and Le troisieme sens, in which Barthes applies photography with semiology, I outline Barthes¡¦s early thought and delineate why Barthes turns from semiology to phenomenology. In the second part, I focus on Barthes¡¦ last work La chambre claire, and explore the notions such as ¡¥studium¡¦ and ¡¥punctum.¡¦ Thirdly, I use Sartre¡¦s early work l¡¦imagination to interpret the notion of ¡¥punctum,¡¦ in order to outline the phenomenology in La chambre claire more clearly. In sum, my thesis concerns itself with the interplay between early Barthes, Barthes in La chambre claire, and Sartre in l¡¦imagination.

This thesis argues for new theoretical and methodological approaches to the viewing and description of archival photographs. Many archivists continue to focus on photographic subject content, ignoring photographs’ contexts of creation, context of later use and the multiple ways photographs can be viewed. The thesis first charts the implications of postmodernist viewpoints on archival records generally. It then traces, in the context of the Canadian archival community, the gradual spread of a postmodernist regard for photographs specifically. The thesis then draws on the theories and methodologies of a range of other disciplines to suggest fresh approaches to the viewing and description of photographs. It applies these suggestions to a series of photograph albums held by the Archives of Manitoba. These applied suggestions reveal that photographs are richer archival sources when considered as evidence of both creator and viewer intent rather than as transparent windows onto the past.

This thesis argues for new theoretical and methodological approaches to the viewing and description of archival photographs. Many archivists continue to focus on photographic subject content, ignoring photographs’ contexts of creation, context of later use and the multiple ways photographs can be viewed. The thesis first charts the implications of postmodernist viewpoints on archival records generally. It then traces, in the context of the Canadian archival community, the gradual spread of a postmodernist regard for photographs specifically. The thesis then draws on the theories and methodologies of a range of other disciplines to suggest fresh approaches to the viewing and description of photographs. It applies these suggestions to a series of photograph albums held by the Archives of Manitoba. These applied suggestions reveal that photographs are richer archival sources when considered as evidence of both creator and viewer intent rather than as transparent windows onto the past.

Uppsatsen undersöker konstnären Lage Lindells (1920–1980) strävan att beskriva sin egen tillvaro bortom glas och ram genom att i huvudsak undersöka tre olika verk: en muralmålning, ett verk i akryl och en uppstoppad docka. Undersökningen fokuserar på mötet mellan konstverket och betraktaren och hur de samverkar.

In the development of psychiatric science, patient photographs have been used to classify and visualize mental illness. Within the social sciences, this historical practice has been interpreted as an exercise of power, where the depicted people are reduced to diagnoses. This thesis explores the possibility of alternative ways of interpreting patient photographs. Based on the French philosopher Roland Barthes’ theory of photography and his concept of punctum - time, four photographs of patients at Ulleråker's psychiatric asylum in Uppsala from the early 20th century are analyzed. The thesis draws a historical background to the role of photography within psychiatry. The four photographs are analyzed in relation to other forms of portrait photography and the status of patient photographs as portraits is examined. Finally, the question how the time since the photo opportunity affects our ability to interpret the images is discussed.

We will discuss here the issue of manipulation in the digital era of photojournalism. At first we will describe the relation between photography and its referent inculding its ability to represent the reality. Depicting the contrast between analogue and digital photography we will point out the independent position of digital photography from its referent, which is creating better possibilities for manipulation and decreasing the credibility of photography. Then we will analyze the text The Dusk of Photojournalism? that is reflecting these perspective and offering the solution increasing the position of the relation between photography and its referent. By contrast we will analyze the text called Photojournalism is dead, long live photojournalism. Why digitization can increase the credibility of journalistic photography? which considers this perspective as obsolete and offers us the new perspective of the relation between photography and its viewers, that could increase the credibility of photography in photojournalism. According to these two major perspectives we will point out whether it is possible to consider this option of photography - viewers relation as a relevant alternative. Based on these conclusions we will point out the major point of credibility of journalistic photography and imply...

Paul Auster¡¦s The Invention of Solitude is not merely an autobiography, but an attempt to render such a genre to challenge writing itself by trying to write what is of no possibility to be written. In addition, Auster further adds elements of photography in The Invention of Solitude, which on the one hand enhance the genre itself (as an autobiography with photos attached as solid evidences to the written words), and on the other hand, by doing so, the author as a matter of fact deconstructs everything he has been trying to construct. By adding photographs and descriptions of the photographs very consciously, he actually, beyond the ostensible purpose of trying to lend credibility to the autobiographical work, tries to challenge the solidity of such work. Lots of researches have been done on Paul Auster, for whom has already recognized world-widely as an important contemporary American writer, most of them focus on his renowned New York Trilogy (1987),The Music of Chance (1990), or The Brooklyn Follys (2005), while little researches have been done to The Invention of Solitude¡V¡Voften referred to as a memoir of Auster. The book is structured with ¡§Portrait of an Invisible Man¡¨ and ¡§The Book of Memory;¡¨ the former is written right after the sudden death of the author¡¦s father Samuel Auster and the latter is Auster¡¦s own account on matters that later have become his re-occurrent themes throughout his works. I study the utilization of involving photographs in fictional autobiography by looking at the two photographs Paul Auster has reproduced in The Invention of Solitude. Namely, how photography and fiction put together to ¡§renew¡¨ each other (Louvel 31). In chapter one I discuss autobiography and photography, the intertextuality between photographs and texts, and the selection of the two photographs in The Invention of Solitude (including different arrangements of the two photographs in various editions). In chapter two, I mainly focus on Walter Benjamin and Roland Barthes¡¦ reading on photographs; I aim to conclude that each of them talks about one particular essence of photography respectively only with different terms¡V¡Vas aura and punctum¡V¡Vthe endeavor is to illustrate and attest to a certain and unique quality of human that can never be portrayed any how and by any means. Auster¡¦s usage of putting together the words and the photos is also a means to pursuit the same untraceable human quality; he testifies the unseen by presenting something to be seen. The Invention of Solitude requires reader to treat it with the way of reading photographs and pictures; a pictorial reading of words is of necessity in tackling the work, just as in Liliane Louvel¡¦s words, to treat ¡§the image as a means to study fiction through the lens of what I call the ¡¥pictorial third¡¦¡¨ (31). In chapter three, I delve into the anxiety and hunger for portrayal, linking which to the act of writing that functions as a healing process for the writer. I then concentrate on the text, demonstrating how this text itself can possibly be decoded with ways analyzing a picture. In its form and way of writing, the composition of The Invention of Solitude is just like the early procedure of long exposure in taking photographs, the distance and aura have both remained through the writing and the given photographs. In addition, the text is far more than simply combination of words, each word has been rendered as if an element of photography; that is, words can be read with multiple layers of meanings that are all linked with photographs. And I would explore this point through the reading of ¡§room¡¨ in the book. Besides, I¡¦ve involved Susan Sontag, Henri Van Lier, John Berger, Edward W. Said and Thierry de Duve in the three chapters, serving to converse with my argument. Chapter four includes the film Smoke as the subject, the film not only contains photographs as a heavy ingredient and one of the major themes; what¡¦s more, the sequence of weighting smoke also best serves as the footnote, penetrating Benjamin, Barthes and Auster.

Il s'agit de l'action de cueillir de Ia pluie. La pluie se présente comme matiere plastique de recherche et c'est ce qu'on exprime dans ce travail qui entrelace les Arts Visuels et l'Éducation. De maniere à que l'impression et dilution de l'eau et de supports constituent le mouvement qui montre et parcourt, dans un processus d'expérimentations qui est un apprentissage. Pour ça, cette recherche produit des photographies et s'approche des notions de Ia gravure. Elle essaie des façons de rechercher avec l'art et Ia littérature puisque ces façons ont lieu à travers Ia poétique visuelle et l'écriture. Avec Roland Barthes, elle trouve dans Ia notion de Punctum le dédencheur pour Ia production d'un texte de désir, en s'approchant de l'expression française CoupdeFoudretrouvée dans les contes de Guy de Maupassant. CoupdeFoudrea comme figure l'Amour subit et immédiatpourquelqu'unoAinsi, l'amour, Ia pluie et Ia nuit sont des éléments qui ouvrent le texte et les images produites à des hasards et à des traversements non programmés. Dans cette rencontre entre le processus plastique et l'écriture, cette recherche a, dans Ia brieveté, dans Ia possibilité d'être incitée et aussi dans les marques qui restent et qui se diluent, son apprentissage. Apprentissage sans lequel, autant pour celui qui recherche que pour celui qui lit Ia recherche, un art ne se produitpas. / Trata da ação de colher chuva. A chuva apresenta-se como matéria plástica de pesquisa e é o que se expressa neste trabalho que entrelaça Artes Visuais e Educação. De modo que a impressão e diluição da água e de suportes constituem o movimento que mostra e percorre, num processo de experimentações que é um aprendizado. Para isso, esta pesquisa produz fotografias e se aproxima das noções da gravura. Experimenta maneiras de pesquisar, com a arte e a literatura, sendo que tais maneiras acontecem através da escrita e da poética visual. Com Roland Barthes, encontra na noção de Punctum o disparador para a produção de um texto de desejo. Junto a esta noção, o trabalho aproxima a expressão francesa Coupde Foudreencontrada em contos de Guy de Maupassant. CoupdeFoudretraduz-se literalmente por golpede relâmpagoe tem como figura o Amor àprimeiravista. Assim, o amor, a chuva e a noite são elementos que abrem o texto e as imagens produzidas para acasos e atravessamentos não programados. Neste encontro entre o processo plástico e a escrita, tal pesquisa tem na brevidade, na possibilidade de ser pungido e também nas marcas que permanecem e que se diluem, seu aprendizado. Aprendizado sem o qual, tanto para quem pesquisa ecomo também para quem lê a pesquisa, uma arte não acontece.