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| Empty Flats, 2010 |
The photographer, rather than entering a particular space, is faced with a non-porous surface. Just as docile bodies can drift through space, so too the gaze glides across its surface; one regularly traverses it without either pausing or looking. Space and photography perhaps share common properties; indeed, both generate anxiety in order that we might move on more quickly – continuously postponing, yet reproducing the co-ordinates of, desire itself. Of course, many photographs are certainly designed not to be looked-at for prolonged periods (e.g. the billboards that pervade public spaces); rather they drift into the milieu of the mass media. So too public spaces also discourage prolonged contemplation, and even outlaw occupation. Both activities, looking at photographs and occupying space, are now seen as perverse and suspicious activities as soon as they become prolonged.
Here then, is the paradox of the act of photography in this instance (the protracted activities of setting up tripods, operating the large format camera, the use of sheet film over continuous shooting, etc.); one not only looks at the framed space for a perverse amount of time, one also draws attention to oneself – and is seen by others. The photographer occupies a place, but this place never appears in the image (the view is always ‘over there’), rather it is located only within the Other’s field-of-vision; one becomes a spectre – one’s own presence as intruder is made clear when one’s look becomes visible or exposed.