Roland Barthes Camera Lucida

This is Barthes last book and was written shortly after his mother’s death. The Book is about what makes a photograph memorable, but it also Barthes processing the grief for his mother through trying to understand which picture can truly represent her.

Barthes starts by discussing why photographic portraits never seem right to the subject. He sees this as being a result of the four different narratives that take place when someone takes a photograph of someone else:

They are the person the subject thinks he is,
the person the photographer thinks the subject is,
the person the subject wants other people to think he is, and
the person the photographer uses to make his art.

(Barthes, 1982, 13)

The combination of these four and the subject’s mismatched idea of how his own true character should be represented (as opposed to how others see him) leads to a disconnect that the subject (universally?) finds it difficult to bridge.

Barthes then moves onto what is the core the book what makes an image memorable. Barthes states what makes an appealing image, one we like, is based on the Studium – a combination of attractive composition and subject, alongside the meanings and history surrounding it that we take for granted. There are many images that have the Studium – we like them but they don’t stay in our memories afterwards. The hook for a future recall is the Punctum – that detail which separates the everyday image from the memorable one. He suggests that a Punctum is a personal reaction to an image; what makes a specific image resonate for one individual might have no meaning at all to another. The second may see something else as the Punctum, or indeed not register one at all. Not all images have a Punctum.

The book then goes on his search for a likeness of his mother that he recognises as showing who she really was, and how, eventually he finds it in an old photo of her as a five year old child. He defines the photo as displaying her true personality, rather than the stilted poses which most photo portraits are.

The book also goes into detail about why Barthes feels that a photo is a dead moment – gone forever – but always there as a record that is we know that the people in the image were gathered at that location on that day [in the past]. Although, this particular notion may not be a relivant these days with image manipulation technology we have at our fingertips.

Continuing, rather morbidly Barthes expresses that photos can represent Death – both those of the people in the photos, but also himself (and therefore us a reader). They are a doorway to the past, and at the same time, an indication of what will happen in the future, i.e. everybody dies. This is not something I really agree with or understand just because we freeze a moment it doesn’t really foretell death. Perhaps they was written as a way of processing grief it has coloured his thoughts?

Finally, he talks about the difference between Looking and Seeing, with the latter being unconcentrated and subliminal, whereas the former is active and meaningful a concept that John Berger covered in the Way of Seeing.

For me the essence I will take from this book is Studium and Puctum as these are elements that our photography must have in the correct portion and his opinions on why we don’t like our own photo’s finallt , help me understand why I don’t like images of myself – always thought it was because I thought I looked like my Grandma.

I choose to move on from the death aspect – it is not a concept that I can understand or envisage. Because for me a photograph represents life, my mum passed away 18 months ago and whilst she will never leave my memory and “photo on the mantlepiece” go along way to keep my memories fresh. It doesn’t remind me that she has gone nor did I think when too it she will die one day.