Jacques Rancière: Aesthetics and Photography
- Submitting institution
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The University of Westminster
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- qx80v
- Type
- C - Chapter in book
- DOI
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10.4324/9781315727998-3
- Book title
- Routledge Companion to Photography Theory
- Publisher
- Routledge
- ISBN
- 9781138845770
- Open access status
- Out of scope for open access requirements
- Month of publication
- November
- Year of publication
- 2019
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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0
- Research group(s)
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-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- Rancière’s work on the arts has had considerable impact across many arts disciplines in recent years, but notably not yet in photography theory. Bate’s chapter addresses this knowledge gap by systematically introducing the philosophical work of Jacques Rancière to the study of photography. Rancière’s concepts are scattered across his writings, seen in use rather than in clear exposition. The chapter draws together Ranciere’s conception of the ‘three regimes of the image’ (as representative, ethical and aesthetic images) and introduces their potential use for photography. Bate makes a case for such philosophical work to address the social, political and cultural issues and problems encountered in the critical study of photography. Given the diverse social fields of photography, such as advertising, art, documentary, journalism, travel, and personal and social media images at work across culture, Bate argues that these all involve 'aesthetic', ‘ethical’ and ‘representative’ issues, and that the use of these three concepts enables a more sophisticated analytical and critical approach to the range of photographic practices. Aesthetics is taken up, for instance, as a critical concept that does not ignore differences between different types of photography.
The chapter also pays close attention to the workings of Rancière’s categories of consensus and dissensus, and gives an example of the operations of these via a set of canonical photographs by the pioneering early twentieth-century American photographer Paul Strand, as discussed by Rancière. Rancière’s work deflects the usual attention to authorial intent to consider the cultural shifts marked by aesthetic shifts, thus drawing attention to how aesthetics belongs to the social effects of photography as a representative and ethical form of image.
Earlier versions of this paper were given as talks at the University of South Wales, UK, University of Texas State, USA, and the University of Central Lancashire.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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