Thursday, April 14, 2011

INTRODUCTION







As I progressed with my research on digital media and media philosophy I came to see the intricate network of technology, media and society.
Looking back on the recent years, even though the making and distributing of the actual photographs has become relatively easier and in a certain way more democratic, it has also become more difficult to produce an image that has the potentials to intrigue and engage the public.
To understand this paradox better, I would like to investigate our relationship with the digtal medium and our attitude towards technology. I’m aware that this investigation raises questions, which are pointing beyond the capacity of this thesis, but I am not searching for deffinitive answers just yet.
The issues and the unanswered questions about media, technology and the human consciousness stand at the very center of this thesis. I find it important to shift mentally towards an atemporal, non-linear thinking process, which permits us to see a broader spectrum of the undelying patterns and structures.

We are participating witnesses of an exponentially accelerating technological evolution, which practically can not be stopped anymore. Not without dramatic consequences.
Applied science is constantly provinding us with newer, better solutions that offer the potential to improve the quality of our life and to bring civilization to another level. Yet at the same time it is also highly instabile as the human mind doesn’t have the capacity to develope at the same rate as technology does. Therefore I find it essential to observe the world, the dynamics of history and our activities in the present with an open mind, so that we can look ahead and extend the path of developments into the near future.
The structure of my inquiry into contemporary photography is inspired by John Szarkowski’s book; The photographer’s eye.
This reference stimulated me to study the differences between digital and analog photography, but it also showed noticable similarities in our ways of dealing with a new medium in the past and in the present.

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