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A psychoanalytic perspective on photography. For devotees of Freud, Barthes, Lacan, Badiou and Žižek et al.
William
The Studium and the Punctum
What attracts Roland Barthes to photography is the relationship between particular photographs and their referent; the photograph, he writes, “is literally an emanation of the referent”. Whereas language by its very nature is fictional, the photograph has a sense of certainty and authenticity. For Barthes, then, a specific photograph can never be distinguished from its referent. It carries it with itself, or, to put it another way, the referent appears to adhere to the photograph (or stick to its heel, as Lacan would say). This, argues Barthes, is the essence of photography.
There are two necessary elements to any photograph, which he calls the studium and the punctum. The studium is the general field of cultural interest aroused by the photograph. It is the shared or common ground of cultural meaning – the average effect that the photograph produces in spectators, whether one likes or dislikes a particular photograph. The punctum on the other hand is a more private and personal experience; it is that which punctuates the studium and arouses our specific interest in the photograph. The punctum is that contingent, accidental element in the photograph that captures our attention. As Barthes says, it is that which pricks me, but also bruises me and is poignant for me.
If the studium refers to the overall sense of the photograph, then the punctum is the detail that disrupts its smooth surface. It is the detail that attracts one to the photograph and which Barthes compares with a ‘partial’ object. The punctum has a certain expansive, metonymic power, as it leads one from one association to the next. As such the punctum also works retrospectively. It is not something that can be staged or placed in the photograph, but rather is the detail we recall once we are no longer in front of the photograph and we think back upon it.
-Sean Homer on Roland Barthes / Jacques Lacan
Sean Homer is Senior Lecturer in Media Studies - City College, Greece
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