Sunday, April 10, 2016

Photos

Married in 1977 we have a book of twenty wedding photographs. Yes. You heard me. Twenty. I have a lot of special memories about that day, mainly because I got to concentrate on it.

There's an article knocking around from the New Yorker. It suggests that in the future we will only look at things in order to photograph them.

I have in my possession one photograph which worries me immensely and tells me the danger of such a future.

Two weeks ago I baptised a couple of lads at church. It was a great experience and the crowd (outside on a cool March morning) watched and cheered. I baptised by immersion in a large paddling pool.

Now such a baptism involves carefully, and pastorally, making sure the candidates are fully under the water. I try not to scare them or bully them.

But one photo clearly shows me holding one lad underwater by the throat. There can be no doubt. 

Except there is. Because the crowd will tell you I did not do that. It is a passing shot. It caught my hand moving position and froze it. And there lies the danger. Not from photoshop, although that is dangerous enough, but from thinking you have captured reality when you have created it.

Try and record reality with your own eyes and brain and then see if the photographs remind you of it. This ship may have sailed.

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