Ramifications of "owning" an image of a subject/object/portion of time/pornography?

Charlie, after a night out, Manchester UK 2004

What are the repercussions of a photograph, in relation to owning a photograph of a being? a piece of pornography?

Taking a photograph, turning the person into an object and that time it was taken into an object, must have some repercussions. The owner of the object - photograph, now has in their possessions a part of the subject/object. And the replications of the subject as object exist in all of the owners world, as well as in the subjects own history.

In relation to pornographic images, this kind of disturbs me.

But I also see the attraction in it. I own, for my personal use, an object that I find arousing, which is beautiful to me, and by my very nature I want to collect and keep things that are beautiful to me for my further enjoyment.

There is a "religious belief that a photograph can steal a soul, imprisoning it within its amalgam of polyester, celluloid, salts and gelatin (or perhaps a CCD if you are into digital photography) is still shared by many cultures across the globe...The soul is believed to be composed of thirteen parts, photography damages or even removes some of these components." (http://www.weddingphotographydirectory.com/wedding-photo/for-wedding-photographers/bleeding-edge-column/art-of-stealing-souls.aspx)

Photography removes and imprisons parts of a soul in the photograph itself. How does this sit in relation to pornography?

What happens to the subject/object after the photograph is taken, developed and distributed?

Notes on the Language of Photography/Photographs

Ellice, Manchester UK 2004

TAKE
To take a photograph. You're taking (recording) a piece of time, a facsimile of an object in an instance, for yourself. The image "taking" has 2 methods of recording: 1. Recording an "object" itself in that moment the shutter closes, and 2) Recording your projected idea of what is worth recording in that time, for what ever reason, beauty, attraction, anomaly etc and returning it to object form - the physicality of the photograph itself - to retain.

By both accounts, you have taken something away from Time.

SHOOT
To shoot is to kill, and then (in photography's case) preserve. Photography is both a death and preservation of time. From the moment the image is recorded on film/sensor, that moment is both dead and preserved

.

I have issues with time, time escaping, time lost. Sleep sometimes scares me as you go to "sleep" for a period of time, but where were you? Asleep, but where is the time gone? what has happened in that time? With photography, I have the "power" to keep that time, keep the moment, when i see fit, ad it to my catalog of visual language and personal narative: I was here, I saw this, I consider this moment worth keeping as an object.

How does this relate to my growing obsession with portraits/figurative works?

I love, to the point of obsession looking at people. I love people watching, whether it be a the way they dress, the way the light falls on them, the shadows made by their features, the way they hold themselves. I want to record the things I see, for posterity, for pure fact that at that moment in time I've found something beautiful in some aspect of their person. I've found a "punctum" (1) in an "object" (because I turn the body/being into an object by wanting to photograph) that I want to keep, and study at a different time (possibly to discover what makes me as a photographer want to keep this person as an object).

SNAPSHOT
Unplanned, non staged photograph. I've recently been going through some photos I've had on file for quite sometime, searching through "Snapshots" to find "Photographs". I'm unsure of the snapshot, because I set out to make images (photographs in this instance) first and foremost, I don't understand where the snapshot fits in to my image-making vernacular. Doesn't every image I make/take have the power of my history and knowledge in art making behind it, enough so to make it a "Photograph" rather than said "Snapshot"?

(1) 'Camera Lucida' - Vintage Classics Edition 2000, Roland Barthes, 1915-1980 pg 26,

John, Manchester UK 2004

Ellice, Manchester UK 2004

Charlie, Night Out, Manchester UK 2004

Charlie, At Work, Manchester UK 2004

Charlie, Manchester UK 2004

John, Manchester UK 2004

Ashleigh's favorite stiffy

Pieces/Thought Patterns/Warrant (not the hair metal cherry pie kind)

• Photography invents pasts.
• To photograph is to confer importance. 
• To take a photograph is to participate in another person's mortality, vulnerability, mutability. Precisely by slicing out this moment and freezing it, all photographs testify to time's relentless melt.
• What pornography is really about, ultimately, isn't sex but death. 

Sontag quotes on photography/pornography

Recording people in moments of time to keep for myself, I like to collect things I find beautiful, or interesting, in that moment I see it. Before it changes into something else. It's almost a catalogue of changing visual tastes.

I made it through the wildernesssssss

I've just finished watching American Teen. Made me realize a couple of
things about what happened to me end of high school. I only applied to
one university, and got in on the same day I had my interview. I'd
been wanting to go to this uni since I was in year 7, so a good 5
years later when I actually was of age and could I apply, I was so
shocked that I got in i miss heard them and had to call them back two
days later just to check.

I lived in a pretty shit country town like the kids in the
documentary. It seems like every country town in the world has high
school kids the same: trying to fit in, trying to stand out, trying to
get by. Trying to get out.

I got out. Imagine what would have happened if I didn't get out? I
can't even think about it. How was I so brazen to apply for one
university? what happened to that brazen?
last time I saw him, I was packing my bags and going where absolutely
no one knew me - Manchester UK. Haven't seen him since really.

I never write these blogs... except for art focussed whinging. I guess
I'm just feeling a bit luckier than usual after sitting through that
and realising what I've done since high school. got a degree, got my
ass overseas, got my art practice going.. slowly, but steadily. baby
steps. and I'm thankfully I didn't get stuck in that fucked up country
town.