LECTURE VIIII//Censorship & The Truth.

LECTURE VIIII//Censorship and Truth.

Notes from today's lecture with James Beighton.

OVERVIEW

- Notions of censorship and truth.

- The indexical qualities of photography in rendering truth.

- Photographic manipulation and the documentation of truth.

- Censorship in advertising.

- Censorship in art and photography.

HEALTH WARNING! (Risque content)

INDEXICAL QUALITIES OF PHOTOGRAPHY

- Photography captures a scene, a moment, "the camera never lies".

- Ansel Adams, Moonrise Hernandes New Mexico, c. 1941-2- A classic landscape image, what "truth" do we need to know in the image?- Showing here that manipulation of images in no new thing- darkroom skills and manipulation going in to the processing and print process.

- An original is the slide/negative, an actual image that exists on the roll of film (or in digital, the code that exists digitally).

- Ansel Adams, Moon over Half Dome, 1960.

- Ansel Adams, Aspens- using different exposure time, burning, etc he suggested different times of year, weather, time of day etc, using the same negative (images shown compared to one another in a retrospective of his work).

- Manipulation with Stalin's Communist Government in terms of images with propaganda- abuse of the truth- 'Stalin with, and without, Nikolai Yezhov'- a manipulated documentation is going on by removing elements of the ikmage.
- 'Stalin with, and without, Trotsky' (Stalin's largest rival, follower of Lenin). What is published to us is not necessarily the truth- political agenda, only wanting you to see a particular truth (their truth).


- Airbrushing and "the truth" in glamour/modelling- Kate Winslet on the cover of GQ, legs elongated in Photoshop.
- Photojournalists are often known to manipulate images- however, their basis of their work is delivering the truth to the public. Documenting the truth, should we believe it?


- Robert Capa, 'Death of a Loyalist Solider', 1936. Capa was photographing during the Spanish Civil War- is this authentically an image of the Soldier being shot in battle? Does it matter- Is it indicative of the events of War?
- 'This is War, the work of Robert Capa at War'- the photograph has been decided that this was the moment of death- but perhaps not of the War conflict but another situation that arouse during this time.
- 'With lively step, breasting the wind, clenching their rifles, they ran down the slope covered with thick stubble. Suddenly their soaring was interrupted, a bullet whistled- a fratricidal bullet- and their blood was drunk by their native soil'- caption accompanying the photograph in Vue Magazine (in which it was first published, French magazine). 


- 'The Unseen Gulf War' by Photojournalist, Peter Turnley- 1991 published images.
- Baudrillard wrote, 'The Guld War Did Not Take Place'- the simulation/simulacra- not like a real War at all, done for media purposes, almost such as an event for Westerners. Other than a bomb going off in London, to Westerners the War did not seem "real" (what Baudrillard wrote about).
- 'In our time' Graphic MAGMA Photographic Photojournalism book.
- B&W used- more arty? Less graphic and "real".
- An-My Le, Photographer, demonstrated a more artistic version of war "Small Wars', etc- are these "real" images- unusual juxtapositions, representing one person's reality- should this be seen as news, or is a more uncensored image necessary?

CENSORSHIP

1. A person authorised to examine films, letters, or publication, in order to ban images... etc...


MORALS


- Principles of behaviour in accordance of standards in right and wrong.


- Thoedore Levitt, The Morality (?) of Advertising, 1970- the idea that everyone wants to embellish and distort the world around them- the ability for avdertising to improve your life- the lifestyle as oppossed to the products.
- Cook, G. (1992), 'The Discourse of Advertising', London, Routedge, pg 51.
- Oliviero Toscani, United Colours of Benetton, advert 1992- "there is no such thing as bad publicity."


- Many fine art images are focused on nudes or provocative images. Agnolo Bronzino, 'Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time', c. 1545, Oil On Wood- Venus is being kissed and touched by her son, Cupid- a subject from Greek Mythology and fine art- this is somehow accepted, unlike Photographic imagery.
- Balthus, 'Th Golden Years', c. 1945, 'Therese Dreaming', 1938- overtly perverse images of young and adolescent girls in provocative and suggestive poses. 


- Amy Adler- The Folly of Defining 'Serious' Art- essay which looks at censorship in fine art and the media. Professor of Law at New York University.
- The 'Miller Test;, 1973- Asks 3 questions to determine whether work should be labelled 'obscene':

1. Whether the average person would find the work appeals to the prurient interest.
2. Does the work have explict sexual content


...


- Aim to protect art.
- The dividing line between speech and non- speech.
- The line between prison and freedom for the artist creating the works.


- Sandy Mann, 'Candy Cigarette', 1989- much of her work revolves around her own children. Girl opposing as a young woman with a candy cigarette.
- 'Immediate Family', 1984-92- children depicted in a way that could be sexualised, harmful to them, and questionable of her own motherhood- an exploitation of her own children, does the child have the right to reply and respond against it?


- How much should we believe in the 'truth' represented in the media?
- Should we be protected from it?