Photos of the Gods - By Sandra and Ana

Ok we are getting more and more postmodern. This time we decided to add images to the comment and we are also using a blog which gives us the possibility of not simply writing, but also more ease of editing each other as well as the incorporation of pictures and links.
So let’s set this up, by introducing the author as well as ourselves, and by attempting to do this through visuals and the subsequent analyses of them: This is Christopher Pinney.

He’s currently a professor of Anthropology at University College London, his webpage is here . Apart from “Photos of the Gods,” he lists “Camera Indica: The Social Life of Indian Photographs” as one of his major publications. He looks nothing like we imagined.

Here is us:

This image depicts the everyday situation of a (grad) student. Note first the monochromatic colour scheme. The image is roughly divided by the diagonal line of the desk in two halves of clutter versus empty space. In front of the grad student lies the horizontal desk surface, filled with various accessories indicating that some time has been spent at this text. Behind, there is only empty white wall. The historical and social contextualization is easily given here: 12:30am the night before grad school applications are due. The photo would be completely bleak, if the center figure of the student was not caught in a moment of laughter. The person taking the photograph is a close friend. The student in the photograph has (clearly) had some experience in arthistorical analysis. In terms of reception, the other half of the team records that: The image is a result of digital photo and the use of camera here serves as a register of the irrelevant. This new realism is condensed in the image of grad school application night. One can even feel the smell of old coffee in the room. The glance of the person is generating closeness to her insomniac night.
The context of this photo is the preparation for the act of teaching a class. The frame is dark, as all lights but a desk lamp are off. The grad student is reading a book, while watching a video; we can see her from the back. The perspective here suggests on the one hand intimacy, as the viewer is quite close to the student, but on the other hand also deep concentration. The person who took the photo seems to be quite close, or perhaps quiet. The context here is the fact that the photo-taker was about to go to sleep in the same room. The other half of this team records that this photo engages her on a very intense level, in terms of lighting and setting: the perspective of the photo suggests that one could very well draw closer and read over the student’s shoulder. Certainly the other half of this team has memories of similar situations that are vividly evoked by the composition of this image.
Now on to the text:
Pinney's main interest here lies in mass produced images since 1875 in India. He starts from the point, where Benjamin is standing, the rise of technology that alters the uniqueness of a piece of art. Along this line of thought, the author is talking about the reproduction of an aura of images, which is then not lowered by the process of mass production, but rather enhanced by 1) its spread and 2) its very real effect on people. The aim here is consequently not to narrate an external history reflected in images, but rather to trace that history engendered through the visual, or in other words how social engagements in political as well as religious realms are in fact affected by images. Pinney focuses here specifically on India pre- and post-independence. Though he claims that he does not intend to merely run through an art history of lithographic and printed media, he does follow a historical sequence in which images are intertwined with religious re-emergence and political struggle. This is perhaps a point of critique to which we’ll return later.
One point of interest in this text is his discussion of the notion of aesthetics as a space of contestation. Pinney rejects the absolute definition of aesthetics as proposed by Kant: a total rejection of the body of the observer and its denial by the artist. Rather he understands this as the type of aesthetics of Europe as part of the realization of the colonial project. He proposes to call this anaesthetics or dumbness of senses in contrast to corpothetics or the bodily engagement with images through the senses. Thus the images open a space of intensities free from the demands of closure of the discursive meaning. In addition the images he analyzes are performative in two senses: they generate a virtual space that claims realism against the regime of truth of coloniality and they engage the viewer with what is represented, the viewer and the god-image merge in a mutual glance. While it may appear as if Pinney is setting up a contrast between western and non-western, or formal and informal engagement with images and art, we think that he is trying here to contest the notion of anaesthetics altogether. However, the theoretical procedure set forth here versus the methodology applied to the images remains perhaps problematic, when we focus on his use of western analyses of composition and lines. His analyses of the corporate, colonial, counter-colonial and spiritual dimensions of his (expansive) archive of images are however both sound and aware of the heterogenous local publics for and from which these images are produced.

As a final point, we must admit that this text does not necessarily follow through on its trajectory: While Pinney certainly promises a new revolutionary method of dealing with the visual, the remainder of this book finds itself mostly following on the one hand a form of culturally contextualized art historical analysis, and on the other hand lacks a re-integration of the political/religious analysis with a) the theoretical approach and b) the ethnographic detail, which is only briefly addressed in the second-to-last chapter.

[14:51] luce: mhmm
[14:51] luce: yes
[14:51] luce: although
[14:51] luce: I would add a caveat because he makes it sound as if western engagement with visuals is not corporeal
[14:51] luce: which I would contest
[14:51] luce: and given to that the fact that he does execute an art history analysis
[14:51] luce: makes it a little problematic
[14:52] Ana Vivaldi: i agree but i think he is contesting the notion all together
[14:52] luce: yup that's cool then
[14:53] luce: are there any important points we're missing?
[14:54] Ana Vivaldi: yeap many i guess
[14:54] Ana Vivaldi: like india
[14:54] Ana Vivaldi: anderson and nationalism (i didn't like that)
[14:55] Ana Vivaldi: india's magical realism (this is not so cool either)
[14:55] Ana Vivaldi: xeno-real image
[15:22] luce: (how do I always end up doing this extreme postmodern stuff when I work with you?)
[15:42] luce: Mhmm, I don't know whether whe should add chapter by chapter
[15:42] luce: it's pretty long so far
[15:42] Ana Vivaldi: ok lets leave it there
[15:42] luce: sending it back to you then
[15:43] luce: yooohooo