|
ROLLING STONE IMAGES OF ROCK & ROLL |
|
Images can involve the elaborate construction of a persona, metaphor made visible, or they can simply be a minute on the street, an easy instant of posing and moving on, the photographic encounter forgotten the second it is over. The first type of image can entail costumes, historical journeys, a submergence of the self into characters, the evocation in the still photograph of an implied, ongoing drama. The other relies on the viewer's knowledge of the photographic subject; ignorance of the person being shot drains the image of all significance. But are those two approaches ultimately so different? A street is no less consciously chosen as a photographic site than a studio set -- even if it is chosen exclusively by necessity. Nor is it any less theatrical. Street clothes are not arbitrary; they are no more or less revealing or concealing of meaning than costumes. Neither is more or less a clue to identity. People smile or laugh in impromptu pictures, not necessarily because they are happy but because they are being photographed. They are playing a role -- the role of someone whose picture is being taken -- as surely as if they were on a stage.
|