pher; but I hadn’t—I don’t like all o f Mapplethorpc. Hcncc I could not accede to that notion which is so convenienc w hen we want to talk history, culture, aes-thetics—thac notion known as an artists style. I felt, by the strength of my "invcstments," their disorder, their capricc, their enigma, rhat Photography is an un certain art, as would be (were one to attempt to establish such a thing) a science of dcsirable or dctestable bodies.
I saw clearly that 1 was concerned here w'ith che im-pulscs of an ovcrready subjcctivity, inadequatc as soon as artieulated: / like / / don't like: we all have our secret chan of tastes, distastes, indifferenccs, don't we? But just so: I have always wanted to remonstrate with my moods; not to justify them; still less to fili the sccnc of the text with my individuality; but on the contrary, to offer, to cxtend this individuality to a science of the subject, a science whosc name is of littlc importance to me, provided it attains (as has not yet occurred) to a gencrality which neither reduces not crushcs me. Hence it was necessary to take a lock for mysclf.
I decided then to take as a guide for my new analysis the attraction I felt for certain photo-graphs. For of this attraction, at least, I was certain. What to cali it? Fascination? No, this photograph which I pick out and which I love has nothing in common with the shiny point which sways bcforc your eyes and makes your
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head swim; what it produces in mc is the very opposite of hebetude; something morc like an inrcrnal agication, an excitement, a certain labor too, the pressure of the un-speakablc which wants to be spoken. Weil, then? Interest? Of brief duration; 1 have no need to question my feelings in order to list the various reasons to be interested in a photograph; one can either desirc the objcct, the land-scape, the body it represents; or lovc or have loved rhc being it permits us to rccognize; or be astonished by what one secs; or clsc admirc or dispute the photographcr s performance, etc.; but thesc interests are slight, hetero-gencous; a certain photograph can satisfy one of them and interest mc slightly; and if nnothcr photograph interests me powerfully, I should like to know whar thcrc is in it that sets me off. So it seemed that the best word ro desig-nate (temporarily) the attraction certain photographs ex-erted upon me was advenience or cven adyenture. This picture advenes, that one doesn’t.
The principle of adventure a Iłową me ro make Photog-raphy exist. Conversely, without advcnture, no photograph. 1 quotc Sartre: "Newspaper photographs can very well say nothing to me.’ In other words, I look at rhem without assuming a posturę of existcnce. Though the per-sons whose photograph I sec are certainly present in rhe photograph, they are so without existcntial posturę, like the Knight and Dcath present in Ddrcr’s engraving, bur without my positing them. Moreover, cascs occur where the photograph leaves me so indifferent that I do not cven bother to see it 'as an image.’ The photograph is vaguely constitutcd as an objcct, and the persons who figurę there