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shifts his close-ups of genitalia ftom the pomographic to the erotic by photographing the fabric of underwear at vcry elose range: the photograph is no longer unary, sińce I am mterested in tbe texturc of the materiał.

In this habitually unary spacc, occasionally (but alas all too rarcly) a "dctail" artracts mc.

I fccl that its mere presence changes my rcad-ing, that I am looking at a ncw photograph, marked in my eyes with a higher value. This "detaiT is the punctum.

use to mc

Ic is not possiblc to posit a rule of connecnorfTetween the ittulium and the punctum (when it happens ro bc there). It is a matter of a co-presence, that is all one can say: the nuns "happened to bc there," passing in the back-ground, when Wessing photographed the Nicaraguan sol-diers; from the vicwpoinr of rcality (which is perhaps that of the Operator), a whole causaliry explains the presence of the "dctail”: the Church implanted in these Latin-American countrics, the nuns allowcd to circulate as nurses, etc.; but from my Spectators viewpoint, the detail is offered by chance and for nothing; the scene is in no way "composcd" according to a crearive logie; the photograph is doubtlcss dual, but this duality is the motor of no "dcYelopmcnt,” as happens in classical discourse. In order ro perceivc the punctum, no analysis would be of any perhaps me mor)' somerimes woul"d,)as we

shall scc): it suffices that the image bc large cnough, that I do not havc ro study it (this would be of no help at all), that, givcn right there on rhc page, I should receivc it right herc in my eyes.

Very often the Punc tum is a "dctail," /.<?., a partial objcct. Hcncc, to givc examples of punc-tum is, in a ccrtain fashion, to give myself up.

-a

i I

r-

Here is a family of American blacks, photographed in 7926 by James Van der Zee. The studium is elear: I am sympathctically interested, as a docile cultural subject. in what the photograph has to say, for it speaks (it is a "good” photograph): it utters respectability, family lifc, conformism, Sunday best, an effort of social advanccment in order to assume the White Man’s attributes (an effort touching by rcason of its nalvetć). The spectadc interests mc but docs not prick mc. What does, strange to say, is the belt wora Iow by rhc sister (or daughter)—the "soląc -ing Mammy”—whosc arms arc crossed behind her back like a schoolgirl, and above all her strapped pumps (Mary Janes—why docs rhis dated fashion touch mc? I mean: to what datc docs it refer me?). This particular punctum arouses great syomthy-in-ntc, almost a kind of

. nnw-Yet the punctum shows no prcfcrcnce for morality or good tastc: the punctum can be ill-bred. William Klein has photographed children of Lirtle Italy in New York

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