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Written feedback and learning points in orange

A well-written, constructed and ambitious essay. The questions you are asking are (too?) huge (yes too huge but see end of report for rationale for sticking with it) and you offer a genuine attempt to answer some of these difficult and pressing questions about the nature of perception and the difficulties of the shifting photographic (and beyond) landscape.

The specific examples of art work that you give to try to unpick your ideas are really useful for the reader and help to emphasis your philosophical points. I, for one, would have enjoyed more of these to help me get to grips with some of these ideas! I do plan to add more, including more of my own – the work is in development. There are some minor grammatical and spelling errors that I have circled that are easy to remedy. Thanks

I am left with a couple of critical points that you might like to address in your final draft, if you think appropriate.

 1 I know that you are specifically addressing photography (and at times the moving image) in the context of this essay but on a couple of occasions when reading through (I have scribbled comments in the margins if you can read my writing!) I felt that you were distancing photography from other modes of production that do not suffer from the same Cartesian problems (performance art, participatory art practice?). This is problematic because you are, in part, discussing huge problems, ideas and world views that if critiqued solely (or predominantly, at least) through the photographic lens, can lead to a falsely narrow view – the very thing that you are suggesting is problematic with the way that we (in the West) think about and represent the world. This is a good point – and I will find a way to underline the discussion could apply to various ‘isolated objects – i.e. disciplines’ within the arts. And, of course, to politics, academia, and economics – to a general mindset in the West. But, that due to my course, I am looking through the lens of photography (of the academic art sort), which as it happens, is particularly guilty of the charges laid. There is probably too much to say about the split in western consciousness (logic vs ‘feeling’) – rationalised in the Cartesian era, and eventually expressed in photography, hence the inclusion of Cassandra as a figure – so maybe worth finding a way. Photography (of the academic art type) often seems incredibly myopic. And whatever flaws it has in relation, are compounded by what comes across as a fragile ego and the subsequent manifestation of that, a horrible superiority complex – which leads to work that claims to be about universal issues but often seems about little more than its own insecurities.  

It may be that you haven’t emphasised your reasons for concentrating on photography in the essay (because you are studying on a photography course? See above). As well as continuing to be the most dominant form of representation for consumers, the photographic community all too often alienates itself from other modes of representation. This is not, unfortunately, as a way of creating an objective distance to help the debate, rather as a way of protecting itself from intruders as well as for commercial reasons (see above). Interestingly, the very people who seek to critique the medium from the inside (Hilliard, Arnett et al.), arguably do the opposite; the further alienate photography from a wider discourse?

 2 I say the following reservedly, wanting to avoid a panicked inclusion of unnecessary material, but: You have done well to avoid bogging yourself down with too much of a description of quantum theory but I wonder if there is room for a little more help for the uninitiated reader? I suspect a few tweaks here and there could shift this impression. There is also a very good bit from Barad where she stresses classical and quantum models do not describe two different worlds. They describe the same world but from different points of view/perspectives. I already identified I should probably make sure that’s in there somewhere.

 3 Does your conclusion adequately sum up your argument? Do you need to refer more to quantum theory here? Yes, I should. Or will this confuse rather than illuminate?

I agree with comments made on the document by hand that the conclusion needs to be longer. I will also delete the bits you say you got lost in – I have clearly been unable to describe myself properly there and am looking for areas to cut: the bits I can’t explain properly for lack of thorough understanding is probably a good place to start.

The main ‘flaw’ with the essay is that it is too big a subject to be dealt with in 5000+/- words. However, the issue is so pressing, so unbelievably important that the disadvantages of sticking with it are outweighed by the need. The hubris of the ‘single-authored’ hero mentality that dominates our culture has completely destroyed our habitat. Barad’s theory (which has been so important to New Materialism – a term I purposely didn’t mention in the essay as there were enough new words and categories to contend with) underpins a way of thinking that promotes the rejection of human (white/male/western) exceptionalism. Today, that is so pressing – and it cannot be stressed enough. As I write it, that mentality is being played out in the worst way possible. Perhaps my essay will not change many minds, but it will influence my circle of people and I have already seen some of these ideas have an impact on others. It’s vital that we all find small ways to shift the destructive mindset we Westerners have assumed is natural and fixed for too long.