Thursday 8th October 2020

From reading John Berger’s Uses of photography it has taught me ways of how I could understand a photograph and it has also made me question my collection. Berger says in his book that there are photographs which belong to public and private. “The private photographs – the portrait of the mother, pictures of a daughter, a group photo of one’s own team- is appreciated and read in a context which the camera removed it.” (Berger, 2009, p.55). private photographs should serve their purpose in a private domain. They are not for public viewing.

A photograph serves as a memento from a life being lived. “Yet, unlike memory, Photographs do not in themselves preserve meaning. They offer appearances – with all credibility and gravity we normally lend to appearances - prised away from their meaning.’ (Berger, 2009, p.55). Meaning which a photograph can be a trigger object for us to recall a memory, but the photograph doesn’t capture the memory, it can capture the essence of a memory. “Meaning in the result of understanding functions. “And functioning takes place in time and must be explained in time. Only that which narrates can make us understand.” Photographs preserve instant appearances’(Berger, 2009, p.55). Because I do not know the functions of theses photographs, I can not add or explain their real meaning: memories, narratives and history of them but I feel I can give some sense to their true identity by describing the subject matter within the photograph.

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