Author Description

<p><i>Failed Images</i> approaches photography in terms of its divergence from the reality it would claim to show. How does the photograph transform that which exists before the camera? A variety of factors influence the way photography constructs its images--not only the technical features of the medium, but also the conventions that have sprung up within it, governing the field from the most formal portraits to the quickest "snapshots." </p><p>Combining cultural theory with many case studies, <i>Failed Images</i> offers a different approach to photography, celebrating the medium's range of possible modes of image-making. In this book the photographic image is explored through what might seem to be its outliers--photographic practices that resist the presumed dominant approaches to the medium. These counter-practices include staged photography, blurred photography, archival photography, and under- and overexposed photography.</p>