Is not the most erotic part of the body wherever the clothing affords a glimpse?
Roland BarthesRead
I want a History of Looking. For the Photograph is the advent of myself as other: a cunning dissociation of consciousness from identity. Even odder: it was before Photography that men had the most to say about the vision of the double. Heautoscopy was compared with an hallucinosis; for centuries this was a great mythic theme.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote explores the notion of identity and self-perception in relation to photography and visual representation.
In this quote, Roland Barthes reflects on how photography can create a separation between one's identity and their conscious perception of self. He suggests that photographs allow individuals to see themselves as others see them, leading to a complex relationship with self-identity and the philosophical implications of observation and representation, particularly in the context of historical discussions about double vision and self-perception.
Themes
PhotographyIdentitySelf-PerceptionVisionConsciousness
In practice
Example use cases
In a lecture on the impact of photography on self-identity, one could use this quote to illustrate the philosophical implications of visual representation.
More from Roland Barthes
All quotes →If I acknowledge my dependency, I do so because for me it is a means of signifying my demand: in the realm of love, futility is not a "weakness" or an "absurdity": it is a strong sign: the more futile, the more it signifies and the more it asserts itself as strength.)
Roland BarthesRead
The gesture of the amorous embrace seems to fulfill, for a time, the subject's dream of total union with the loved being: The longing for consummation with the other.
Roland BarthesRead
The text is a tissue of quotations drawn from the innumerable centres of culture.
Roland BarthesRead
I think that cars today are almost the exact equivalent of the great Gothic cathedrals: I mean the supreme creation of an era, conceived with passion by unknown artists, and consumed in image if not in usage by a whole population which appropriates them as a purely magical object.
Roland BarthesRead
All those young photographers who are at work in the world, determined upon the capture of actuality, do not know that they are agents of Death.
Roland BarthesRead
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