The Commodification of Human Relations

In pages 221-239 of Liz Wells’ “Photography: a Critical Introduction”, she spoke about how the style and context of photography defines the meaning it has to society. Wells explains that there are “three possible readings of a photograph”, “Dominant, negotiated, and oppositional”. Dominant is when the viewer understands the message that the photographer intended, negotiated is when an image includes “irrelevant” elements to communicate it’s message but the message is still understood, and oppositional is when the image is “In total conflict with the meaning”, and does not communicate effectively with the viewer. These three possibilities define good and bad advertising in the the world of photography. 

In the case of advertising, all photographers use specific techniques in both the way in which they take their photographs and dress and pose their models, to achieve a certain “look” and message. This defines the photographers as artists in a sense, but also allows communication of many false messages. This issue is especially present in fashion photography, where as Wells puts it, the photographers create a perfect and fantastical world of expectations that real life cannot live up to. This effects women in more cases then men because “men look at women and women watch themselves be looked at”. An issue that has come up with photographing women for clothing and makeup commercials is the “fragmentation” of the female body. Wells states that since Picasso first began dividing up the female figure into separate pieces, photographers have followed suit, showing just legs, lips, ect. This technique is degrading to women and portrays them as objects of desire rather than human beings. It is ironic that prior to the 1970’s most makeup adds showed a woman’s entire body and now in a world where woman supposedly have equal rights and value, they are being sold as images of lustful desire. Unrealistic standards in the fashion industry have driven many women and girls to become anorexic, and resulted in death for many. The photographer holds great power over their audience, manipulating them in sometimes harmful ways.