The Musée de l’Elysée, Lausaznne, is running an exhibit titled, “We Are All Photographers Now!” on “The rapid mutation of amateur photography in the digital age”.
They’re displaying photographs submitted by individuals from around the world. If you have a web connection you can contribute. By simply uploading your photograph, it will become a part of the exhibition and displayed at some point on a gallery wall. If you don’t mind your work having been only displayed for about five seconds (I think it’s a random computer selection) you can tell everyone, “My work has been exhibited at the Musée de l’Elysée.”
They will send you a photo of your photo being shone on the wall.
In another crap shoot, your image may be chosen by computer to be printed and displayed for a week then archived in the permanent collection.
Whatever, it sounded like a few seconds of fun so I submitted three photos. Two out of a series I’ve been doing with H.o.p. and one of the Katrina aftermath.
The Child Experiments with a Bowl and Water
Digital photo with manipulation 2006
The Child Experiments with Being a Minotaur
Digital photo with manipulation 2006
Gulfport, Mississippi #9, November 2006. One year after Hurricane Katrina.
Digital photo with manipulation 2006
Why not? For at least five seconds times two, H.o.p. playing at being himself will be displayed on the gallery wall. So will some of the devastation left behind by Katrina in Gulfport, Mississippi. There may be someone standing there at the time who will see them. Maybe not. Whoever is standing there may look up and their imagination be caught and wish to view the photo longer, but it won’t be possible. For five seconds they will see either a boy with a bowl on his head, a minotaur, or Gulfport, Mississippi.
I put down in the description of the photos of H.o.p. that they were collaborative efforts with H.o.p. Which they are. I take the photos and do the post production work on them but he dreams up the subject.
I told H.o.p. about it and that they will send us a picture.
“Yay!!”
He was pleased.
“Thank you, mommy!” And he gave me three kisses. “Thank you, mommy, very much! That meant a lot to me. One of my art works will be on the wall of a museum. That makes me so happy. I’m so proud. Maybe someone will see it and like it.”
He was really thrilled even though it will be shown for five seconds. I hadn’t expected him to be THAT thrilled.
He does feel that these are also his art works, and well he should. And I think it also says something about our natures, that to some extent we feel we own our visages. I think it is more than just a matter of believing we own our faces.
The Musée de l’Elysée blog links to an animation by Chris Ware in which the story is related of how 5th or 6th graders all made fake movie cameras and everyone started walking around fake filming everything for fake news reports. This ended when there was a fight in the middle of the schoolyard and all the kids gathered around and filmed the fight, but no one stepped in to help or went for help. They just filmed. It’s stated that just holding the camera made the people behave differently and do things they wouldn’t normally do. Is that true? H.o.p. and I have been talking about it today.
The exhibit began in February and runs through the middle of May.
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