Martin Charvát – Elektro-fotografické imaginárno. Přízraky mezi fotografií a elektřinou

#1 min Tomáš Pospěch, Martin Charvát

29. 1. 2024

#46 TourismBook ReviewTechnology

NAMU has published the fourth volume of the Interface series, which is devoted to the relationship between photography and electricity in the 19th century. Here, electricity is viewed broadly: from the analogue recording of the light spectrum on a photosensitive layer to X-rays. Martin Charvát presents photography as a volatile and difficult-to-grasp medium. The overriding message of the book is that human existence is a simulacrum of the image. Such an image makes the primacy of death over life visible. "Those who are really alive are the images, since they are preserved forever in hardware, in a virtual untimely void, from where they are summoned at the touch of a button to replay a few scenes over and over again. They never get old, they are eternal."

 

Martin Charvát: Elektro-fotografické imaginárno. Přízraky mezi fotografií a elektřinou. Prague: NAMU, 2023

#46 TourismBook ReviewTechnologyPhilosophyAnalog DeathTruthVirtualTourism

Tomáš Pospěch

is an art historian and visual artist. He works as a teacher at the Institute of Creative Photography at SU in Opava and as a curator of photography at the Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague. As an art historian, he focuses mainly on photography and contemporary art of Central Europe. He has authored or co-authored more than 40 books, including Eugen Wiškovský, Viktor Kolář, Jindřich Štreit, Jiří Hanke, Jan Jindra, Gustav Aulehla, Jaroslav Pulicar, Pavel Vavroušek and a selection of Josef Koudelka's diaries.

Martin Charvát

works as an assistant professor at the Department of Media Studies at the Metropolitan University in Prague and is the head of the Center for Media Culture Studies there. Externally, he cooperates with the Prague FAMU. He focuses on media philosophy, French poststructuralism, and the (semiotic) analysis of pop / cultural phenomena. He is the author of four monographs. The latest is about the TV show True Detective (True Detective: A World in which Nothing is Solved). His fifth monograph on the topic of technoimagination in Czech poetism is being prepared for publication by AMU Publishing House (Miraculous Crossing: Karel Teige and Vítězslav Nezval). He is also co-author of three collective monographs and co-editor of two collective monographs. He has written more than two dozen academic studies.

#46 Tourism

It is interesting how much the world of photography is connected with tourism, in other words, how much the two domains may have in common. If we look at them through the lens of a mass phenomenon, they may even be similarly old. And it is in this perspective that a number of controversial questions arise in all their clarity. To what extent has tourism affected many of the coastlines and unique destinations that attract tourists? And to what extent does photography influence our perception of the places we visit?

Josef Koudelka – Ruins

#2 min Tomáš Pospěch, Josef Koudelka

Josef Koudelka – Ruins

#46 TourismProfileHistory

What will Prague or New York look like in a thousand or two thousand years? My aim here is not to contribute to the dystopian genre, so popular today. But we do have a sufficient historical experience of the emergence and demise of civilizations. It is therefore not so hard to imagine that where New York City used to stand, waves will beat against the remaining concrete foundations of a few skyscrapers and Prague too will be reduced to the ruins of a few of the most significant buildings – if the city isn’t entirely abandoned, that is. Without depicting these scenes directly, such notions might follow from Josef Koudelka’s newest photographic series, titled Ruins.

Food Served to the Camera

#8 min Tomáš Pospěch

Food Served to the Camera

#42 FoodHistoryEnvironment

The ubiquity and primary biological need for food predetermine that food has undoubtedly been photographed by every photographer at some point. Furthermore, "gourmet pictures" enjoy great popularity nowadays. According to surveys, they are among the most liked pictures on Instagram and food bloggers are becoming "celebrities", bringing here joy, there wrinkles to waiters. There is a growing interest in the origin of ingredients, food blogs multiply, reality cooking shows are on TV, and restaurants with an open view of the kitchen pop up increasingly often. We are experiencing a turn in thinking about the appearance of our food and forms of eating.