Sharing is Caring: The Changing Nature of Photography

In our first lecture on Themes in Contemporary Photography, I was taken with the idea of 'sharing' and how this related to photography, and how the two have changed and evolved together. In the past, the photograph was a physical object that was passed around the hands of grandparents, aunts and uncles. Today, the photograph is 'shared' quite differently.

I was interested in the way we share photographs, and how this might all bottle down to social change, and therefore revolutionizing the social uses of photography and how we practice it. Obviously due to new developing technologies of the 20th and 21st Century, photography has become more accessible, more mobile, and more communal.

Photography has therefore now become very significant in the way in which we communicate. Instead of sending a message, we now send a photo (eg via snapchat) to represent a feeling or a moment in time. We can show and share it live, rather than explain it through words.

These ideas are the starting point of my project are ideas that I want to explore.