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Photograph
is also known as ‘light-writing’ and therefore can be ‘read’.
Reading of photograph has evolved over time in relation to the language of
painting and literature, especially in terms of symbolism and narrative
structure
The photograph achieves meaning through a language of codes that involves
its
own visual grammar. Whenever we critically look at a photograph we
are
engage in reading the correctness of visual grammar and rank a
photograph
as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ photograph
Since photography is essentially for the sighted, we do not know how to
‘read’ a photograph by the visually impaired. Use of ‘non-visual’
senses by the visually impaired make their photographic work distinctly
different from
that of the sighted
Photography by the visually impaired open up a critical gap between what
we
‘see’ in the photograph and what we are suppose to ‘read’
To read a photograph by the visually impaired, one has to penetrate beyond
the surface of the photograph to understand the uninhibited relationship
between the visual world and non-visual photographer. Both play and
conflict of conscious and unconscious, present and absence, sure and
unsure experienced by the visually impaired while taking of photographs
bring up surprisingly different ways
of looking at the world
Visually
impaired photographers are author of ‘‘new’ visual language
with
‘no’ predefined visual grammar, it demands new way of ‘reading’
with
openness of mind
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