Studiegids

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Theories of Photography and Film

Vak
2010-2011

Admission requirements

BA-degree

Description

In this course we will discuss some seminal theoretical texts about photography, film, and video. In particular, we will focus upon essays that aim to address the medium-specific characteristics of each of them. In the case of photography, one can think of such issues as ‘that-has-been’ (Barthes), ‘memento mori/privileged moment’ (Sontag), ‘indexical icon’ (Krauss), ‘trace of perfect crime’ (Baudrillard), or ‘apparatus’ (Flusser). In the case of cinema, we can think of its initial definitions as either a ‘photoplay’ (Münsterberg) or as the seventh art (Canudo), the concept of photogénie (Epstein), the transition from a silent aesthetic to the coming of the talkie (Arnheim, Kracauer), cinema’s realist ontology according to Bazin, the introduction of widescreen processes (Barr) and the so-called apparatus theory (Baudry, Comolli). Next we will introduce video as a ‘reflexive medium’, a term used by Yvonne Spielmann to highlight that this electronic medium is often put to experimental and artistic use. In addition to the medium-specificity of photography, film, and video, this lecture series will also reflect upon the consequences of the digitization of these media. Moreover, we will shed a further light on the theories by discussing them in relation to primary material: mono-disciplinary photos, films, videos as well as mixed-media works.

Course objectives

What do the students have to know at the end of the course?
Course objectives will be made available on Blackboard at the start of the course.

Timetable

12 lectures (two hours) in first semester from September to December: timetable

Teaching method

  • Lectures

Test method

  • written exam with essay questions

Blackboard

Do you use Blackboard, and if so, in what way.

  • Course information (e.g. schedule of series and objectives) and course documents (e.g. additional documents for lectures)

Reading list

  • Reader

  • List of literature: to be announced (before classes start)
    A list of books, syllabi and/or articles; where they can be bought (syllabi) and if any literature must be studies before classes start.

Registration

Petra Jochems, secretary of Film and Photographic Studies
Aanmelden voor Contractonderwijs via: contractonderwijs

Contact

Peter Verstraten or Helen Westgeest

Remarks