Photography Changes Everything Response

Reading essays like this often make me nod my head in agreement, but then what? I hit the last page and I find myself saying “aaand?...” “Photography Changes Everything” notes some important things, but in my opinion they are arguments that hardly even needed to be noted, unless it was being read by someone who truly believed photography wasn’t an expansive, ever-changing, process which affects all manners of life. Heiferman discusses how big and important photography is, but just because it is big and important doesn’t make those thoughts original or even necessarily interesting. Ask a freshman in high school to think of all the ways photography is used and how it affects them and I think you’ll get a less eloquent version of this essay.

            Maybe I am being callous, but I do not find much to respond to in this essay other than a bland general agreement with its statements. If this were a preface for a longer work than informed the reader of all the oddities of specific photography jobs—like the example of the thermal parking lot images—or the areas of photography pushing the limits of technology, I am sure I would be more positive. However, just providing a couple examples to illustrate things I already know leaves me a little rant-y. Maybe I’ve been made harsh by expectations of clear and original arguments from Art History essays and persuasive papers being graded by persnickety English professors, or maybe I am just looking at it in the wrong light, but I don’t feel like my knowledge or mindfulness has been broadened by Heifermans work.