So-called “realist” photography does not capture the “what is.” Instead,…

So-called “realist” photography does not capture the “what is.” Instead, it is preoccupied with what should not be, like the reality of suffering for example.

Sourced, Photography, or the Writing of Light
(2000)

Other Jean Baudrillard Quotes

The close-up of a face is as obscene as a sexual organ seen from up close. It is a sexual organ. The promiscuity of the detail, the zoom-in, takes on a sexual value. (p. 43) - View Quote Details on The close-up of a face is as obscene as a…
The need to speak, even if one has nothing to say, becomes more pressing when one has nothing to say, just as the will to live becomes more urgent when life has lost its meaning. (p. 30) - View Quote Details on The need to speak, even if one has nothing to…
For nothing can be greater than seduction itself, not even the order that destroys it. - View Quote Details on For nothing can be greater than seduction itself, not even…
Challenge, and not desire, lies at the heart of seduction. (p. 57) - View Quote Details on Challenge, and not desire, lies at the heart of seduction…
The only thing worse than being bored is being boring. - View Quote Details on The only thing worse than being bored is being boring.
Picturing others and everything which brings you closer to them is futile from the instant that ‘communication’ can make their presence immediate. (p. 42) - View Quote Details on Picturing others and everything which brings you closer to them…
Boredom is like a pitiless zooming in on the epidermis of time. Every instant is dilated and magnified like the pores of the face. - View Quote Details on Boredom is like a pitiless zooming in on the epidermis…
Seduction is the world’s elementary dynamic… All this has changed significantly for us, at least in appearance. For what has happened to good and evil? Seduction hurls them against one another, and unites them beyond meaning, in a paroxysm [sudden outbreak of emotion] of intensity and charm. (p. 59) - View Quote Details on Seduction is the world’s elementary dynamic… All this has changed…
The simulacrum now hides, not the truth, but the fact that there is none, that is to say, the continuation of Nothingness.( essay -”Radical Thought”) - View Quote Details on The simulacrum now hides, not the truth, but the fact…
Marxism is therefore only a limited petit bourgeois critique, one more step in the banalization of life toward the “good use” of the social! - View Quote Details on Marxism is therefore only a limited petit bourgeois critique, one…