Monday 22 October 2007

How far is close enough?

What do these two images (first by Jonas Bendiksen and second by Susan Meiselas) have in common?






Well, believe it or not, both are pictures of somebody stepping on a puddle. I love the colorful and twisted image produced by Bendiksen, the sense of scale... but the first time I saw it I completely missed the girl in the bloody DEAD CENTRE of the frame stepping on a puddle. In this unreal image, a girl in an absolutely deserted street carefully lifts her foot towards the water. What if I had seen it directly, as if we were very close to her? Probably the whole aura of mystery and the game would have died. But what if I never got to see her? I guess I'm lucky to have the book, in which she's a lot easier to see that in this poor jpg...

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