Differences between a photograph and the thing itsef
Dorethea Lange said, "Photography takes an instant out of time, altering life by holding it still." A photograph is a moment frozen in time forever. People are things and they are ever changing. If a portrait is really good, looking at it should give the viewer some insight to who the person is. Paul Strand said, "It is one thing to photograph people. It is another to make others care about them by revealing the core of their humanness." Even if it doesn't do this accurately the portrait seems to tell a story about the person in it. This makes a photograph (the portrait) very different from the thing itself (person). A person is ever chaning, while a photograph stays the same forever. The second the photograph is taken the person is duplicated in a sense, and is turned into a piece of art for many to view. One thing that photographs and people certainly have in common, is the way they are judged, picked apart, and analyzed by all who see. While a photograph and people have many layers, a person has the ability to speak for themselves, but in a portrait the photographer is given the ability to speak for the subject.