Truth in Photography

This housewife may look the part of wealth and be in a setting of glamour, but she is still living in oppression and inequality. The way the domestic objects are arranged directly leads viewers to where the model's eyes are looking which seems to be a very important part of the image. There's a sense of sadness, a sense of anger, a sense of death to her stare, in a way of a woman being treated as a product. Miles Aldridge is telling a story here by transferring his ideas using the camera as a tool to manipulate reality. The model is real, the props are real, but the story? .
             This image also reminds one of a documentary, as it was meant to be seen as it is not posed; the model is not looking into the camera, she is doing the housework. We recognize this image, as we all do it everyday. However, the fact that this is a confirmed fashion image means to prove that everything is styled from the clothes to the use of lighting; everything is highly staged from the smallest details. Berger once said that "the invention of the camera changed the way men saw. The visible came to mean something different to them" (Berger, 1972)(3). This leads to questions about reality. Everything that exists in the photograph is real, so is this picture real? If not then why is this not real? From which perspective is it not real? What is the camera showing us here and is this showing everything or are some parts are hidden? Photographs are a way for human to communicate through objects and ideas. Barthes wrote, "Every photograph is a certificate of presence" (R.Barthes, 1981) (4). Those are very direct and heavy sentence to say that everything that appear in a photograph is real. From the technical perspective, it cannot be argued. However, a camera can only record what is in the frame; not like human eyes, the camera has a fixed focus on an area. It does not give the viewer the entire picture; what we can see are only parts that was chosen by the photographer, parts which he or she found important, beautiful or interesting.