picturetom ®

During the Weimar Republic, the foundation was laid for today’s representation of photographs in illustrated mass media. The individual photograph was replaced by the reportage (series of related pictures). The reportage was/is pivotal in shaping the character of magazines and the reader’s world view. On the one hand, the reader was provided with an illusionary world with the tenor

“look, the world is good, life is worth living”.

On the other hand, the prejudices of the individual and his/her position in society were strengthen by depriving him/her of fringe groups, crimes, etc., This gave him/her the ability put up boundaries to others,

‘I am better, more beautiful…. than the other ones’.

In conclusion, one can determine that photography, on the basis of social conditions and a specific historical process, is fixed in human consciousness as an everyday occurrence (a form of mass communication). This development applies to the producer’s side (use of the camera): from the expensive and hard to use Daguerreotype, to the cheap, easy to use small picture camera which allows snapshots, especially in private settings; and to the side of the recipients: from the photographic art object and unicum, through to omnipresent media and advertising. At the same time the production and use of photographs are related, and mutually bring each other about.
Without the (historical) learned and arranged use of photographs, production on today’s scale would be unthinkable: By constantly holding a mirror of the world in front of the viewer, photography also brings out the viewer’s desire to take personal possession of this world.