Curations

What was exchanged ?

Why do we always feel a deep sense of resonance when reading family narratives or watching family films? What exactly have we exchanged through them? How can those trivial details expand into something universally human? And what about empathy in photography? When the lens stares directly at reality and confronts the pain of others, does it feel like part of your soul has also been taken? In staged photography, even if the photographer clearly doesn't care about souls and focuses only on the face, chest or legs, the subject and the viewer may still sense that the spirit has either been empowered or diminished. Between taking and being taken, seeing and being seen, what have we exchanged?