Truth of the Moment & Truth of Reflection

In an informative article from Photovision Magazine entitled, “Truth of the Moment & Truth of Reflection,” authors Robert Hirsch and Greg Erf voice their opinion on the ideology of photographic truth. According to Hirsch and Erf, “the oxymoron known as photographic truth has never been a fixed entity; rather it results from an attitude of seeking and building reality from a particular viewpoint at a specific time.” The authors use a photograph by taken by Alexander Gardner in 1863, entitled, “Home of the Rebel Sharpshooter," to support thier opinion (photograph can be seen above). According to the authors, during the American Civil War technical limitations prevented photographic documentation of actual battles. Thus, "it was customary for photographers to create a representation, both in and outside of the studio, to produce a desired reality." Although with "Home of the Rebel Sharpshooter,"Gardner intended to portray the battle of Gettysberg, the photograph was actually taken two days after the battle. To "create his representation," Gardner moved the body of the soldier 40 yards from his final resting place, he added the gun (which in actuality is a musket not a sharpshooter), and also moved the face of the corpse to face the camera. The the photo is not a truthful documentation the battle, instead, "Gardner's war experiences guided his camera to bring forth an allegorical reference from a Norther perspective about the forlone loneliness of the Confederate cause, making such photographs not so much evidence of history as history themselves." Thus, the photographer's subjective perspective of the event takes presedence over truthful documentation. Gardner's experience is what is being documented, not the actual battle.
In the article, the authors even go so far as to claim that the discussion of photographic manipulation is a contradiction in terms. "Is not the act of photography a manipulation in space and time, a presentation of a particular point-of-view as opposed to an empirical fact." In essence, we can see that the very act of taking a photograph is an entirely subjective decision, with the photographer deciding what to shoot, what angle to shoot at, what to exclude from the frame and so on.