What I did this week | After Jeff Wall, Krauss and Barad

In a nutshell, this week was one where, after finishing the Jeff Wall reading group, I moved on to Rosalind Krauss and began to think, from the perspective of New Realism and New Materialism, that "perhaps photography updates philosophy."

The core of this consists of three things: Krauss's "Notes on the Index: Part 1", Tatsuhito Sato's "The Development and Possibilities of New Materialism", and Karen Barad's "Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning".

Here, I will leave my reading notes for this week in the following order: what emerged after Jeff Wall, why Krauss is interesting right now, where New Realism and New Materialism are hitting home, the fact that I am finally able to reach the long-standing problem of "modernity," and which book I will move on to next.

1 | After Jeff Wall, came Krauss

The Jeff Wall reading group has ended, and next is Rosalind Krauss's "Notes on the Index: Part 1."
Reading photography theory for the first time in a while is, as expected, interesting.
What is different from the past is that instead of just being overwhelmed by difficult writing, I have become able to read it within the flow of the era and photography, thinking, "Ah, this era was paying attention to this."
Arguments that were just dots before are now gradually becoming visible as lines.
That sense of progress is, for the first time in a while, a happy one.

2 | Not seeking a "solution" for photography, but as something that updates the side of philosophy

What I find interesting right now is not philosophy that seeks a "solution" for photography.
Rather, it is the opposite; I am more interested in whether I can read photography as a circuit through which photography itself updates the side of philosophy.
I am not calling on philosophy to define what photography is, but rather, because photography exists, philosophy is forced to rethink itself.
I think to myself that I have finally reached the point where I can read photography theory in that way.

3 | The entrance to New Realism and New Materialism

That is why New Realism is interesting.
This week, I was repeatedly reading Tatsuhito Sato's "The Development and Possibilities of New Materialism."
Just having one paper like this significantly reduces the breathlessness when entering difficult books. It feels like I can spread out a map first instead of just plunging into the mountains.
Thinking along those lines, I wonder if New Materialism is quite compatible with my own view of religion, or perhaps my view of the universe.
I don't have to discard things that dwell in places or arise between relationships, like Doshojin (road ancestors) or Genius Loci, as merely pre-modern.
I think that kind of sensibility was there in me from the beginning.

4 | How to repair what "modernity" tore apart

I have spoken about this in the past as follows:

Reading this back now, I think this feeling was touching on something quite deep.
According to Barad, it might be possible to re-grasp this as a problem of Cartesian-Newtonian dualism, in other words, "modernity."
And what is troublesome is that this "modernity" cannot be unraveled by simple deconstruction, and even "postmodernism" as an escape is contained within it.
This has been a long-standing theme for me.
Taking photographs.
Being separated from things.
Swaying between being a bystander and participating.
Those things never quite connected well within me.
But this week, I had the feeling that I might finally be able to reach that "itchy spot."

5 | Read it now, or solidify the surroundings first?

So, what I am most worried about right now is whether to read Barad first.
I think it is a book that will probably cut quite deeply into the questions I have held for a long time.
There is just one point of concern: its thickness.
580 pages.
The thought is interesting.
But it is also physically heavy.
Even so, having read Krauss after Jeff Wall, and now seeing Barad after Krauss, I feel that this order is relatively correct.
This week, even though I was supposed to be reading photography theory, I noticed that the very foundation of philosophy was starting to shake a little.
It was that kind of week.

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