Blow Up assignment

Contrast: Photos vs. Writings

Examples of contrast:

A)
“like and photo, where nothing is missing” (126).
“guilty of making literature, of indulging in fabricated unrealities” (124).
The contrast made here is that photographs are all seeing, they cannot be fabricated, whereas writing can be created from nothing.

B)
When describing taking the photo the narrator states, “I was satisfied with myself” (127).
“I was unable to find a way to say in food French what Jose’ Norberto Allenda was saying in very good Spanish” (127). When one is attempting to accomplish a task, such as translating a piece of literature, it is frustrating when the task is failed. This is contradictory to his satisfaction from taking the photo.

C)
The narrator realizes that photos are very easy to understand and lack confusion, stating, “we look at a photo from the front, the eyes reproduce exactly what position and the vision of the lens” (126.)
The narrator speaks of a man with a paper that he has been pretending to read. He describes the man as having “the grimace that twisted his mouth askew, it covered his face with wrinkles” (125). The man was confronted with reading a paper and although he was not actually reading it, he is described as a wrinkled. Wrinkles can often be formed by confusion, thus the mere presence of writing is symbolized by the confusion on the man’s face.



Thesis:
Photography and writing are both forms of art, but the symbolism and understanding of each can contrast one another.