The Impact Of Photography And Privacy In Public Spaces

Write an essay on the topic-

Melissa Miles argues that “photography continues to have the power to help us negotiate public life and plays an important role in questioning the way we think about and define our realities” (2015, 289). Do you agree with Miles’ assertion? Your essay should refer to at least two specific examples of contemporary street photography.

Increase in Restriction on Photography in Public Spaces

According to Melissa Miles (2015), street photography is circulating in ever more limited fields. The purpose of this essay is to disuses the broader impacts of increasing the restrictions related to photography in public places. There has been a significant shift in perception of photography and privacy over the years. It gives rise to the need of restrictions in photography in public places (Miles 2015). Talking photographs of any individual or a place without their consent is unethical and can lead to serious breach in privacy. For example, in February 2002, a case of unethical photography was reported when the photographs of male rowers from a Melbourne private school was taken without their consent. The photographs were although taken in public places, the permission for the same were not fetched. As a consequence of that, the website in which the photographs were posted was termed as gay website. The label of gay website positioned the teenagers as objects for homoerotic gaze which is not acceptable. The privacy of those teenagers was breached as they were being viewed as sexual objects. Thus it can be said that increase in restrictions of photography in public spaces is necessary to eliminate the inappropriate use of those photographs (Miles 2015). With the increase in the use of internet, it has become easier to circulate photographs thus increasing the threat to privacy of the individuals. Therefore, the need of a law that would restrict photography in public spaces is prominent.

With the fact that privacy is increasingly under threat with photography in public places, there is a need to reform of the laws in relation to photography in public space (Hawker 2013). With the increase in the concerns of public photography over the years, the current situation dominates the Australian photography controversies and in turn it demands chances to the privacy laws with greater restriction.  

In this context, the concept of contemporary photography is needed to be evaluated as well. The contemporary photography is a photograph of own time as compared to the image of the photography from an earlier period (Tucker 2012). According to the definition of the contemporary image, it can be described as a photograph that is taken in recent times and not in earlier periods. Contemporary art or photographs are those photographs that are taken since 1970s. The contemporary photographs of city are often found to be curiously empty which works against the more familiar image of a densely populated and a dynamic city. With the increase in population density across the globe, the advertised vibrancy of the urban experience is found to be quite rare. The figure below represents the contemporary photograph of an empty street.

Figure 1: Representing the empty street Photography

(Source: Hawker 2013)

As seen in the picture above, the contemporary photographs are empty and still which may not be true for all cases.

Along with the contemporary photographs, there are certain issues associated with the street photography as well. It is often seen that in street photography, the dynamic city streets which are filled with people and traffic appears to be deserted and plague stricken in the photographically recorded images.

Contemporary and Street Photography

Figure 2: Representing a Street Photograph of Earlier Times

(Source: Tucker 2012)

In this context, the history of street and contemporary photography is needed to be evaluated. With a rapid change in photographic technology, the concept of street photography quickly developed into a genre based on spontaneity (Lester 2015). With the advancement in photographic technology, the contemporary and street photography has seen certain changes over the period of time.  In the older contemporary and street photography, the photographers use to celebrate the density and the activities of the people on the street (Lindner and Meissner 2015). On a contrast, the contemporary street photography is extremely deserted. This can be related to the ethical issue that might arise with taking pictures of the individuals present at that place where the photographs are taken. This might be a primary reason behind the deserted street photography in contemporary photographs.

Thus, in this context the street photography ethics is needed to be evaluated. It has been observed that there is an increasingly complex link between photography, privacy and public, which calls for an urgency in the analysis of the situation. It is often seen that the photographers are frequently questioned about public or street photography (Coleman 1987). Although photography has become important and fundamental to social and public life, the issue associated with public photography has increased as well (Miles 2015). In relation to public photography, the right to privacy must be understood. The perception of privacy is increasing in Australia as it is been observed that the privacy is being eroded to an extent that it will be lost completely (Lindner and Meissner 2015). The broader impacts of increasing the restrictions of the photography in public places are needed to be evaluated since the privacy of thousands of people are in stake. That might be a reason behind the contemporary photographs of street are possibly empty which does not depicts its real state.

It is seen that street photography has emerged over the years. Since its inception, street photography has been transformed into an art in its own right. The perception of the privacy related to street photography is constantly under threats. From the beginning of photography in the year 1838, most powerful representation of streets and people traversing in the streets has been captured. However, this picture has changed in the recent years (Lindner and Meissner 2015). The contemporary street photographs are surprisingly empty which is because of the increasing concerns regarding the privacy of the individuals who have been clicked in the process of capturing the street photographs (Langmann and Pick 2014). Since circulation of the pictures and data is easier with technology and internet, the privacy of the people is in question (Hunt 2014). This is the reason behind the striking differences between the early photographic process and the modern contemporary photographs. The creation of the modern photographic records, intends to depict the liveliness of the urban life, which may not be possible if the privacy of the individuals are concerned.

Ethical Issues Surrounding Photography in Public Spaces

The photography from the mid nineteenth century has begun shifting its gaze towards the social human arrangements of men and women (Brooke 2014). Streets have been a good place to capture the sites of human interest by different photographers. The twentieth century photo journalists on the other hand explored the socially and politically significant urban subjects. For example, the pronounced photojournalist, Roger Mayne had embarked on a long term project of photographing the life of London’s working class streets during the year 1950 (Langmann and Pick 2014). However, in recent times, the efforts to make photography in urban public space sparks a host of conflicts regarding who is exactly entitled to photograph in such places (Lindner and Meissner 2015). This is mainly because of the growing public debate associated with laws and moral conduct associated with photography in urban public places. The fact that the photographs are circulated without taking permission from the individuals increases the security and the privacy risks associated with the same. The process of surveillance of public places and recording the same bore directly on the social body in new ways that raises the fundamental questions about the privacy issues of the individuals (Palmer 2013). However, surveillance is necessary and therefore any laws against it cannot be imposed.

Since the photographs that are taken on street can be put to various uses, the privacy concerns arise. Thus imposing restrictions on photography in public spaces is essential (Wells 2015). It is essential to impose rules for photography in public spaces as the photographers along with the users of photographers often face certain risks while taking or publishing the photographs that have been taken in public places (Lindner and Meissner 2015). Apart from the privacy of the individuals, the photograph that has been taken in the public places might contain certain copyrighted subjects. The photographers who infringe the copyright might require compensating according to the rules (Brooke 2014). Thus prohibition of photography in such places is needed to be enforced. Thus, if a photograph contains any object that is being protected by copyright, the photographer or any user of that photograph might be in great trouble. Street photography is therefore associated with the increasing concerns related to the protection of privacy of the individual and copyrighted subjects (Langmann and Pick 2014). This might be the reason behind the strange inversion of urban photography in terms of the photographs taken in earlier periods.

The increasing privacy concerns associated with the clicking and sharing of street photographs is the main reason behind the circulation of the photographs in limited fields. The increase in the restriction for circulation of street photographs aims in eliminating the security and the privacy issue associated with street photography (Tormey 2013). Limiting the circulation of street photographs has certain advantages. With the increasing privacy issues, the photographers have limited freedom to capture the essence of lively streets as the circulation of such photographs might give rise to data security and the privacy issues. With increase in the restriction to the circulation of the street photographs, the photographers will have the freedom for clicking the real images of street and not the empty deserted streets (Bate 2016). However, one of the negative aspects of increasing restriction to the circulation of the photographs taken is that, it limits its reach. Limiting the reach of such photographs eliminates the issues associated with the privacy of the individuals who is being clicked in process. This is a major reason behind the recent shift in perceptions of privacy and photography in Australia. This has fuelled the demand of reformed laws in Australia. Since the privacy issues are exploited the most in street photography, the reform in the laws and increase in the restriction of street photography is essential.

The History of Street Photography

Photographers should avoid the photograph prohibited Zones while filming or capturing the picture of the streets (Scott 2014). This will eliminate the privacy issues associated with capturing and circulation of street photographs. Illegal circulation of the pictures have increased over the years since with the advent of internet, the circulation of photographs across the globe becomes easier (Langmann and Pick 2014). There is no issue associated with the circulation of street photographs, but the contents in it may not be appropriate for sharing. Thus imposing restriction on street photographs can help in elimination of this issue. This is one of the significant reasons behind the circulation of the street photography in ever more limited fields. The restrictions are mainly based on public places (Lindner and Meissner 2015). Since the concerns for privacy dominate the other contemporary Australian photography controversies, the change for privacy laws with greater restrictions is needed. Ban on spy phones in public swimming pools is as example of the law reforms in photography (Freund 2017). The privacy concerns dominate the need for law reforms in street and contemporary photographs. The complex links between the photography and privacy is needed to be acknowledged so that the issues related to street photography can be acknowledged. The contemporary Australian debates associated with the photography and privacy is needed to be understood in relation to a much greater context so that the issues can be acknowledged (Goldenfein 2013). The perception of privacy in Australia is increasingly under threat which is needed to be acknowledged as well.

Conclusion

The report discusses the reason behind limited circulation of street photography. Increase in the restriction of photography in streets and public places are necessary for elimination of the different issues associated with the same. Privacy is concept that is difficult to define mainly because privacy is needed to be acknowledged. The report addresses views from different authors regarding the issue and concludes that increase in the restriction of street photography is justified. Therefore, it is seen that street photography is circulating in ever more limited field since it aims in protecting the privacy.

References

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Coleman, A.D., 1987. Private lives, public places: Street photography ethics. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 2(2), pp.60-66.

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Goldenfein, J., 2013. Police photography and privacy: Identity, stigma and reasonable expectation. UNSWLJ, 36, p.256.

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Tormey, J., 2013. Cities and photography. Routledge.

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