Revija Fotografija št. 93, 94 / 2022: Gospodar

The master (slo. "gospodar") has been linked to his image since before the invention of the photographic camera - in coins, statues, paintings and other media - but photography seems to have both continued and complicated the relationship between master and image. As before, the master can stage portraits and public performances to secure his domination through the public circulation of his image or images. But photography's 'contribution' to the relationship between master and image was not only to increase the interplay between master and image. At least since the beginning of the 20th century, it became clear that photography could capture something else at the same time: the unexpected, the unintended, the excess that escapes control. Moreover, the massive proliferation of image-making in the early 21st century and the changing ecosystems of information and communication have meant that control over one's own public image has become a precarious process, largely dictated by the wider social 'apparatus' that generates images and by algorithmic logic. The age-old dialectic between master and servant seems to have been largely turned on its head - the master is increasingly the servant of his own representation, of his most shareable common public visual denominator, whether it is adored, hated or criticised. Is the master becoming more and more a servant of his own representation? Has this representation been emptied, has it become "merely" an abstract visualisation of power, divorced from any of the characteristics of the master? Have we entered a new age of the figure of the master without power or charisma, of the master who has no sign of dignity - the master who is only a master in the sense of political power, but who has none of the "great" visual signs of the historical figures of the past? The current issue of Fotografija attempts to answer the questions: what role do photographs play in the creation, consolidation or subversion of (images of) the lord? Do photographs consciously or unconsciously legitimise power or do they redistribute power in a wider social network of signs? What is their role in the subject's respect for power, in obeying the master's rules? Is domination through visual signs a necessary condition for social domination today, or is it just a sideshow?