A Barthes Reader Camera Lucida Critical Essays The Eifel Tower and Other Mythologies Elements of Semiology Image-Musie-Text A Lover's Discourse Mythologies New Creal Essays On Racine The Pleasure of the Text Roland Barthes Sade/Fourier/ Loyola Siz Writing Degree Zero A BARTHES READER EDITED, AND WITH AN INTRODUCTION, BY Susan Sontag UD Hits ano Wane ew voRK 4 on of Fear, Sas end GrThe Photographic Message Tr pes phonograph isa message Comidred overall this sneap formed by a source feson, a channs f rans Ison and a point of xeon, The sure of emion the Sat ofthe nowapepe he proup of tecicine crtln of Som fake the pot, some 6f whom choos, compose, and trea i hile other al give it til,» capon and 8 ommenay. hep of rsepton she plc which eas the paper As forte chanoe of ransmision, th he sews erie or, more precy a complex of content mex Sopwith te potogrgh x Cntr and rounds conned By ie text te ile the caption, the layout an, Jn & more shan tw os nr wy ye ne ae the paper (i mame representa owed that can hey rie ig othe mag cy pang: + tograph can changes meaning spats from the Wey tonsertatve Laure tote Communit Lumen), These eeratons ae not witoot heir iportace for ican rade iy be sen that in he cate of he pres photograph he tree teat pars of the message Go not ell for the sine From Image-Muse- Tes, tranalsted by Stephen Heath (New York: Hild Wang, 1978) 194 The Photographic Message sa 195 ‘method of investigation. The emission and the reception of the message both lie within the field of a sociology: itis a matter ‘of studying human groups, of defining motives and attitudes, and of trying to link the behavior ofthese groups to the social totality of which they area part. For the message itself, how- ever, the method is inevitably different: whatever the origin and the destination of the message, the photograph is not sim- ply @ product or a channel but also an object endowed with @ structural autonomy. Without in any way intending to divorce this object from its use, it is necessary to provide for a specific method prior to sociological analysis and which ean only be the immanent analysis of the unique structure that & photo- ‘graph constitutes. ‘Naturally, even from the perspective of a purely immanent analysis, the structure of the photograph is not an isolated Structure; it sin communieation with at lest one other struc- ture, namely the text—ttle, caption, or aticle—accompany- ing every press photograph. The totality of the information is thus carried by two diferent structures (one of which is in- esti). These two structures are cooperative but, since their ‘mis are heterogeneous, necessarily remain separate from one another: here (in the text) the substance of the message is ‘made up of words; there (in the photograph) of lines, sut- faces, shades. Moreover, the two structures of the message cach occupy their own defined spaces, these being contiguous bbut not “homogenized,” as they ae for example in the rebus, which fuses words and images in a single line of reading Hence, although a press photograph is aever without a writen ‘commentary, the analysis must frst of all bear on each sep- aate stractue; its only when the study ofeach structure has ‘been exhausted that it will be possible to understand the men- rer in which they complement one another, Of the two struc- tures, one is already familiar, that of language (but no, itis true, that ofthe “literature” formed by the language use of the196 Ge A BARTHES READER newspaper; an enormous amount of work is still to be done in this connection), while almost nothing is known about the ‘other, that ofthe photograph. What follows wil be limited to the definition ofthe inital dificulties in providing a structural analysis ofthe photographic message. ‘THE, PHOTOGRAPHIC PARADOX ‘What is the content of the photographic message? What does the photograph transmit? By definition, the scene itself, the literal reality. From the object to its image there is of course a reduction —in proportion, perspective, color—but at ro time is this reduction a transformation (in the mathemat cal sense of the term). In order to move from the reality to its photograph itis in no way necessary to divide up this reality into units and to constitute these uaits as signs, substantially diferent fom the object they communicate; there is no neces- sity to set up a relay, that is to say a code, between the object and its image. Certainly the image isnot the reality But at Teast itis its perfect analogon and it is exactly this analogical pet~ fection which, to common sense, defines the photograph, Thus ‘canbe seen the special status ofthe photographic image: i i ‘@ message without a code; fom which proposition an impor tant corollary must immediately be drawn: the photographic message is a continuous message. "Are there other messages without a code? A‘ fist sight, yes precisely the whole range of analogical reproductions of reality ~arawings, paintings, cinema, theater, In fact, however, each ‘of those messages develops in an immediate and obvious way ‘a supplementary message, in addition tothe analogical content itself (scene, objec, landscape), which is whet is commonly called the style of the reproduction; second meaning, whose signifier is certain “treatment” of the image (result of the action ofthe creator) and whose signified, whether aesthetic (oF ideological, refers to certain “culture” of the society re The Photographic Message «a5 197 ceiving the message. In short, all these “imitative” arts com- Prise two messages: a denoted message, which is the analogon itself, and a connoted message, which is the manner in which the society to a certain extent communicates what it thinks of it. This duality of messages is evident in all reproductions ‘other than photographie ones: there is no drawing, no matter how exact, whose very exactitude is not turned into a style (the style of “verism”); no filmed scene whose objectivity is not finally read asthe very sign of objectivity. Here agnin, the study of these connoted messages has stl tobe carried out (in particular ithas tobe decided whether what i called @ work of art can be reduced to a system of signications); one ean only antieipate that forall these imitative arts—when common— the code of the connoted system is very likely constituted eb ther by 2 universal symbolic order or by a period rhetori, in short by a stock of stereotypes (schemes, colors, graphisms, gestures, expressions arrangements of elements). ‘When wc come to the photograph, however, we fil in pine ciple nothing of the kind, at any rate as regards the press photograph (which is never an “artiste” photograph). The photograph professing to be a mechanical analogue af reality, its first-order message in some sort completely fills its sub- stance and leaves no place for the development of a second- cotder message. OF all the structures of information, the pho- tograph appears as the only one that is exclusively constituted and occupied by a “denoted” message, a message which totally ‘exhausts is mode of existence. In front of a photograph, the feeling of “denotation,” or, if one prefers, of analogical pleni= tude, isso great that the description of a photograph i literally cf oferalnal sare Mien for Sarl comes dete re wihoat ny coe a shoud me soo ven fing oo (or trtacr anager ole ta rile of inte dn iinaiy prety ater ogc ake o's va) ‘ny conta nce Esper snc198 Ge A BARTHES READER impossible; to describe consists precisely in joining tothe de- noted message a relay or second-order message deve from a code which is that of language and constituting in relation to the photographic analogie, however much cae on takes tobe exact, a connotation: to describe is thus not simply to be ‘imprecise oF incomplete its to change structures, 1 sipity something diferent rom what sshown.* ‘This purely “denotatve” status ofthe photograph, the per {ection and plenitude of is analogy, in short its “ebjectvy has every chance of being mythical (these are the charactrle ties that common sense atibutes to the photograph). In actual fac, there is a strong probability (and this will be a ‘working hypothesis) that the photographic message too at leas inthe press—isconnoted. Connotaton isnot necesearily immediately graspable at che lvel ofthe message itself (iis, ‘one could say, at once invisbie and active, clear and implicit) but it can already be inferred from certain phenomena which ‘occur atthe levels of the production and reception ofthe message: on the one hand, the press photograph is an object that has been works! on, chosen, composed, constructed, treated according 10 profesional, sesthstie, ideological ‘norms which ate so many factors of connotation; wife on the ‘other, this same photograph i no only pereive, received, 4s read, connected more ot less consciously by the public that consunies if (0 a trations stock of sign. Since reery sign Supposes a code, itis this code (af connotation) that one should try to establish. The photographic paradox ean then be seen a the co-existence of two messages, the one without 2 code (the photographic analogue), the other wth a code (the “ae. o the treatment, or the "writing," ofthe shetori, of the photograph); structurally the paradox is clealy not the col te denn of dig bene, ving, ny, te dcp rose a ay one i ten ei eh ese eae that chloe es ef ga a ‘otis a very ew poe ‘The Photographic Message «a 199 sion of a denoted message and a connoted message (which is the—probably inevitable—status of all the forms of mace communication), iis that here the connoted (or coded) mer. sage develops on the basis of a message without a code. This Structural paradox coincides with an ethical paradox: ‘when one wants to be “neutral,” “objective,” one strives to eopy ‘ality meticulously, as though the analogical were a fare of resistance against the investment of values (such at fest ie the definition of aesthetic “realism”; how then ean the photo. ‘aph be at once “objective” and “invested,” natural ard col, ‘ural? Its through an understanding of the mode of imbrica, tion of denoted and connoted messages that t may one day be Possible to reply to that question. In order to undertake this work, however, it must be remembered that since the denoted _message inthe photograph is absolutely analogical, which i 9 ‘8Y continuous, ouside of any recourse to code, there is no nee to lok forthe signifying units ofthe fonder message, the connoted message on the contrary does comprise plane ctexpression anda plan of content, thus necessitating aver table decipherment, Such a deciperment would as yet be pre smature, for in order to isolate the signifying unite andthe ‘ignifed themes (or values) one would have to carry out (Perhaps using tests) directed readings, artificially vary tain elements of a photograph to sce ifthe variations of forms Jed w variations in meaning, What can atleast be done now is {0 forecast the min planes of analysis of photographie con. notation, CONNOTATION PROCEDURES Connetation, the imposition of second meaning on the pho- ‘ographic message proper, is realized at the diferent levels of the production ofthe photograph (choice, technical treatment, framing, layout) and represents, finaly, «coding ofthe photo, raphe analogue, It is thus possible to separate out various