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a short reflection on consumerism| where to get STAMP| SUSI SAYS continued...| fully fashioned

A picture paints a thousand words, and hence is a good storytelling tool. As a photographer, the way I have chosen to present my work literally tells how an image is only an image. As quoted by photographer Richard Avedon, “There is no such thing as inaccuracy in a photograph. All photographs are accurate. None of them is the truth.” Yet taken into consideration is how most people would decipher an image looking at the content, what the image is expressing; a pseudo-paradox.
We are always in a need to buy more products, and better products, and cannot be freed from the habit of consumption. Have we considered buying earth friendly and fair-trading products? Unconsciously consumerism has become a catalyst for media, marketing, advertising, and plays a vital part in how we view and appreciate images. Consumerism had found itself widespread as a force behind technological development, for the need to improve and outwit each other, to be the reason of why a product must be purchased. It is because the product claims to be superior over another. Consumers are subsequently influenced by the claims of each individual product and the comfort, excitement, or entertainment it will bring.
Improving technology gave us photography taking over from painting and painted portraiture as a popular medium of expression. Soon celluloid films have replaced glass plates, and in less than a century after the birth of celluloid films, they are getting taken over by imaging devices, opening a mass of questions as to how long before this changes again and what the future holds for the photographer.
While the future is always uncertain, a photographer is always aware of the vulnerability and fragility of an image, it is but a two dimensional representation on a media.
Ethical consumerism is still the driving force behind the developments of recycling technology and is having a massive influence on art, design and images, therefore influencing photography and the way an image is captured. We just have to have more. We are slaves to shopping. We are slaves to material products. We are slaves of our own existence.