The Culture of Photography in Public Space

From privacy concerns regarding Google Street View to photography’s association with terrorism and the protection of children from sexual predators, over the past decade photography has become a complex terrain upon which anxieties about public space have been played out. Yet the photographic threat is not limited to the image alone. A range of social, technological and political issues converge in these rising anxieties, and are seriously affecting the practice, circulation and consumption of contemporary public photography today.

The Culture of Photography in Public Space critically examines the increasingly fraught culture of photography in Australia and internationally, and analyses its many implications for photographers and members of the public more broadly. The essays and photographs contained in this edited collection offer a new response to these restrictions, the events and anxieties that give rise to them, and the various ways in which photographers, theorists, politicians and members of the public are seeking to come to grips with their own place within this uncertain environment. By situating contemporary debates about photography in public space within a more nuanced account of the medium in its social, historical, political and creative contexts, this book aims to diffuse the photographic threat and provide an opportunity to more fully address the highly contentious issues at hand.