Derrida developing Barthes: prolegomena to the philosophy of photography

The subject of this article is photography in the philosophy of Jacques Derrida, which is addressed for the first time in his work in the context of Roland Barthes' book "Camera lucida". In this publication, we have attempted to reconstruct a dialogue between the two eminent French philosophers, focusing on the problem of photography and related concepts and topics. Special attention is given to Jacques Derrida's short text, "The Deaths of Roland Barthes," written shortly after the tragic death of philosopher. In Derrida's view, Roland Barthes' "Camera lucida" is a text about ghosts, which permeate its fabric and logic and form the category of "punctum." Referring to Jacques Derrida's text "The Deaths of Roland Barthes," we used the concept of ghosts to analyze the phenomenon of photography. The concept of the "ghost" is explored in a number of texts by Jacques Derrida, allowing us to reflect on what is not present, has no actual form of existence, but at the same time returns to us with persistent frightening frequency. This is why the concept of the ghost can also be used to analyze the phenomenon of photography. Photography creates a unique "flattened" time, a time loop of sorts, in which the separation between presence and absence that should form it occurs. Photography snatches out a fragment of the present, in which a certain fundamental absence is already imprinted forever, the present, which we can see only because of its absence. Photography confirms reality, but it is not a "living" representation of the past as it is often portrayed. Photography spectrifies its viewer by employing a specific type of perspective, which establishes specific rules of perception, and creates a new type of subjectivity with unique characteristics.

Derrida, Barthes, photography, punctum, camera lucida, ghost, death, memory, time, deconstruction