David Low, Picturing the Ottoman Armenian World: Photography in Erzurum, Harput, Van and Beyond

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The invention of photography in the 19th century was widely admired and acclaimed owing, among other things, to the camera’s perceived objectivity, based on its ability to depict reality far more accurately than previous means of representation. Such an attribution, however, overshadowed the fact that the camera is actually a tool of exclusion, omitting from its frame anything deemed unworthy of being seen or recorded. As a result, the clarity and truthfulness a photograph is accredited with...