Nearby Café Home > Art & Photography > Photocritic International

Get new posts by email:
Follow me on Mastodon: @adcoleman@hcommons.social     Mastodon logo

The Image of the Prophet

We kuffar who stand outside the faith do those moderate Muslims no service when, like Ben Affleck and other well-meaning white liberals, we parrot the lie that ISIS/ISIL is not an accurate reflection of Islam, when in fact it represents a fundamentalist form of the faith practiced by people who have studied the Qur’an and the hadiths, and who follow to the letter procedures and plans approved by high-ranking religious figures. It may not be the whole picture, but it’s unquestionably part of it. […]

Dog Day Afternoons: Bits & Pieces (9)

Discovering that leaders in the for-profit post-secondary sector have elbowed their way into art-ed (with photo-ed as a subset thereof) by forthrightly promising professional success — without my even noticing, much less taking a close look — leaves me feeling as if I feel asleep at the wheel. […]

Dog Day Afternoons: Bits & Pieces (8)

I don’t believe we all carry a dormant seed of Tourette’s syndrome — that the internet or the web somehow “caused” the troll phenomenon, demonically inducing paroxysms of antisocial behavior in previously benign and loving individuals. Instead, it seems this technology provides a safe space for the limbic system to strut its stuff — and the lizard brain in a small but energetic number of us has jumped at the chance to come out to play. […]

Dog Day Afternoons: Bits & Pieces (7)

Now we have a fresh example of the visual manifestation of systemic racism: The decisions made by NBC News, CNN, BBC, People magazine and hundreds of other news outlets to pair a formal, official portrait of accused murderer Ray Tensing, smiling and posing proudly in his police uniform with the American flag right behind him, with the mugshot of his victim — a glum Samuel DuBose in a white t-shirt. […]

Election 2016: Image World (2)

I have come to think of Donald Trump not only as exemplifying the Bad Clown but as embodying that nightmare’s apotheosis; he has turned himself into the Republic Party’s version of Steven King’s Pennywise. Indeed, these early days of the campaign resemble nothing so much as a remake of IT, with the rest of the pack banding together as The Losers Club, […]