FAUXTOGRAPHY

Lying with Photographs:
An Analytical Framework

UCR ARTS: California Museum of Photography
Curated by Douglas McCulloh

Lies are ever-present in human affairs, a tidal flow that rises and falls. Recently, lies have been at flood stage and photographs are central to the surge.

Statements, strings of words, are readily seen as assertions, claims. Photographs, on the other hand, are presumed to be a form of evidence. In Susan Sontag’s phrase, we assume photographs are “directly stenciled off the real.” Consequently, photographs, even dubious ones, carry credence in a way that words do not. Moreover, writes theorist Lev Manovich, “the reason we think that computer graphics technology has succeeded in faking reality is that we, over the course of the last hundred and fifty years, have come to accept the image of photography and film as reality.” For these main reasons and scores of lesser ones, photographs are ideal vehicles for lies. (Read More)

Additional Notes:
Sources for the Specimens
Mongrels and Crossbreeds
On the Nature of Lies
Marvels and Magical Beliefs
Precursors
On Abundance

1. Manipulated (Read More)
1.1 Fog and Pestilence
  1.2 Don’t Believe Your Lion Eyes
  1.3 Wriggling, Writhing, and ‘Rithmatic’
  1.4 The Case of the Body Double
  1.5 Failed Photoshop’s Peak Point
  1.6 Face Reality
  1.7   ‘Triple-washed & Sanitized’

2. Manufactured (Read More)
2.1   Cross Purposes
2.2 Political Theater
2.3 Asleep at the Real
   2.4 Expect the Wurst
2.5 Black and White
2.6 The Real Thing. Perhaps.
2.7 Elongated
2.8 In Space They Can’t Hear You Lie
2.9 Cute Overload
2.10 Dead Real

3. Recontextualized (Read More)
3.1   Blue-eyed Boy
3.2 A Glowing Future
3.3 Blowing Smoke
3.4 This Many Pictures...
3.5 Targeted
3.6 Costume Drama
3.7 Fish Story
3.8 Extracting the Truth
3.9 Secrets Serviced
3.10 Against the Wall
3.11 Commemoration

4. Timeshifted (Read More)
4.1 All the Rage
4.2 Catnip
4.3 Time Travel
4.4 Masquerade
4.5 Beach Pathology

5. Extracted (Read More)
5.1 Chapter and Verse
5.2 Whitewashing
5.3 The Case of the Melting Cars
5.4 Deadly Serious
5.5 Striking
5.6 Smell a Rat

6. Mirrored (Read More)
6.1 Orange Appeal
6.2 Crouching Panther, Hidden
Photoshop
6.3 Fool’s Gold

7. Denied (Read More)
7.1 Kidding
7.2 Pregnant with Meaning
7.3 A Lot to Learn
7.4 Out to Sea
7.5 Vial Lies

© UC Regents 2022

Vial Lies

Fact sometimes stares you right in the face. Brush away the lies and accept the real.

The Claim
A vial of AstraZenica Covid-19 vaccine (ChAdOx1 nCoV-19) was photographed on March 15, 2020. The date is right on the label. March 15 is exceedingly early in the pandemic—before the vaccine existed. Thus, the photo is fake and the vaccine a hoax.

The Lie
The photograph is genuine, the date real. The explanation is simple: the image shows the vaccine in development. In fact, AstraZenica Covid-19 vaccine research launched in January 2020. Early doses were in production by February and clinical trial recruitment commenced in late March. This dose is among those produced for trials. The photograph is a still frame pulled from Sky UK; the footage came to them on April 23, 2020.

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