A significant part of our contemporary communications infrastructure is dedicated to the circulation of photographs of cats, apparently because of the way they make us feel. But cats themselves have…

A significant part of our contemporary communications infrastructure is dedicated to the circulation of photographs of cats, apparently because of the way they make us feel. But cats themselves have an exceptionally limited range of expression, so where are these feelings coming from? Julia Tanner explores this paradox. In fact, the question of how emotions are bound up with images can be confusing. Looking at photographs can prompt an emotional reaction and photographs can be made to convey a feeling. Photographs might depict an emotion. But are these the same thing? Is showing an emotion the same as sharing it? David Bate disentangles these different relationships between pictures and the way we feel about them. Wiebke Leister’s research explores the intersections between photography and theatre and what this might bring to bear on questions about authenticity and artificiality. In recent research Leister has become interested in Japanese Noh Theatre and how she might transpose non-representational elements from it to develop an understanding of photography that is not characterised by being a representation or imitation of the real world. Leister’s portfolio comes out of the performance of Echoes and Callings, which was performed at the Noh Reimagined festival. Noh drama is the oldest surviving form of Japanese theatre in which one all-encompassing emotion dominates the main character. Masks are only worn by the main character and when they put them on their individuality recedes and they become nothing but the emotion to be depicted. In the festival Leister performed a live photo collage projection, with sound improvisation. The work proffers a counter-narrative to the patriarchal construction of women in Noh drama and studies visualisations of female demons.