Looking at a Photograph

This chapter draws on a photograph by the eminent Hungarian-American photographer André Kertész (1894–1985) to point toward a phenomenology of aesthetic encounter. This photograph is Kertész’s frequently published 1928 image of Meudon, a Parisian, working-class suburb. Drawing on my own interpretive experience of the photograph as well as student responses, I delineate a continuum of lived encounter ranging from partial seeing to deeper aesthetic insight. Making use of the progressively intensive designations of philosopher Henri Bortoft, I highlight a spectrum of aesthetic experience that extends from limited assimilation to a more comprehensive and engaged participatory understanding.