La photographie et le récit du mal

Abstract

The French neurologist, Jean-Martin Charcot, linked his name to studies on hysteria. The documentation of his work at the Salpêtrière Hospital, in Paris, shows how any sign of emotional excess was recorded and classified through the photographic medium. These images provided the materials for the multivolume album Iconographie photographique de la Salpêtrière (1878). In the photos of Salpêtriere’s patients, the image takes over the disease. The photographic medium was not a neutral witness, but influenced the performance of hysteria. In years when photography seems able to unveil human character and to separate good from bad (as shown by the research by Bertillon and Lombroso), the photographic gaze is soon screwed on itself, seduced by the density of the images.