Interviews From Phosora

Yuju Park

1. Out of the photos you took today, is there a photo you liked? 

I remember a photo of another participant with a visual impairment, taken from behind. They were holding a camera and taking pictures.

2. What thoughts/feelings came to mind while you were shooting?

I wanted to capture the process of a visually impaired person feeling the subject through sound, smell, and touch, imagining the subject and the angle through someone else’s description, and then thinking, planning, and imagining how the photo might change depending on the position of the hands and body or the way the camera is operated.

3. How did you use your sensors, like your hands or feet, to capture the photos?

To a visually impaired person like me, an object that they haven't touched with their hands or stepped on with their foot is just as much in the darkness as a subject that has not yet been photographed. Only after it has been photographed does it shine light and remain in the photo; similarly, only after a visually impaired person touches a subject with their hands and recognizes that they are there can they keep the moment in their memory like a photo. In that way, a photo that a visually impaired person has taken after touching it with their hands or stepping on it with their foot is the very scene the person has "seen." Even if the focus is off or the angle is awkward, that in itself holds the feeling of a faint touch or a slightly unsteady walk. 

4. What emotion do you hope the viewer of your photos will feel?

I hope the viewers will close their eyes for a moment and imagine they are holding a camera. To picture the scene before them, and using that imagination to take the photo with their camera. I hope that imagining the scene, its composition and feeling, not through the camera’s viewfinder but with their eyes closed, can be a way to experience how a visually impaired person pictures the world.

5. What does the world you have expressed through the camera look like? How are your sensory experiences reflected in it? 

I believe there’s no sense better than sight when it comes to taking photos. But for people with visual impairments, the world they capture through photographs may stay as memories more than images. When we look back at each photograph, we hear its description from others, which allows us to recall the space, time, and feelings from when the photo was taken, and share those memories with others.

These days, photography has become so familiar and taken for granted that people with visual impairments can easily be left out. But even if the photos are imperfect or blurry, I think they can still serve as a way to connect, to preserve moments of life and the emotions of the time the photo was taken, and communicate with sighted people. 

Perhaps that’s the kind of world that exists within the photos taken by visually impaired photographers: a world filled with the sound of birds hidden in trees, the scent of rain-soaked earth, the damp touch of a bench, and the voices and laughter of the people who shared those moments. I hope to find that kind of world in my own photographs.

In-sang Hwang

1. Out of the photos you took today, is there a photo you liked? 

I realized that when I hear a sound and take a photo in the direction it’s coming from, I could capture something special, a photo that stays in my memory. That’s why the photos I remember most are the ones I took when I could hear lots of birds singing, and the ones I took while listening to the sound of running water. 

2. What thoughts/feelings came to mind while you were shooting?

I would just point the camera lens in the direction of sound and press the shutter. When the sound of the shutter blended with the chirping of birds or the flow of water, I remember wondering what that might feel like. I wasn’t really thinking much about whether the photo would come out well or what it would look like. My approach was more through sound, through my ears. I found it fascinating to think about the balance between the sound of birds and the click of the shutter, and the way the sound of nature and mechanical sounds came together to create something unique.

3. How did you use your sensors, like your hands or feet, to capture the photos?

Since I’m completely blind, it’s actually quite hard for me to understand what it means for a photo to ‘capture a feeling.’ But the tactile sensations I’ve experienced through my hands or feet are deeply etched in my memory, so I like to think that maybe the lens was able to express some of those feelings in its own way. 

4. What emotion do you hope the viewer of your photos will feel?

I just hope the viewers would feel that the photos turned out well. That’s enough for me. When I was taking pictures, people often told me things like, ‘This part got cut off,’ or ‘It only shows the upper body,’ or ‘It’s just the head.’ I realized that even a slight change in angle can make a big difference. Since I’m not relying on sight, some photos might have come out a bit shaky, but I hope the viewers will think that, for a completely blind person, the results are pretty good. 

For example, when I took photos of water, I found that when the water ended up in the center of the frame, it somehow felt like the best shot. Of course, people who can see might think differently as they can see the background or how things look visually together, but for me, when the subject was right in the center, I got this feeling of, ‘Oh, that’s pretty good.’

5. What does the world you have expressed through the camera look like? How are your sensory experiences reflected in it? 

When I talk about ‘sensory experiences,’ I think I mainly rely on the things I physically feel day by day, like the humidity in the air or the rain. Because of my work as a musician and performer, I’ve traveled to many different places in and outside the country, and I’ve realized that every space has its own kind of resonance. The echo changes depending on people’s voices, and it also feels different depending on the number of people there. So I think I paint the world through those kinds of feelings... the shifts in sound, the weather changes I can sense physically, and the feelings that come from people’s personalities.

6. What does 'sight' mean to you?

I’ve heard that for most people, especially men, more than 70% of their perception comes from what they see. That means I’m living without that 70%. That said, sometimes I wonder if my quality of life may have been much higher if I weren’t visually impaired. Even so, I’m not dissatisfied with my life now; I try to live with a sense of contentment. But I can’t help thinking about how much more beautiful and fascinating the world might be if I could see it.

Yujin Kim

1. Out of the photos you took today, is there a photo you liked?

I remember the blossomed flowers and the walkway the most. 

2. What thoughts/feelings came to mind while you were shooting?

The experience was different from a phone camera; it was much more colorful. The digital camera captured the flower bed and the walkways vividly, and the forest path also appeared as natural as a landscape painting, making the photo feel more precise and vivid. 

3. How did you use your sensors, like your hands or feet, to capture the photos?

I feel like not only the sense of touch, but even the sense of smell was captured in the photo! The raindrops forming, the damp soil, and even things I didn't notice myself were all caught by the camera, so I think the weather and scenery came through in detail. 

4. What emotion do you hope the viewer of your photos will feel?

Since the photos were taken on a day when it was drizzling, I hope the viewers can also experience the freshness and vitality of that moment. 

5. What does the world you have expressed through the camera look like? How are your sensory experiences reflected in it? 

I wanted the four seasons to be a metaphor for the world.