thinking with your feet
fictionalism, embodied practice, and the fluidity of photography.
This paper introduces a photographic practice shaped by movement, collaboration, and critical inquiry.
Blending scientific fictionalism, archival research, embodied methods, and interdependent creative processes, it traces how photography becomes a site of negotiation between truth and fiction, history and reinterpretation, artist and collaborator.
Thinking With Your Feet traces a photographic practice built on movement, collaboration, and critical inquiry. Drawing on Ciro Giordano Bruni's scientific fictionalism — which positions every photograph as a constructed narrative rather than an objective record — the paper argues that fiction is not a distortion of reality but a necessary condition for fully engaging with it. Through five interlocking methods — scientific fictionalism, practice-based research, archival research, action research, and interdependence — photography becomes a site of negotiation between truth and fiction, history and reinterpretation, artist and collaborator.
The paper develops these methods through three case studies: Protected, which engages critically with colonial photographic archives and Māori representation; Monuments, which reimagines the female body as a structure of power and co-authorship, resisting patriarchal traditions of portraiture; and Portraits | Luminograms, which uses luminograms, vintage glass negatives, and mixed photographic processes to explore how memory of WWII concentration camp survivors is preserved, fragmented, and reinterpreted. Together, they demonstrate a methodology that prioritises process over outcome — adaptable, iterative, and grounded in the belief that photographic reality is a living fiction shaped by cultural, political, and ideological forces.
PUBLICATION
Janon, J. (2025). Thinking with your feet: Fictionalism, embodied practice, and the fluidity of photography.
DOI: 10.58054/mediadesignschool.28876103
scientific fictionalism . embodied practice . practice-based research . action research . archival research . interdependence . philosophy of lies . OUxPO
AI USE DISCLOSURE
I write a lot. In my own journals, for the pleasure of writing, and as a way to reflect on my thoughts and creative process.
Artificial intelligence tools were employed solely for linguistic refinement purposes, specifically, to assist with grammar correction and to enhance clarity of expression in English, which is my third language.
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