Where is the truth of the photograph to be found? Does photography present what is really there? These questions are not naïve. They emerge the moment at which the mirror no longer functions as the ideal for presentation. What they are asking becomes even more demanding once it can be conceded that part of what constitutes the real is absence. Whether it is simply an empty room that awaits, or a now vacant chair, or more dramatically absences caused by the history of barbarism, the problematic status of the presentation of absence exerts an unrelenting hold on the image.

Accounting for the reality of absence and holding open the possibility of the presentation of the real will be the opening concerns of this discussion. Holding the discussion in place will be the weave of questions that are named - named but not by defined - by what brings the real into connection with presence and absence.

The interlocutors for this Parlor discussion are: Andrew Benjamin, Jill Bennett, David Burns, Sam Spurr and Robert Sinnerbrink.