Visual Stories
The Week On EyeEm: Volume 40
By Jonathon Davison - 3 min read
Our weekly round-up of outstanding content uploaded onto EyeEm, each volume of The Week on EyeEm is unique - echoing certain details, social narratives, and creative techniques shaping our world. This week we are bringing you a thought-provoking curation and commentary from our Visual Lead, Jonathon Davison.
As an avid admirer of cinematography, I like to adhere to certain aesthetic values whilst curating the best of the week. I like to look for that specific tone that is so often shaded into cinema.
Alfred Hitchcock used to explore a cinematic device known as the MacGuffin. Essentially, this term was used to describe a seemingly meaningless object or item that, although pointless in itself, would eventually reveal vast enigmas surrounding one of his characters or plots.
This got me thinking about the MacGuffin in still imagery. Where do photographers hide their uniqueness and personality traits? Their secrets and their vices. Messages that are hidden in plain sight kept only for themselves, though gripped in isolation as a mystery for the viewer?
So, lens or frame. Mind or soul. Where are you hiding in your work… Where is your MacGuffin?
“Often the hands will solve a mystery that the intellect has struggled with in vain.”
— Carl G. Jung
