Photo Synthesis: Authoring Our Lives in the Age of Instagram –LARB

I believe that we have, somewhat recently, crossed an invisible threshold, where the medium has gone from being primarily a means of recording reality to a force that informs it. More specifically: We used to go places and photograph what happens; now what happens is a function of what we photograph.

Another way of thinking about it: Photography’s role in culture has gone from curational to creational.