Returning the Gaze: Enfreakment in Disability Photography

This paper questions: who has authority over the disabled image? Exploring the difference between positive and negative representations of disability by able-bodied and disabled artists, I look at the impacts of photography on public and private perceptions of disability. This paper explores different genres of photography (medical photography, photojournalism, freak show pitch cards, and fine art photography) and the ways that these modes change the viewer’s understandings of what a disabled body looks like, examining in particular at the works of Diane Arbus and Joel-Peter Witkin. As a disabled photographer, I explore how these particular artists who are commonly perceived as elevating the disability community raise questions about agency and the able-bodied narrator. Drawing from disability theory, art history, and personal experiences, this paper argues for elevating disabled voices in art, and asks for carefully consideration of the role that photography has in shaping the way that we as a public understand disability.