The impact of Maurice Merleau-Ponty on existential photography lies in his radical redefinition of perception, embodiment, and visibility.
"Existential photography occupies a unique philosophical and aesthetic terrain where the image is not merely a representation of the world but a lived expression of being-in-the-world. This approach to photography draws deeply on existential philosophy and phenomenology, especially the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty. As one of the leading figures of 20th-century phenomenology, Merleau-Ponty’s emphasis on perception, embodiment, and intersubjectivity has profoundly influenced how artists and photographers understand the act of seeing and the ontology of the image. His philosophy situates perception as an embodied, lived process that reveals the intertwining of subject and world. Within the realm of existential photography, this view reframes both the camera and the photograph as mediators of presence and existential engagement rather than instruments of detached observation.
This essay explores the philosophical and aesthetic impact of Merleau-Ponty on existential photography. It situates his phenomenological concepts - such as embodiment, the flesh of the world, and the visible and invisible - in the context of photographic practice and interpretation. Drawing on his major works, including Phenomenology of Perception (1945/2012), The Visible and the Invisible (1964/1968), and his essays on art, the discussion examines how Merleau-Ponty’s thought transforms the photographer’s understanding of perception, temporality, and subjectivity. Furthermore, the essay considers the broader existential implications of photography as a mode of being that expresses the tension between visibility and absence, between the world that appears and the self that perceives.
Merleau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception and VisionMerleau-Ponty’s philosophy of perception centers on the idea that human experience is always embodied and that perception is the fundamental way we inhabit the world. Unlike traditional epistemological models that separate the perceiving subject from the perceived object, Merleau-Ponty argues for a chiasmic relationship: perception arises from the intertwining of body and world (Merleau-Ponty, 2012). The body, as he notes, is not merely a physical object but the living medium through which one experiences presence and orientation in the world.
This view has direct implications for photography. If perception is embodied, then the act of photographing cannot be detached from the photographer’s bodily and affective engagement with the world. The camera becomes an extension of the body’s perceptual field rather than a neutral recording device. As Sobchack (2004) suggests, visual technologies participate in the phenomenology of embodiment, revealing how the act of seeing is both mediated and lived. For the existential photographer, this means that the image does not represent reality from an external standpoint but expresses the photographer’s embodied encounter with existence.
Merleau-Ponty’s emphasis on the “pre-objective” world - the world as lived before it is categorized or represented - resonates with photographic practices that seek to capture presence rather than composition. Photography, in this phenomenological sense, becomes an act of returning to the immediacy of the world, to what is seen before it is understood. The camera participates in the process of revealing being through perception. As he writes, “the world is not what I think, but what I live through” (Merleau-Ponty, 2012, p. xvi).
The Flesh of the World and the Ontology of the ImageIn his later work, Merleau-Ponty develops the concept of la chair du monde - the “flesh of the world” - to describe the interweaving of the perceiver and the perceived (Merleau-Ponty, 1968). The “flesh” denotes the shared ontological substance of all being; it is neither subject nor object but the medium in which visibility and touch are mutually implicated. The visible world, therefore, is not external to the subject but a continuation of one’s own flesh.
For existential photography, this concept redefines the ontology of the image. A photograph is not a representation of the world but a trace of this intertwining of bodies and visibility. It captures, in a suspended form, the reversible relationship between the seer and the seen. The photograph thus embodies Merleau-Ponty’s notion of reversibility, where the photographer, in seeing the world, is also seen by it - immersed in its visibility.
This ontology aligns closely with existentialist concerns regarding presence, absence, and being. Photographic images often evoke the uncanny awareness of being both subject and object - of seeing oneself as visible in the world. As Barthes (1981) later articulates in Camera Lucida, the photograph is always haunted by mortality and temporality; it is an image of what has been and will no longer be. Merleau-Ponty’s “flesh” deepens this understanding by situating the image not in the realm of death but of ontological continuity - the photograph as a gesture of being interwoven with the visible world.
The existential photographer’s practice, influenced by Merleau-Ponty, thus becomes one of attunement: the attempt to reveal the world’s visibility as one’s own visibility. The camera does not dominate its subject but participates in the shared flesh of existence. As Walden (2012) notes, Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy of vision suggests a form of visual ethics, a respect for the visible as something that looks back. In photography, this becomes an ethics of seeing - an awareness that every image arises from the mutual encounter between the perceiving self and the world that reveals itself.
Embodiment, Temporality, and the Photographic ActMerleau-Ponty’s phenomenology also reconfigures the notion of time within perception. Experience, he argues, is not a succession of discrete moments but a continuous flow in which past and future are sedimented within the present (Merleau-Ponty, 2012). This temporal fluidity parallels the photographic experience, where each image captures not a frozen instant but a layered temporality. The photograph, as existential document, contains traces of perception - memory, anticipation, and the lived duration of the act of seeing.
In existential photography, the moment of exposure is not a technical instant but a lived event that condenses a continuum of perception. The image, therefore, testifies to both the passage of time and the persistence of being. According to Sontag (1977), photography transforms moments into objects of contemplation, but from a phenomenological standpoint, each photograph also contains the embodied temporality of its making. It reflects the photographer’s duration in the world—their bodily rhythm and existential awareness.
This understanding undermines the Cartesian assumption of objectivity in photography. The photographer’s body - its movement, position, and affective state - constitutes the very condition of the image. As Merleau-Ponty insists, “the body is our general medium for having a world” (2012, p. 169). In photographic terms, the act of framing, focusing, and waiting for light becomes an extension of the body’s intentionality. The photograph is not an external capture but a continuation of this bodily dialogue with the visible.
Thus, existential photography reflects the intertwining of perception and creation. The image does not emerge from a detached observer but from the body’s active participation in being. This insight has inspired numerous photographers - from Henri Cartier-Bresson’s “decisive moment” to contemporary existential photographers who emphasize the lived immediacy of presence. Even when unconsciously, these practices resonate with Merleau-Ponty’s call to rediscover the world as seen through the flesh of existence.
The Visible and the Invisible: The Depth of Photographic PresenceOne of Merleau-Ponty’s most profound contributions to the philosophy of perception is his exploration of the visible and the invisible. For him, visibility is not exhaustive; it always gestures toward what remains unseen, what is latent within perception. The invisible is not the opposite of the visible but its depth - its hidden dimension that gives meaning to appearance (Merleau-Ponty, 1968).
Photography, particularly existential photography, embodies this tension between visibility and invisibility. Every photograph reveals and conceals simultaneously; it discloses a fragment of being while evoking the vastness of what cannot be seen. As Berger (1980) notes, the photographic image is always partial, suggesting the invisible contexts of time, memory, and experience that lie beyond its frame.
In Merleau-Ponty’s sense, the invisible in photography is not metaphysical absence but the horizon of perceptual possibility. The photograph becomes a site where the visible opens onto its own depth—where the seen world gestures toward its unseen origins in the perceiving body and the world’s own opacity. Existential photographers often exploit this tension, creating images that invite contemplation of what lies beyond the visible surface.
Moreover, the interplay of visible and invisible reflects the existential condition of human life. To exist is to be both present and hidden, to appear within the world while remaining inwardly opaque. Photography, grounded in Merleau-Ponty’s ontology, becomes a metaphor for this condition. Each image thus becomes an expression of the human desire to grasp being while acknowledging its inexhaustibility.
Intersubjectivity and the Ethics of the ImageMerleau-Ponty’s later phenomenology places strong emphasis on intersubjectivity - the coexistence of selves within the shared world of the flesh. Perception, he argues, is never purely individual but always intertwined with others’ perspectives (Merleau-Ponty, 1968). The visible world is inhabited by other lookers, and our own vision is always situated within this inter-visibility.
This notion profoundly impacts the ethics of photographic seeing. In existential photography, the photographer encounters others not as objects but as embodied presences who share the same world of visibility. To photograph another person, then, is to enter into an ethical relation of reciprocity - a moment where the subject and photographer co-constitute the image through mutual visibility.
This insight challenges the objectifying tendencies often associated with photographic representation. As Levinas (1969) also warns, the image risks reducing the other to an object of knowledge or possession. Merleau-Ponty’s framework offers a counterpoint: to see another is to acknowledge their own visibility, their own capacity to see. The existential photograph thus becomes an encounter between visibilities rather than a capture of one by another.
In contemporary existential photography, this ethical dimension is often manifested through attention to the lived presence of subjects - through gestures, gazes, and atmospheres that suggest intersubjective exchange. The photographer becomes a witness rather than an observer, attuned to the shared vulnerability of existence. The image, in turn, becomes a site of relational meaning, expressing not mastery over the world but participation within it.
Existential Presence and the Phenomenology of LightLight occupies a central position in both phenomenology and photography. For Merleau-Ponty, light is not a mere physical phenomenon but a medium of visibility - a manifestation of the world’s self-showing (Merleau-Ponty, 1968). He describes light as the way in which the visible emerges from the invisible, the means through which the world becomes perceptible.
In existential photography, light thus takes on an ontological dimension. It is not simply illumination but revelation - a sign of the world’s presence. The photographer’s engagement with light becomes an existential dialogue, an attempt to reveal the being of things as they appear through illumination. As Bachelard (1969) suggests, light in art symbolizes both revelation and the transcendence of being; in photography, it mediates the relation between presence and absence.
Merleau-Ponty’s notion of the visible as self-revealing through light transforms how existential photographers approach their medium. The image is not a copy of the world but an event of its appearance, made possible by light. Each photograph, therefore, becomes a moment in the world’s own process of self-expression. The photographer’s task is not to impose meaning but to allow the visible to show itself, to “let things be seen” (Heidegger, 1971).
This phenomenology of light contributes to the spiritual and contemplative dimensions of existential photography. Many photographers influenced by phenomenological thought - such as Paul Caponigro, Minor White, and more contemporary existential practitioners - use light as a metaphor for being, exploring the threshold between visibility and transcendence. Their work enacts Merleau-Ponty’s insight that perception is always a dialogue between visibility and depth, between the seen and the unseen.
Photography as an Act of BeingFrom a Merleau-Pontian perspective, photography can be understood not simply as a medium of representation but as a mode of existence - a way of inhabiting the world through vision. The act of photographing is an existential gesture, an affirmation of one’s participation in the visible. Each photograph is a manifestation of what Merleau-Ponty calls the “lived body’s intentional arc,” the dynamic structure through which the self extends into the world (Merleau-Ponty, 2012).
This view situates photography as an act of being rather than of seeing alone. It implies that the photographic image carries traces of the photographer’s existence, their bodily orientation, and their perceptual commitment to the world. In existential photography, the camera becomes a medium of self-expression that transcends self-reflection; it is a way of “being-toward-the-world.”
Moreover, this conception of photography resonates with Merleau-Ponty’s rejection of dualisms - between subject and object, self and world, consciousness and matter. The photographic act, like perception, is an intertwining. The photographer does not stand outside the scene but participates in its unfolding visibility. Each photograph thus becomes a trace of this participation, an echo of being’s visibility within the world’s flesh.
ConclusionThe impact of Maurice Merleau-Ponty on existential photography lies in his radical redefinition of perception, embodiment, and visibility. His phenomenology of the body, his ontology of the flesh, and his exploration of the visible and invisible have provided photographers and theorists with a framework for understanding the image not as representation but as revelation. Existential photography, influenced by Merleau-Ponty’s thought, becomes a practice of lived perception - a means of engaging with the world through the interwoven textures of body, light, and being.
Merleau-Ponty teaches that perception is not an act of detached vision but of participation, of belonging to the visible world. Photography, when grounded in this phenomenology, expresses not mastery over appearance but humility before existence. The image becomes a site where self and world encounter each other in the shared flesh of visibility.
Ultimately, Merleau-Ponty’s influence reveals that the existential dimension of photography lies not in what is photographed but in the act of seeing itself. To photograph is to inhabit perception, to affirm one’s being in relation to the visible, and to let the world’s light pass through one’s own vision. In this way, existential photography embodies the phenomenological truth that we are, first and foremost, beings who see - and are seen - within the luminous flesh of the world." (Source: ChatGPT 2025)
ReferencesBachelard, G. (1969). The poetics of reverie: Childhood, language, and the cosmos. Beacon Press.
Barthes, R. (1981). Camera lucida: Reflections on photography. Hill and Wang.
Berger, J. (1980). About looking. Pantheon.
Heidegger, M. (1971). Poetry, language, thought (A. Hofstadter, Trans.). Harper & Row.
Levinas, E. (1969). Totality and infinity: An essay on exteriority (A. Lingis, Trans.). Duquesne University Press.
Merleau-Ponty, M. (1968). The visible and the invisible (C. Lefort, Ed.; A. Lingis, Trans.). Northwestern University Press.
Merleau-Ponty, M. (2012). Phenomenology of perception (D. A. Landes, Trans.). Routledge. (Original work published 1945)
Sobchack, V. (2004). Carnal thoughts: Embodiment and moving image culture. University of California Press.
Walden, S. (2012). Seeing through the visible: Ethics and embodiment in Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy of perception. Continental Philosophy Review, 45(3), 367–385.
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