Introduction-Urban image now: Photographic and filmic manifestations of a subjective city experience

This special issue of Visual Resources investigates the forms and outcomes of contemporary artists' dialogues with the city. While photographers have historically approached the city from both a documentary and journalistic perspective, the photographers presented here tackle the subject as conceptual endeavor, often blurring the line between photography and film, the documentary photograph and fine art print, and the historical account and instantaneous description. Which routes do artists take to depict the city and how have they shifted in recent years? What are the languages employed to capture individual and, at times, highly subjective views of the city? How do the uses of analog and digital media, of still image, video, and film, respectively, influence the assessment and construction of urban space? The authors in this special issue ask these questions highlighting the subjective angle of the photographer, while he or she uses a medium, which, despite the recognition of its postdocumentary loss of the claim for truth, still triggers expectation of objectivity and veracity. It is this tension between the attribution of photography, as subjective and objective medium respectively, and the blurring of these categories that constitutes the core concern of this special issue.