Heil Cancer

CCT357 Photography at the University of Toronto gave me the project of creating a provocative photograph.

An addiction is something that entraps an individual. To lure the individual, the addiction must look appealing and influential. Only then, can the person be controlled and manipulated by it. Using this psychoanalytical approach, the concept can be expanded to a larger ideology of representation.

Through Roland Barthes semiotics approach, cigarettes can be symbolized as an addiction that lures its victim to use it along with providing dire consequences. This idea of influence resonates with Dictatorship governments. The Nazi Party’s influential propaganda was inspirational to this very ideology. Both subjects symbolize influential control.

The photograph depicts a set of cigarettes aligned in rows, much like The Third Reich of Adolf Hitler’s army. The cigarettes are lit to entice and broadcast the luring power of the tobacco and nicotine that each cigarette offers. The Nazi Party was always portrayed to be enticing for its prestigious order and having youth join them.

Both representations are shown to be manipulative with their luring. The juxtaposition of the text “Heil, Cancer”, was inspired by the work of Adrian Piper. She uses text to reveal the hidden truth and real meaning of subjects. My take of the infamous “Heil Hitler” reminds the individual of the hidden truth behind the control, and the results of following through with the control. The Nazi’s follow the infamous command of Hitler, while smoking follows the command of receiving cancer. The individual is succumbed to this idea and made a prisoner.