Look At Me
I know that some of you out there enjoy found photos. Some of you out there enjoy being peed on, probably, but I think that more of you enjoy found photos. You never can fully realize your target audience on the internet though. Sorry to all of you urolagniacs out there.
The appeal of found photos is twofold:
1) It’s a good photo (most of the time)
2) The complete dissociation from the subject of the photo leaves you wide open to imagine any kind of backstory you want.
And that’s the best part in my opinion. You have this photo that you know nothing about except what you can directly see from its contents. Everything else about the picture is all assumption. I love anything where a greater percentage of it’s existence is completely imaginary (cartoons, religion, sex etc.).
I have a photo of a young black girl in a band uniform framed on my door. Why? Because I like the picture, but also because she could be anyone. I could walk past her on the street and not recognize her because of the time between the photo and the present day. She could be dead. She could be completely happy. She could be both. There’s no limit to the possibilities. A picture is worth 1000 words, but imagination is infinite.
The Modern Association understands all of this and has created a site dedicated to a collection of found photos called Look At Me that is constantly expanding. Anyone can volunteer a found photo for their collection. Of course they aren’t the only ones who have joined the found photo bandwagon. Here are some worthwhile links for you to scope on the found photo tip:
Look At Me
10eastern
And of course the progenitor of them all Found magazine which encompasses photos, letters, notes, and anything else that people have put their stamp on and then promptly lost.