Wonder: surprise, marvel, astonishment, amazement, amazedness, wonderment, admiration, awe, bewilderment, stupefaction, fascination, thaumaturgy. – Description of ‘Wonder’ from Roget’s Thesaurus.

“I see trees are green, clouds are white, the bright blessed day, the dark sacred night… and I think to myself what a wonderful world.” – Louis Armstrong.

Wonder is not a tangible or substantial quality and neither is it a quantifiable or specific commodity. It is simply a promise, an offer of something more, something special that may be found within any aspect of our world. Without wonder there would be no reason to be. For the search to find amazement and awe in the world around us inspires us to do great things. This self perpetuating phenomenon will continue as long as we continue to exist, as the subjective nature of wonder declares perfection a possibility that is plausible, yet always just out of reach.

In part, it is this sense of wonder that entices us towards all art. It is our own notion of wonder that invites us into an image with promises of meaning and beauty and hidden depths beneath the aesthetic veneer. It is wonder that imparts art with its very ability to attract and interact with us – and the marriage of Fine Art ideas and the Photographic image, with its in-built sense of reality, give an image a great deal of this power.

The notion that the camera lens is looking directly at some notionally real, tangible and physical presence gives the resultant image an instantaneous stature for the simple reason that it is pictured from an implied truth. This truth has the power to astound, as our connection with the world around us is as limitless as the ways in which we can record it.

A single drop of milk on a plate hardly seems full of wonder in itself but when the moment of impact occurs and the now iconic, Milk Drop Coronet is captured by Harold E. Edgerton it becomes an object of awe; transforming something simple into a suggestively regal art piece to be admired. A captured moment of real-time – yet a moment that without the wonders of photography would otherwise be denied our considered gaze.

Joan Fontcuberta merges the natural and imagined world in similarly dynamic fashion, presenting his animal assemblages in the most convincing way, they read as if from the pages of the National Geographic. Logic tells us they are constructs. However, our need to be bewitched by the possibilities of this photographic alternate reality gives his ideas purchase on our imagination, fuelling our ability to be marvelled.

Just as the phrase “You could knock me down with a feather” seems to be a ludicrous statement, it conveys an idea, a notion that in the mind’s eye may be visualised as a genuine possibility. We enjoy these possibilities and photography finds innumerable ways in which to do just that: we may indulge the “what if” factor as much as we wish. The promise of Fine Art to astound is fulfilled, as the photograph offers the closest possible match in perception to our actual visual experience of the world through the lenses of our eyes.

In this manner, the photograph has aided dealing with the complex issues that surround us. The sheer accessibility of imagery recording every aspect of our world has helped us to develop a visual dialogue with photography, which is reinforced every day in the media. This instant language propagates our very need for it, not only on a communicative level but also on a level of trust that has superseded many genres with its availability to deliver a message quickly, providing a catalyst for judgement. Through advances in technology we can put a visual image to the very fabric of our universe – both on a micro and macrocosmic level.

Lennart Nilsons’ pictures of the foetus inside the womb are awesome examples of the advances in both science and photographic explorations of our very essence. With this power of belief in photography comes a great responsibility, as the potential to manipulate the viewer is increased. As an art form, photography has made leaps and bounds at a velocity unheard of in any other medium. As the magnitude of the available images grows, the thirst for “proof” does also. We are no longer satisfied with written descriptions alone. The quest to emulate beauty is constant and important, as we need to prove its worthiness.

The effects achievable with photography can duplicate the visual nuances of the eyes – and thus even our dreams – as reality and artifice converge to our delight through shadows, colours and light. Man Ray used glass tears, emulating the language between waking and sleeping. Wanda Wulz overlapped negatives to merge her own self-portrait with that of a cat. Logically, we can see both of these examples are tricks; yet with their roots in truth through being real subjects and objects placed in front of the camera, we are allowed to indulge in the visual sorcery of it.

Brushstrokes on canvas have a tactile quality, which serves to prolong the artist’s response to an image. Conversely, photographs are much more immediate – hence speeding up the process of judgement. Although they produce such a response, the very nature of this immediacy gives the onlooker time to reflect, explore and recall the picture presented afterwards. If directly compared to other media – such as painting – the subjective interpretation of the image is inverted, coming only with the presentation of the completed object. The primary duties of the art photographer lie in the process of editing and choosing the right image or sequence in the correct context, rather like the laying of specific tarot cards to elucidate or allude to the desired meaning. It is far easier to remember the details of something familiar than the specifics of the ethereal brushstroke. We are more likely to place the painted picture in a more spiritual context. Wonderment of technique and skill has a tendency to be overlooked in photography, whereas a painter’s ability to render our world, whether real or imagined, can be admired from a standpoint of distance rather than through a full understanding of the undertaking involved. The photograph is such a ubiquitous and utilitarian media that the appreciation of the photograph varies considerably when viewed in different contexts and situations. Regardless of this, the appreciation of a craft is not the same as the appreciation of art.

The proliferation of the professional photographer has heightened its status and gradually – despite initial resistance – the idea of photography as a Fine Art has become accepted throughout the globe. We are now able to travel the world in such a way that the details photographers choose to photograph can project the intimacies of people and places like never before. Beauty is now found in the most unlikely places, as the photographers gaze expands to include everything society has to offer, the subjective concerns being as valid as the aesthetic ones. Consider Andreas Gursky’s elevation of the concrete modernist landscape as epic focus of meditation, Andres Serrano’s beautification of the profane or even Nan Goldin’s brutal, yet intimate, portraits.

We do not just want to see the picturesque, we want to see and smell and taste the reality, no matter how unpleasant that reality may be. We want to be sensualists and indulge in the evocative associative realisation that photography allows.

The photograph has become a tool of exploration, a visual enigma for us to dissect not only the image but the photographer’s intention. Beyond the single image, we can be guided through a photographers’ fascination for his or her subject more fully through a collection of pictures, which instils our belief in the images presented and creates a sense of artistic identity.

As a human race, we are always striving to capture awe and beauty. We love to be amazed and it is even better to have such amazement at hand whenever we wish to appreciate it. Photography gives us this in abundance through books, magazines and newspapers, readily available at an affordable price for us to indulge more than ever before. Through advances in technology, the high standards of such reproductions allow its audience to compare and contrast work, but most importantly, increase its expectations, pushing the boundaries of creative observation further still.

The portrait, for example, has changed so radically that we neither need the subject to pose or even be recognisable in the frame. Conversely, the egalitarianism and instantly recognisable qualities of photography enable a much quicker and more willing suspension of disbelief in a viewer. The very fact that many people will more readily accept a photograph as a true representation of reality as opposed to other media such as painting, drawing and sculpture makes the potential alchemical power of a carefully selected image all the more intense. As any artist will tell you, the idea of an innate truth in any image – photography or otherwise – is a fallacy. This, however, is beside the point, as Art is viewed as one would view a magician performing a trick or illusion. Some people are more willingly fooled than others, but everybody wants to be fooled. Some people will more willingly accept beauty and wonder than others, but – fundamentally – everybody wants to believe in that beauty and wonder.

Deep down – although they may know that the conjurer is merely performing an elaborate sleight of hand – we all want to be fooled, as we all would like to believe in magic.