SOME OF THE NAMES OF PHOTOSHOP
2009
poster, inkjet print on paper, 464 × 91 cm, exhibition view Passagegalerie Künstlerhaus
SOME OF THE NAMES OF PHOTOSHOP is the blow up of a screen shot that has been transferred to print. It shows the 41 names that appear for seconds on the computer screen each time the image processing program Photoshop starts. The names in hierarchical and not alphabetical order — from Thomas Knoll, the “inventor” of Photoshop, to Kevin Connor, Director of Product Management at Adobe Systems — represent the basis for today’s digital editing of photography and images.
The names refer to the people co-determining the flood of images surrounding us: Either because they program applications for digital image processing that are subsequently used in commercial photography and fine arts alike. Or because they are working to establish the file formats and programs developed by Adobe as international standard. Furthermore the display of the names of the leading managers and programmers of Photoshop (CS2, version 9.0) can be read as a request to perceive the economic and political impact of their monopoly in the field.