Doug Hall
«Neighborhood Watch»

Neighborhood Watch – the title of Hall’s work, addresses the voluntary installation of surveillance systems, today a common practice in affluent neighborhoods of the USA, but not only there. Perhaps understandably installed to deter crime, they run the risk of quickly adopting quasi-totalitarian traits. In that respect, the installation of video surveillance systems in lower middle-class districts plays an important role as well. The indicated shift from a photo-archive of offenders (the Bertillon model) to the video surveillance of the entire «potentially criminalized» open area for living seems to function like a backdrop for Hall’s work. And the potential to «totally criminalize» is only heightened through the digitalization of data streams. Doug Hall himself writes: «Until recently, someone captured by accident on film was simply an image. But with the introduction of computer-supported image processing, the further reduction of the image information composed of pixels transforms the image to a pure supply of data. This makes it more abstract and easier to shape than in that frozen state of emulsion responsible for making the resemblance materialize on the surface of photographic film. That the collective data is easier to shape expands the possibilities for using or maliciously abusing them.» (in: Hubertus von Amelunxen; Stefan Iglhaut; Florian Rötzer (ed.), Fotografie nach der Fotografie, Dresden a.o., 1996, pp. 197/198).