Abstract

How is digital stock photography contributing to the colonization of visual communication in urban Guatemalan spaces?

Keywords: Colonialism, stock photography, eurocentrism, representation, visual autoethnography, visual culture, ethnic representation, Guatemala, urban, global south, visual communication design, graphic design, decolonization, the West and the Rest.  

The consequences of colonialism in Latin America manifest in every aspect of the subcontinent, including its visual culture. More specifically, global capitalism, neoliberalism and postcolonialism have comfortably merged in urban Guatemalan spaces. Currently, the dogmatic relationship between western ideals and their visual omnipresence in cities, has created problematic and oppressive visual phenomena. Among these is the widespread use of digital stock photography in visual communication design. The invasion of western images fluctuating between digital stock photography and their manifestation in the corporeal Global South impulse the lack of representation of people of colour and impose whiteness as the visual standard. This research evaluates the historical, political, and social literature that builds the context in which western digital stock photography has exponentially propagated in Guatemala. Based on the theoretical evaluation it examines the consequences of this phenomenon through a critical lens by using visual autoethnography as a research methodology. The author analyses their own personal narratives experienced in Guatemala City with the aim of encouraging designers to be aware of the use of Eurocentric practices. Then, the narratives show in the context of the theoretical framework, that the massive use of stock photography inside Guatemalan urban spaces contributes to Eurocentric ideals through neoliberal systems, finding that stock photography is a tool for visual neocolonialism. Furthermore, it suggests terminology that helps describe the phenomenon in question, which can be potentially incorporated in the visual communication design jargon. In addition, it evaluates existing knowledge from a Global South perspective and creates new exemplifications and evaluations based on the life-long experiences of the author. Finally, the thesis and its reproductions–which include a website, a printed book, and its archival format–act as a protest through the acknowledgement and criticism of the phenomenon.